I’m going to suggest food items that we still take from nature and eat with minimal preparation:
Honey
Fish like salmon, trout, grouper
Shellfish (eg oysters)
We have evidence of shellfish and fish being eaten for a very long time - at least the middle stone age at 140kya - in middens which are 10s of thousands of years old.
Honey is likely to have been a food source - a treat even - even before humans left Africa (so before 100kya) but sadly this would be invisible in the archeological record
I was going to say oatmeal, but honey is actually a better answer, since it predates even agriculture as a major food.
If you live somewhere with fresh seafood that’s also a great answer. I wonder if grocery stores somewhere sell fresh insects, although that wouldn’t be the West as per OP.
I’m going to suggest food items that we still take from nature and eat with minimal preparation:
We have evidence of shellfish and fish being eaten for a very long time - at least the middle stone age at 140kya - in middens which are 10s of thousands of years old.
Honey is likely to have been a food source - a treat even - even before humans left Africa (so before 100kya) but sadly this would be invisible in the archeological record
I was going to say oatmeal, but honey is actually a better answer, since it predates even agriculture as a major food.
If you live somewhere with fresh seafood that’s also a great answer. I wonder if grocery stores somewhere sell fresh insects, although that wouldn’t be the West as per OP.