Some food historians conclude that recipes compiled by an ancient Roman named Apicius are a reliable indicator of how...

shunhe on June 14, 2020

Hi @Maria-Marin,

Thanks for the question! So let’s take a look at what the stimulus is saying. It tells us that some food historians think that recipes from this one dude Apicius reliably indicate how rich Romans prepared and spiced their food. But the stimulus concludes that this is far too hasty, since few other recipes have survived, and this dude might just have done things in a weird way, like some notable modern chefs today. It’d be like concluding how Americans ate from watching a YouTube video of a famous vegan chef or something.

Now we want to know how the argument works. (A) tells us that the argument rejects a view held by the food historians solely because there is insufficient evidence to support it. The word “solely” should cause us to be wary of this answer choice, since that’s a tall order. Is insufficient evidence really the only reason to reject the view? Well, no, because the author also appeals to an analogy to modern times with modern chefs. So (A) is too strongly worded to be the correct answer.

(C), on the other hand, tells us that the author provides a modern analogue that purportedly undercuts the historians’ view, and this is what the author does in the last sentence of the paragraph.

Hope this helps! Feel free to ask any other questions that you might have.