HERB - cordials

[Kathleen H. Keeler]

>Hello All,
>
>Well, after years of using herbs for a multitude of things I have
>decided to try and document some of the things I've been doing.  I
>wonder if anyone here can help?
>
>I'm making cordials/liquers.  Does anyone know if rose petals would have
>been used in the middle ages to make a cordial? by whom? for what use?
>I have a lovely rose petal cordial with a competitve spirit but I don't
>know if it is actually period.
>
>I'm going now to try and locate the brewers' list and maybe ask them but
>I've been with you folks a long time so I thought I'd ask you first.
>
>Thank you,
>Ginger
>dragon at lemoorenet.com

Hi Ginger
 The way I'd tell it, adding herbs to alcohols is a medicinal approach
going back well prePeriod (there are recipes for e.g. thyme wine in
Dioscorides' Herbal, AD 64).
  The distillation of alcohol to make something stronger than wine occurred
about 1200, becoming widespread in northern Europe shortly thereafter.  Of
course the first goal was medical.  Brandies are even better than wines at
killing germs.  (They didn't distinguish the external and internal person
as we do: for say, an upset stomach, you could rub it on you stomach or
drink it.)

   So all our lovely tasting liquers, so carefully made in monasteries,
began as medicines (or so they told the prior).  Since roses are a potent
herb -- as rose petals, rose water, oil of roses, rose hips -- yes there
should be no problem with a rose cordial (you might check Grieve or
Culpeper or Gerard to see what they say about roses).

   I'd bet that every plant known to Europeans was put into liqueur's
during the era of experimenting with distillation.

   This isn't sufficient documentation for a brewing entry, tho--brewers
will have to give you that.

	The story of brandy reads like cocaine at the end of last century.
It worked medicinally, but at first they didn't know it had an addictive
effect.  So they overused it before they figured out it had to be handled
with restraint. The Book of Quintessence (I found it in the library at U
Calif. Berkeley) promotes the quintessence (5x distilled spirits) to cure
everything from impotence to old age.  And puts a wide variety of things
into them--e.g. pearls, gold (hence the modern liqueur goldwasser),
herbs...Its from middle period, about 14th C I think.

Agnes
kkeeler1 at unl.edu


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