sca-cooks Transport of Foodstuffs

[Judy Gerjuoy]

On Thu, 10 Apr 1997, Beth Morris wrote:
<snip>
> Should we be attempting to cook feasts that are *typical* of medieval
> feasts (or at least as typical of medieval foodstuffs as we have access
> to them today - I don't get to cook with swan, heron, etc very
> often...)?
> 
> Or should we stretch and strain to include modern foods because it is
> possible that somewhere in Western Europe, or countries contacted by
> Western Europe, somebody may have once tried to eat this thing?
> 
> I had a discussion recently with a gentleman who was telling me about a
> feast that involved a chocolate gateau and amaretto ice and various
> other things, and I frankly cringed.  He claimed to have "documentation"
> for several other foods that I do not believe were commonly eaten in
> period and that he has served in feasts.
> Now, in all the cookbooks I've been through (and I've been through a
> *lot*) and in all the supply orders & household records, I don't recall
> seeing major orders for chocolate.  Sorry.  Or potatoes.  Or corn.  Or
> half a dozen other things that I've had people tell me are period
> because one person somewhere might have nibbled on one.  So are we
> trying to cook 'typical' things of the period, or scrounge documentation
> for oddities?

Well, I think we are trying to cook, whenever possible, 'typical'food of
the period.

I see no purpose to stretch and strain to document chocolate, or corn, or
potatoes, etc.,just because it *might* have been used somewhere in some
way or another.

Now, if we find extant period recipes involving these ingrediants, and use
them in the way they were used in period, that is another matter.

but, to say that because there is a mention of white potatoes somewhere we
can serve potatoe salad at feasts, no.

Jaelle


jaelle at access.digex.net
If the world were merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely 
challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning torn 
between a desire to improve the world, and a desire to enjoy the world. 
This makes it hard to plan the day. - E. B. White