SC - meat pies (of a sort)

[david friedman]

At 3:29 PM -0500 12/15/97, Karen Lyons-McGann wrote:

>To a newcomer like me,  the question begs to be reversed.  Why isn't it
>appropriate to post a general can this be documented type question?

A "can this be documented" question, at least in the context I was
discussing (and objecting to), means that you have a recipe from some
non-medieval source and want to know if there is evidence that it is
period. That seems to me to have two problems.

1. It leads people in the direction of doing modern cooking and trying to
find evidence that the modern recipe could conceivably have been done in
period. At the very best, that means doing those period recipes that are
most like modern recipes, hence have the least to tell us about how
medieval cooking differed from modern cooking. At the worst--which, in my
experience of the SCA, is the norm--it means doing modern cooking with a
thin gloss of medieval excuses--the "they could have" sort of documentation.

2. It is a backwards approach, and as a result a very inefficient way of
approaching medieval cooking. You already have a recipe, so the only
remaining thing is finding, somewhere in the enormous corpus of surviving
medieval recipes, something similar. Surely it makes more sense to start by
looking at the medieval recipes, pick the first one that looks interesting,
and try it.

None of this applies to questions about whether particular techniques, or
ingredients, or whatever were used in period--only to the sort of question
which starts with an existing recipe not known to be period.

>Is
>SCA-Cooks a place to post completed research only?

Certainly not.

>Is it a place only
>for those with access to more direct sources to post their
>pronouncements?

No--but since primary sources are readily available, I am not sure what it
means to be without access to them. If you are trying to do medieval
cooking without any medieval cookbooks, surely the first question to ask is
where to acquire medieval cookbooks.

>I'd hoped for a place for those without the skills or
>resources for more scholarly research to post a question in hopes of
>answers ranging from minimal advice to complete documentation.  Of course
>you shouldn't ask for assistance in documenting nacho dip, but a request
>for assistance with a recipe that consists of appropriate ingredients
>doesn't seem like it should be off limits.

I don't think it is off limits. My post was explaining why my reaction to a
question of that sort is a negative one--obviously other people may feel
differently.

David/Cariadoc
http://www.best.com/~ddfr/


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