SC - kitchen commandments

[L Herr-Gelatt and J R Gelatt]

>At 6:18 PM -0500 2/2/98, Deborah J Hammons wrote:
>>This past weekend at an archery event, the Archer General of the Outlands
>>and I were lamenting the state of our health, and musing what would be a
>>period remedy. Chamomile mead was mentioned. Probably a better question
>>for the brewers list, but did anyone make mead out of Chamomile?  Is is
>>possible to make mead out of chamomile?
>>
>>Aldyth
>
>As someone else said, I am sure it is possible--other herbs get used in
>mead.  The place to look for this would be _The Closet of Sir Kenelm Digby
>Opened_; 17th century, but it is the earliest collection of a lot of mead
>recipes I know of.  He has pages and pages of mead and related recipes,
>with a variety of spices and herbs used to flavor; I don't offhand remember
>chamomile, but I don't know the book that well.  It is included in
>Cariadoc's cookbook collection vol. 1.
>
>Elizabeth/Betty Cook
>

Hello!  I have included all of Digby's mead recipes in my book "A Sip
Through Time".  His collection of mead recipes does not use chamomile.  In
fact, none of the mead/hydromel/metheglin recipes I have uses it.  The only
recipe I have (out of 400 recipes!), that does is from Sir Hugh Plat's
Delights for Ladies, 1609:

8. D. STEUENS  AQUA COMPOSITA - 1609
Take a gallon of Gascoin wine of Ginger, Galingale, Cinamon, Nutmegs and
graines, Anniseeds, Fennell seeds, and Carroway seeds, of each a dram; of
Sage, Mints, red Roses, Thyme, Pellitory, Rosmary, wild Thyme, Camomil,
Lauender, of each a handfull:  bray the spices small, and bruise the herbs,
letting them macerate 12 houres, stirring it now & then, then distil by a
Limbecke of pewter, keeping the first cleare water that commeth, by it
selfe, and so likewise the second.  You shall draw much about a pint of the
better sort from euery gallon of wine.

"The recipe for Doctor Steven's Cordial Water, or Aqua composita, was very
popular and was reprinted many times with many variations.  Aqua composita
was originally intended to be a health tonic - most of the medicinal herbs
and seeds are, or have been, used as digestive aids...

*Chamomile.	Anthemis nobilis L.,  Compositae, (Britton & Brown, v3: p517).
		Garden Camomile, Maythen, Manzanilla.
Chamomile has long been used in folk medicine as an aid to digestion, and
to cure colds, fevers, worms and diarrhea; it is also an emetic.  "The
flowers boiled in posset-drink provoke sweat, and help to expel all colds,
aches and pains, and promotes women's courses.  Syrup made of the juice of
camomile, with the flowers in white wine, is a remedy against jaundice and
dropsyŠ"(Culpeper, p. 70)  It is an aromatic plant with a faint apple
scent, used to flavor some sherries."  (Excerpted from "A Sip Through
Time", copyright 1995, Cindy Renfrow.)

HTH,

Cindy/Sincgiefu
renfrow at skylands.net


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