SC - The Dom and the Rock

[LrdRas@aol.com]

hi all from Anne-Marie

there is some discussion on why we dont have brewing books, but we
have some cookbooks.

a couple ideas on that:
- --dont forget that in the middle ages, guilds controlled strictly which
professionals could do what. Very goofy furniture got made because
the turners couldnt join, and vice versa. Bread was made by bakers (as
a general rule), brewing was done by brewers (again, as a general
rule), and cooking was done by les cuisiniers. Never the twain shall
meet, according to the rules.
- --who wrote the cookbooks? we have one from an ennobled cook
(Taillevent). we have one from a rather stuffy head cook to an
illustrious duke (Chiquart). we have written by an uppity middle class
guy in a major city (le Menagier). we have a bunch written by some
unknown English people, but if the pattern holds true, they werent
written by Mistress Goodwife, but rather by the head cooks of
illustrious households. These people would likely, in my opnion, have
followed the guild rules.
- --we dont have any brewing recipes, and very few bread recipes (and
those only as a byblow of another recipe, like Rastons), in my logic
train, because the folks who wrote the cookbooks didnt make bread.
Not until much later (May, Markham et al), when books were written for
"the Gud Huswife", who was expected to do it all.

There may have indeed been some books written by brewers and
bakers, and we havent found them, or like the dyers, they didnt tend to
write stuff down in an attempt to immortalize their own efforts (a class
difference? ie cooks tended to be more self promoting than other
trades? dunno.)

In any case, my spin on it is that as la cuisinier for a noble household,
it would be innappropriate for me to make my own bread or brew. I
would either have a crew trained in that, or else just like today, order
my bread, beer and wine from a reputable baker or brewer/vintner in
town. I figure this because in the shopping lists we have from the
medieval period (Chiquart, etc), he specifies how many casks of wine
you need from the distributor, not from his own cellar. Ditto the bread.
We know that there were large oven buildings in big castles (they're still
there), but Chiquart didnt bake. Maestro Baker did.(and likely baked the
pies and tarts too...according to the instructions that say "to take your
pie to the oven and bake with the bread")

I would be hesitant to blame everything on the Church, and more likely to
blame it on the universal need of people to protect their job security!

- --AM
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And the division of labor idea that abounded for a good while.  Maybe
the scribners/illuminators would froown on commoners writing the
books?

Literacy of the upper class people you mention may also have impacted
in your theories.......peasnats didn't have much time/need for reading
and writing to do their tasks.  They may have had the reading skills to
prepare wort/must for fermenting, but the skills needed for writing are
greater and require more practice.  A luxury for the higher classes and
guild masters, not the jouneymen and apprentices.  Then the expense of
wriing materials enters in until the advent of papers........

I'm willing to bet there were 'professional texts' written on brewing that
were restricted to membership of the guilds.  Lost in antiquity and
wating for Geraldo Rivera to discover the secret libraries.

niccolo difrancesco
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