SC - meat days and fast days - MIXED?

[Stapleton, Jeanne]

General comment:  Elaina, get out of my mind.  :-)

Elaina answered Page:

On Wed, 28 Oct 1998, Page Huchinson wrote:

> I see your point, however being that I am not born of that time, I do
not believe
> that ALL the dishes or feast included meat.  Does not history suggest
that it is
> possible for non meat dishes?  Especially for those folks who are
poorer then dirt.
> would not there consumption of dinner be maybe broth and bread.  So in
that case
> there would be no meat?
> 
> Page

People who had meat, ate meat.  Certainly many people at many times did
not have meat - especially poorer to middle class people and especially
at
certain times of the year.  But when we recreate feasts, we recreate
feast
foods.  No one would hold a feast and then serve poor fare.

B:	I was on the verge of composing a response startlingly similar
to
	Elaina's.  Yes, Page, you're right, certain classes of people
did not
	eat meat often.  maybe a few times a year if they were lucky.
	However, as Elaina notes here and I wrote a few days ago, nobles
who
	could get meat ate it.  It was as much about privilege as about
	availability and "tastes".  The religious observances are also
clearly
	reflected in dining, but few people are willing to even pretend
that
	they observe those fast and feast days, even if it's in their
persona.
	
	Further, the people who were so poor that they didn't eat meat
because
	they couldn't afford or keep were generally not of an educated
class,
	so i'm not aware of any "365 Ways With Barley" types of
cookbooks out
	there.

At all times, some people did not eat meat for religious reasons.  For
example, someone doing penance, members of certain religious orders,
some
people on pilgrimage, people under some type of vow of abstinance.  And 
at some times, practically no one ate meat - again for religious
reasons.
For example, during Lent, during Advent, on Fridays (and/or Wednesdays
and/or Saturdays).  We have lots of recipes for how to hold a feast
during
Lent (or on some other fast day) but all of them involve large amounts
of
fish -not- a substitution of vegetable dishes for meat dishes.  Having
served fish at a couple of SCA feasts, I'm not about to make that
mistake
again.

	The Halibut Berengaria I made at your house is the *only* thing
I
	have served regularly with any luck at an SCA feast.  And that's
	not a true fast day dish because of butter and sour cream and
various
	other things.  Salmon also went over well in Oertha, but that's
a
	really rarified clime in terms of what's available and what's
not.

	Another thing aobut Lenten feasts is that people have tried
serving
	various pickled and preserved things that would've been offered
then,
	and then had to live with complaints in their group ever
afterwards
	about 'serving everything soaked in vinegar".

In period, what would a penitent or a religious do if seated at table
during a feast?  Eat of those dishes that were offered that seemed most
likely to meet his special needs.  -NOT- ask that special dishes be
prepared to meet those needs.  That is exactly the -opposite- of the
whole
idea of fasting.  To fast, you -give- -up- certain things.  You don't
ask
others not to eat them.  You don't make something else as a substitute.
you look at the things you cannot have, consider their goodness, then
pass
them by.  And yes, this means that sometimes the person who was fasting
might each nothing but bread and ale (both pretty nourishing).

But the point I'm trying to make was that not eating meat in medieval
and
Renaissance Europe was a matter of religious choice or obligation.
Unless
abstaining for a particular reason, those who had meat, ate meat.  Even
the lower classes would use meat or broth, if available, to flavor their
porridge.  If nothing was available but grain, then they ate that as
bread
or porridge.  When other foods became available, they were added in.  

This idea of not eating meat for dietary or moral purposes, or of
wanting
to each 'balanced meals' that include different food groups is simply
not
relevant to period dining.  That said, I still make a point to have a
number of non-meat dishes at any feast I serve.  However, I draw the
line
at deliberately serving vegan fare.

	Hear, hear--this was the comment that made me say "Get out of my
	mind".  The Food Pyramid didn't exist in the Middle Ages!  The
	idea of being a vegetarian as we know it did not exist, but the
	ideas of abstinence and poverty did.  It's only now that people
	bring in the idea of getting a menu to choose from with
them--once
	again, not the notion that they're eating what is essentially an
	ethnic cuisine.  A note, living in Caer Galen, Land of Many
	Vegetarians:  I do try to make sure that there are dishes that
	don't happen to include meat in them.  In general, "vegan" means
	no animal products of any kind--they'll ask you about the
background
	of spray coatings you may use on frying pans searching for
animal
	products.  "Vegetarian" has various iterations; I understand
"vegetarian"
	to mean "will include lacto-ovo products".  Some of my modified
	vegetarian friends say they just don't want to eat anything with
a
	face, so they're okay with some shellfish.  I generally can't
accommodate
	vegans--for one thing, there's no guaranteeing that directing
one of
	my friendly assistants "grease those pans" means that they'll
grab the
	right kind of coating.  I can't keep track of it, so I don't
try.

	Leave bacon out of two pies and put a smiley face in onions on
top?
	Sure, I can do that, gleefully.  :-)

	But structure an entire feast to make sure there's a vegetsrian
entree
	track running all the way through it?  Unh-uh.

Berengaria
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