SC - Elizabethan buffet (long)

[Ceridwen]

>

His Grace wrote:

> 1. The objective is to to produce something as close as possible to what a
> period cook would have produced. From that standpoint, the more information
> you have about the dish, the better--because more information allows you to
> narrow down the set of possible ways the dish might have been made, making
> it more likely that what you are making is what they made. That applies  to
> using the information contained (for the first recipe) in the title of the
> dish and the first version of how to cook it, and it also applies to the
> information on the meat/suet ratio contained in one of the two variants of
> the Digby recipe.
>

    Now my question is this: if a dish is mentioned twice in any given manuscript,
and if the descriptions are similar enough to infer that it is indeed the same
dish, it is therefore wise to use both references to produce one's recipe, correct?
(providing there are no explanations for the differences i.e. meat vs. fish day
versions, or the advice to thicken with egg yolks for a lord and with bread for
others)    How about comparing recipes for the same (apparent) dish from two
different sources that are approximately within the same time frame? I am thinking
about things like Curye on Inglishe, being a compilation of manuscripts of the
approximately same time; or for example two different but corresponding Elizabethan
cookbooks?
    Where does this stop being the right way to get as much information as possible
for a given recipe and where does it become investigating the
chronological/regional history of a particular dish and the distinct differences
thereof?
    When we do this , we are looking at several possibilities. One being the
occurrence of scribal errors, the second being the "whim" of the cook or his/her
employer, and third; the same variations we see here on this list as to recipes
for, oh, potato soup as an example. We tend to make things the way we like them, or
the way we were taught.  One can currently look in 10 different cookbooks for the
same  thing and find 10 different recipes, varying in quantity, spicing, and
preparation instructions, but in the long run, they are all indeed the same dish.
Can we safely  assume that these variables also existed in the MA ?

Curiouser and curiouser,

Ceridwen

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