SC - Food Preservation

[THLRenata at aol.com]

Morgan asks:

>>Third, I really wanted to pickle some mushrooms just because they are my
favorite :)  I can't find a late period English source for it, however.
Does anyone out there have a period source for pickled 'shrooms?
I would be eternally grateful :)<<

Here's one from Lady Elinor Fettiplace's Receipt book. I've made this as
marinaded mushrooms, but the recipe works for pickled as well. Watch the
amount of ginger! The first time I made this I did not know how thick a 1 inch
pice of ginger root should be (come to think of it, I still don't) and the
recipe came out VERY gingery. I took it to a tourney where it was sampled by
everyone who came into our pavilion. The comment was unanimous "Hmmm,
interesting." 

Have fun with it!

Renata (who no longer allows her culinary creations to be called
"interesting"!)

To Pickle Mushrooms

Take your Buttons, clean ym with a sponge & put ym in cold water as you clean
ym, then put ym dry in a stewpan & shake a handful of salt over ym, yn stew ym
in their own liquor till they are a little tender; then strain ym from ye
liquor & put ym upon a cloath to dry till they are quite cold. Make your
Pickle before you do your mushrooms, yt may be quite cold before you put ym
in. The Pickle must be made with White-Wine, White-Pepper, quarter's Nutmeg, a
Blade of Mace & a Race of ginger.

Hilary Spurling redacts this recipe as follows:

Make the pickling liquor first. For every 1 lb. mushrooms you will need about
1/3 pint of white wine, 6 white peppercorns, half a nutmeg, a blade of mace
and a 1 inch piece of fresh ginger root, peeled and sliced. Put all
ingredients into a small saucepan and simmer, covered, for 10 minutes. Add a
few spoonfuls of water if the liquid shows signs of evaporating. leave to
cool.

Wipe the mushrooms clean. Put them, whole, into a thick-bottomed saucepan with
a heaping teaspoon of slat, and heat them gently, shaking and stirring with a
wooden spoon from time to time, especially in the begining before the juices
begin to flow. Keep the lid on between stirs. The mushrooms will plump up,
squeaking, then sweat lightly and finally stew in their own juice. Cook until
tender, about 10 minutes. The mushrooms will start to reabsorb their juices.
Let them cool completely if pickling -- if marinading them for immediate
comsumption, pour the pickling liquid on them while they are hot. Let cool
before eating.

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