SC - Anthro and cooking

[cclark at vicon.net]

>Tollhase1 at aol.com wrote:
>How similar and different are Chinese noodles, and Italian pasta which
>developed from it? Any other examples of similar medieval foods
>developing regional variation? Seems like Great Britain vs. the
>Continent would provide several examples.

I wouldn't care to speculate about the noodles, especially since I know of
no historical connection between Chinese noodles and Italian pasta. When
someone finds Christopher Columbus' new proof (written by his own hand) that
the Earth is round, and Robin Hood's pardon bearing the seal of King Richard
I, I'll consider believing the old story that Marco Polo introduced noodles
to Italy. But this is turning into "folklore and cooking." :-/

There are some spinach recipes that might be worth looking into. Al-Baghdadi
(1226) has a recipe for fried spinach (isfanakh mutajjan), which is
parboiled in salted water, dried, fried in refined sesame oil, and seasoned
with garlic, cumin and coriander seed, and cinnamon. The Forme of Cury
(English, about 1390) has a recipe for fried spinach (spynoches yfryed),
which is parboiled, dried (by pressing, not just draining), fried in oil
(type not specified; I would guess maybe olive or walnut), and seasoned with
sweet powder (a spice mix that may have been similar to pumpkin-pie-spice or
pudding-spice mixes). According to one contemporary English food writer, all
fried foods were sugared before serving - that might apply to this recipe.

The main difference between the two recipes is that in the English recipe
the seasoning is the same sweet powder that is used for many other English
vegetable dishes. I would guess that as spinach was transported northwards
to England, the recipe came with it. When the English cooks first
encountered spinach, they might have asked "How do you cook it?" and someone
told them. And from there they just adapted it to their local style. Later
English cookbooks have various other spinach recipes, such as sweet and sour
boiled spinach with currants.

Alex Clark/Henry of Maldon

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