SC - CONCERNING POTAGES

[Christine A Seelye-King]

> Digby, CONCERNING POTAGES
> 
> ...half an hour before dinner, take light bread well dryed from all
> moisture before the fire; then cut in slices, laid in a dish over
> coals, pour upon it a ladleful of broath, no more than the bread can
> presently drink up; which when it hath done, put on a nother 
> ladleful,
> and stew that, till it be drunk up; repeat this three or four times, 
> a
> good quarter of an hour in all, till the bread is swelled like a 
> gelly
> (if it be too long, it will grow glewy and stick to the dish) and
> strong of broth; then fill it up near full with the same strong 
> broth.
> 
> Vika
> mmm, glewy gelly

	So, if I'm reading this right, it is saying to put the toasted (dry)
bread in a pan over the coals, and stew it with each ladelful of broth,
so that it swells up but does not get gummy , which is avoided by
carefully timing the stewing in-between each ladelful.  And then, you
fill the pot up with broth, I am assuming to float or at least cover the
now-sopped sop.  
	This is the first time I can recall seeing sops actually stewed.  I have
seen 'serve on dry bread' and 'thicken with hunks  of bread (or
breadcrumbs)',  but this seems to be something quite different.  And, as
the title is Concerning Potages, are we to assume that the sop then is
the main body of the dish, as would be in potages of other grains or
meat?  
	Curiouser and curiouser,
	Christianna
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