SC - Pea soup humor - a true (but long) SCA story

[THLRenata@aol.com]

Ok, here it goes, I am in my armor for when you cast stones.....

IMHO,

I believe the chipped beef on toast pre dates medieval times....

I believe that people have been putting things on bread and toast and putting the heel
of the bread in soup/stew since the day after bread was invented.

I have read  in more than one cookbook and history of food book that "bread was the
staff of life and everything else was just something to go with bread".

I have read that it was considered rude to eat your trencher at the big fancy feasts.
So, some people must have eaten them for it to be talked about.    The beggars ate the
trenchers.  And some people did eat them the next day dipped in wine.  Why would you
not eat the lovely bit of bread that just soaked up the juices of your meat?  My guess?
Because you needed to save room of the more expensive treats to come, and to prove you
had enough to eat without eating your trencher. (status symbol)  I believe the medieval
surfs and beggars and working classes would have all eaten their trenchers without a
second thought.

So, I think that not eating the bread under your food is an aberration, not the norm,
in the long history of food.   I will go a step farther to say, I even think that it is
an aberration for the medieval times as well,  because more people than not, would have
been to poor to throw away that bread.

                                                    I am ready for your slings and
arrows.

                                                                    Helen

>
>
> In Britain we have a habit of putting all manner of things "on toast" that
> Americans might think odd. (e.g. (canned) spaghetti on toast, scrambled egg on
> toast, baked beans on toast, sardines on toast, cheese on toast (not so odd?)) -
> you can even buy "toast toppers" in the supermarket - "chicken", "ham" etc.
> I'm wondering if this came from the trencher tradition?
>
> Any ideas?
>
> Elysant
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