SC -Cookery changes

[Philip & Susan Troy]

LYN M PARKINSON wrote:
> 
> >>Even theat is not as radical a jump as you claim it to be. The
> disapperance of
> galingal, cubebs and grains of paradise was abrupt and there is little or
> no
> evidence that shows their use was gradually withdrawn over the span you
> mention. <<
> 
> That is something I've been pondering, lately.  Why should the 17th C.
> eliminate so much spicing, and some of the favorites up until that time?
> Sure the Turks and Mongols were doing some erratic things to old trade
> routes, but the Dutch East Indian Company and the Hanse and the English
> were making more and more trips via ship into the very waters that
> produced the spices.  There's information I'm missing, here.

One possible explanation is that these spices, having become somewhat
easier to come by, probably lost some of their exotic charm. 

Another factor is that the medicinal value of some spices was being
re-evaluated in the 17th century: Galen was no longer (or to a lesser
extent) the One True Icon God of Physicke, and people like Harvey were
beginning to experiment and learn how the circulatory system works, for
example. 
> 
> It doesn't surprise me that more reliance was being put on a wider
> variety of local produce, since agriculture, via Tusser and Gerard and
> others, seems to be making some leaps and bounds in developing better and
> better vegetables and fruits.  There are also the New World varieties
> being imported, developed and used.  I expect cookery to expand, but why
> the areas of contraction?

Probably because there is a limit to the number of products an economy
can support -- a very theoretical number, perhaps, but a genuinely
legitimate concept, I'd say. Spending money in the market for red kidney
beans grown from seeds imported from the New World means less money for galingale...

Adamantius
Østgardr, East
- -- 
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com
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