SC - payn ragoun

[Philip & Susan Troy]

LYN M PARKINSON wrote:
> 
> Cairistiona,
> 
> I, too, originally thought of 'brawn' as the equivalent of head cheese,
> but checking the glossary in Curye on Inglish gave me the right info,
> except that I read 'brawn' as 'meat', which it occasionally is, but most
> often is 'pork meat'.  I'm learning, the hard way, that what I think I
> learned all those years ago in grad school old and middle English 'ain't
> necessarily so'.

Usage pretty much depends on the individual case. It always is a
reference, even if indirect, to meat of some kind, I'd say, but if you
actually look at a recipe for brawn, most of which seem to occur in
later period, I'd say the nearest equivalent for modern cooks would be
more of a galantine than head cheese, for the reasons you mention. A
modern galantine (different from the various period dishes by that name
but having in common with some of them the presence of jelly) is usually
a rolled, pressed piece of boiled meat, usually attractively stuffed,
and sometimes but not always brined before cooking, then coated with
aspic. Late period brawn recipes generally seem to refer to a small
whole pig, boned out, rolled into a "collar", tied up, brined, and
cooked with the skin on or perhaps enough feet or bones to make the
cooking liquid gel when cooled.

At some post-period point this became fused with / replaced by head
cheese, which really is more like some period galantines, some of which
are actually referred to by etymological cousins of the modern German
term "suelze"...

Yeah, everything you never wanted to know... .
 
> Taffy is very chewy--can pull your fillings loose.  It isn't soft.

More or less. It suffers from metal fatigue, in a way. Most taffies
should be hard enough to break cleanly when flexed quickly or snapped,
but will bend if flexed slowly, if you know what I mean. Its crystal
structure, or the lack thereof, is derived from the same stretching of
the hot sugar you see in some period recipes. Gen-yoo-wine Atlantic City
Salt Water Taffy seems to be a bit softer than other varieties, but also
usually comes wrapped individually in small pieces, so flexing is a
problem anyway.
  
Adamantius (I didn't _think_ it was too early in the morning for this
stuff, but I may have been wrong)
- -- 
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com
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