SC - Perforated or covered vessel?

[Philip & Susan Troy]

LYN M PARKINSON wrote:
> 
> Hi List,
> 
> Forme of Cury, #39, is for Blank dessore.  Take almaundes blaunched;
> grynde hem and temper hem vp with whyte wyne, on fleissh day with broth;
> and cast therinne flour of rys, pther amydoun, and lye it therwith.  take
> brawn of capouns yground, take sugur and salt, and cast therto and
> florissh it with aneys whyte.  Take a vessel yholed and put in safroun,
> and serue it forth.
> 
> One of the footnotes has ' & hele it' in one of the other copies.  H & B,
> in the glossary, take this to mean a perforated pot is wanted.  I see no
> reason to try to pipe this is design with a funnel type one-hole
> perforation, and can't imagine why you'd force it through a colander to
> make soupy, or stiff, bits.  Also in the glossary is this: held(e), hyld,
> =pour; yholde  =covered.  It makes more sense to me to put the dessore in
> a covered dish.  Would a skin form on the surface as it cooled, as in
> pudding, because there's wheat starch in it?    Anybody else have an idea
> on either one?

No, no skin on top, at least not any time soon, because it would appear
to be served hot. Other recipes for the same dish (at least nominally)
call for the inclusion of white grease, which would also help.
> 
> I checked the Florilegium, but nobody's put that one in the chicken
> recipes.  There wasn't an exact duplicate in 1000 Eggs, either, which
> often has a comparable recipe.

There are at least four or five blank de syre recipes in Curye on
Inglyshe (and even two in the Forme of Cury), and I note that #39 is the
only one that mentions this vessel yholed. One does mention putting the
dish in a room free of dirt; I wonder if inverting a colander over it
might keep insects out while allowing steam to escape rather than
condensing. Certainly a cover would keep dust, dirt, and insects out
(this dish is supposed to be white).

Another possibility is that the dish is strained/pureed while hot, and
not as thick as it will later become, to make it more homogeneous when
served. Note that in many similar dishes the meat is boiled and teased
apart with the fingers, which gives the cook a fair amount of control
over the texture of the finished dish. What other cooking utensils have
their own built in nerve endings/biofeedback systems? But in this case
the meat is ground, presumably pounded in a mortar. Yes, it's possible
to get the meat nice and smooth, but a final straining couldn't hurt.

Ultimately, though, it's hard to say what it means when one scribe or
cook chooses to include the instruction about the vessel yholed, while
all the others don't seem to see the significance. I mean, if it's just
the one source, and he's not telling... . 

Adamantius
- -- 
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com
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