SC - Initial impressions of A Drizzle of Honey

[Nick Sasso]

A Drizzle of Honey, The Life and Recipes of Spain's 
Secret Jews, by David M. Gitlitz and Linda Kay Davidson.  
St. Martin's Press       1999


My initial impressions from the copy I received in the mail three days
ago is that it is a great cooking book that has somewhat gauged value
as a historical cooking source. 

The introduction is forthright in saying exactly what they have done
with their tome.  The authors inform the reader that they worked from
ingredients lists taken primarily from testimonial eveidence from the
Inquisition (a brilliant source of information to say the least), and
not from period recipe sources.  

The testimony is of christians using food traditions and culture to
coinvict the heretics.  We get good lists of foods in use by the
jewish conversoras  (public converts/covert jews).  What the sources
did not give was recipe work of any sort (proportions).  The authors
used contemporary sources to generate hypotheses as to what the dishes
would come out as.  they then experimented and changed as they thought
would be best.

I look forward to reading more of this book, and wanted to give a
really brief overview of this source for those who are considering it.
 Worth the $25 give or take including shipping, in my opinion.  The
only problem I have is that the pages on mine are really ragged on the
ends. . . should I have expected that from Amazon, or is this a reject
that Ishould send back?

pace e bene,

niccolo difranceco
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
                                                                      
       
============================================================================

To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to
Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".

============================================================================