SC - Re: 16th century potato soup recipe?

[Thomas Gloning]

I assume that "white potatoe" is 'solanum tuberosum'.

Looking for a 16th/17th potatoe soup recipe, I first checked the index
of Hans Wiswe, Kulturgeschichte der Kochkunst. He says, among other
things, that potatoes began to be used widespread only in the 18th
century, especially as food for the poor (p. 78).

However, Wiswe quotes a passage from a work on gardening and the
culinary use of garden plants from the year 1648:

"Die Kartoffeln werden gewaschen und in Wasser 'muerbe' gekocht. Nun
wird das Wasser abgegossen. Man laesst sie abkuehlen. Nun zieht man die
'auswendige [aufwendige_Wiswe] Haut' rein davon. Die grossen Kartoffeln
schneidet man ein- oder zweimal auseinander, die kleinen laesst man
ganz. Dann tun man sie wieder in einen Topf, giesst Wein darueber, tut
Butter, Muskatblumen und anderes Gewuerz sowie Salz daran und laesst sie
fein uebersieden. Danach richtet man die Speise an und streut Ingwer
darueber" (Hoyer 1648, second ed. 1651; Wiswe p. 125).

Wiswe then points us to a similar passage in the 'Diaeteticon' of
Elsholtz (1682). Looking up that passage, Elsholtz writes:

"Man isset aber diese Tartuffeln theils zur Lust und verenderung/ theils
als eine naehrende Speise/ weil sie nunmehr zimlich gemein bey uns
worden" (p. 31/32; "ziemlich gemein" = 'quite common').

Checking the electronic Text of Bartholomaeus Huebners 'Neu
Speisebuechlein' (1603) for "Erd-", "Kart-", "Tart-", I did not find
anything important in respect to potatoes.

Wiswe also mentions potatoes dealing with (Spanish) recipes for Olla
potrida, but the recipe for "Hollapotrida" in Rumpolt (1581, fol.
137b-139b) does not mention potatoes.

Going on, I checked some dictionaries.

Hopf has no entry "Kartoffel", and her entries "Erdapfel" (see Rumpolt
Vorrede 16v), "Erdbirne" do not mean 'solanum tuberosum'. But the entry
"Tartuffol" leads us to the "Frauenzimmerlexikon" (1715), where there
are four recipes with potatoes (cols. 1979-1981). Manfred Lemmer
comments on these recipes in his "Nachwort" (p. 23): "Wie die Rezepte
lehren, wurde die Kartoffel aber damals noch nicht als Beilage zum
Fleisch genossen, sondern in der Suppe oder als Salat". Now, it is
important to know, that these lines were written in 1980 by Manfred
Lemmer, who is also the editor of the facsimile of Marx Rumpolt (1976)
and probably one of the few persons who read Rumpolt entirely. I am
quite sure that Manfred Lemmer would have mentioned any potatoe recipe
already available in the cookery book of Rumpolt. And so would have done
Hopf, I assume; she used Rumpolt as one of her source texts for her
dictionary.

[BTW, I am beginning to transcribe Rumpolt, and maybe in some months or
years we can search this text. Anybody working on the same project,
please drop me a line.]

The article in the "Deutsches Woerterbuch" (vol. 11, 244f.) says that
"Kartoffel" was derived from earlier "Tartuffel". Alas, it does not lead
us to early cookery recipes, but to quotations from German poets
(Moeser, Schiller) ...

I must stop now; maybe I can check some other sources later.

To sum up: German recipes with potatoes seem to be first attested
somewhere in the 17th century. A linguistic problem is that in some
cases we don't know if an expression like "Erdapfel" oder "Gruendling"
means the potatoe or something else. Up to the 1720ies, there are soup
preparations with potatoes. -- If I remember correctly, the first
attestation of potatoes in Germany is from the end of the 16th century:
potatoes were part of a medical garden in Norimberg (I don't recall at
present where I read that). Anyway: a German potatoe soup recipe from
the 16th century would come as a great surprise for me.

Cheers,
Thomas
 
PS.: Please let me know if I should try and translate the German
passages into English or (period!) Latin.

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