SC - Citron and Potato
Robin Carroll-Mann
harper at idt.net
Wed May 5 07:07:23 PDT 1999
And it came to pass on 4 May 99,, that Stefan li Rous wrote:
[concerning my translation of CIDRA Y PATATA -- Citron and Potato]:
> > > How sure are you that the potato that is meant is the white potato?
> >
> > I am not certain at all, but I felt that period recipes for any kind of
> > potato were rare enough to be of interest.
>
> Uh oh. Please don't get me wrong. Yes, period recipes for either type of
> potato are of interest. It's just a consideration that occurred to me
> after hearing comments on this list about potatos previously.
I took no offense at the question, my lord. (Print is both a wonderful and
a terrible medium for carrying on a discussion.) I just wanted to make
clear that I had no certain knowledge about the type of potato used. Of
course, since finding the second recipe, some of my thoughts and
assumptions have altered.
> As I don't like sweet potatos, I was not trying to influence things in
> that direction. Just interested in finding out the correct potato if
> possible.
A laudable goal. I'm still hoping that some of the agricultural historians
amongst us will have more to add..
> >One possible clue is that the
> > mixture is to be cooked until the stuff at the bottom of the boiler
> > turns white. If you were starting with white potato and citron and
> > sugar, then I assume the mixture would become more opaque, and look
> > whiter.
>
> Yes, I missed this. I don't see how you could get the orange sweet potato
> to go white.
::sigh:: Unfortunately, as you may have read by now, the second recipe
blew that theory out of the water. The recipe for "Carne de limon, y
batatas" (flesh of lemon, and sweet potatoes) contains the exact same
instruction. Now, a couple of things are possible. One is that the
*syrup* turns opaque and white, and that would be independant of the
color of the other ingredients. Another is that both recipes use white
potatoes; there's a lot of room for scribal error between "patata" and
"batata". Another possibility is that the direction to let it turn white is a
scribal error -- I have seen a recipe for rice which includes the sensible
instruction to clean any dirt off it. A sensible precaution, which is taken even today. It was followed immediately by a recipe for noodles bearing the same instruction, which I attribute to scribal error. Or perhaps period sweet potatoes were paler, as I understand carrots were paler?
> > I wish I'd noticed this before, but this source is not the one I'm
> > primarily working with, and it's over 400 pages, and as a diabetic, I
> > don't pay much attention to confectionary recipes.
>
> Yes, as I also a diabetic, I understand this. Wish I could use Nutra-sweet
> to make Sekanjabn.
I hear you, oh my brother! I see a lot of recipes that I'd like to redact,
but so many of them are too sweet, too starchy, or too fattening for me
to have more than a taste. I am considering trying my hand at some
biscotti -- those I can bring to work, and only have a nibble myself.
Brighid
Lady Brighid ni Chiarain
Settmour Swamp, East (NJ)
mka Robin Carroll-Mann
harper at idt.net
============================================================================
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".
============================================================================
More information about the Sca-cooks
mailing list