SC - FOOD AND FEAST IN TUDOR ENGLAND

[Philip & Susan Troy]

"HICKS, MELISSA" wrote:
> 
> If that is the Alison Sim book then yes I have it.  I haven't read it for a
> while but from memory it kinda glosses over the food info.  From memory
> there are other books that I would prefer to spend $40 on (mine was a
> present). I'll check again tonight and write a review for you.
> 
> Meliora.

FWIW, if it does gloss over the food info, we do have some cookbooks
more or less framing the early Tudor period (as distinguished from the
Elizabethan era, although there are a fair amount of cookbooks from
then, too), and it's likely a lot can be gleaned from them. At the early
end we have our faithful Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books, available
in HG Cariadoc's Collection, if somewhat too Lancastrian/Hundred Years
War. At the late end we have the Newe Proper Boke of Cokerie (more
Elizabethan) and the Good Huswive's Jewell books (even more
Elizabethan). Right in the middle of all that is Andrew Boorde's Dietery
of Helth (~1542 C.E.), which is a medical text similar to Platina,
although with no real recipes to speak of, but quite a bit of comment on
food, which foods go with which, and in which season, etc. The fact that
it is dedicated to Galen, Prince of Physicke, is probably significant,
and should give a fairly good idea of what it's all about. Lots of stuff
about humors that we rarely see from the medieval English perspective,
but which still looks pretty familiar if you've looked at the various
Mediterranean medical texts like the Tacuinum Sanitatis.
   
I'm not sure where the Dietery of Helth can be found; my copy sort of
fell into my lap, and it's a photocopy taken from a first edition on
microfiche. I've been very slowly transcribing it for those who get
headaches from reading the early Gothic-print mass-produced books, but,
as I'm one of those people, and this isn't my top priority at the
moment, it's liable to take a while.

Adamantius  
- -- 
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com
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