OT - Re: SC - Re: saffron

[LrdRas at aol.com]

In a message dated 4/6/00 3:54:36 AM Eastern Daylight Time, 
CBlackwill at aol.com writes:

<< I wonder if the Lord of the Manor ever got tired of eating the same 
recipes, 
 and ordered his cooks to "do something different, for Pete's sake!" >>

I think he did but NOT at official feasts at which his cooks were expected to 
recreate the recipes that were 'appropriate' for such feasts. Think 'sumo' 
wrestlers and their stylized fighting techniques and you will get a fair idea 
of what I am trying to say. The only manuscripts we have are from those types 
of feasts. Anything else is mere guessing at best and completely contrived. 
Without benefit of actual documents we have no way of knowing what was served 
outside the 'official' type feasts. Again I would love to see manuscripts 
outside of that narrow range but they simply do not appear until the late 
Renaissance and Early Modern period to my knowledge. 

I know many do not think of themselves as noble but the SCA defines us as 
such and we have the records of what noblemen ate. Those records are enough 
to keep me busy for a lot of years so I so not see a need to speculate about 
peasant cookery nor do I see a need to go outside the realm of actual recipes 
at this time. perhaps such a need will arise but for now that is where I am 
coming from. 

Other folks have taken up this work and I look expectantly to any results 
they post with much interest.

Ras