SC - Strawberry Quest

[Kerri Canepa]

Greetings,

>Who has a period recipe for strawberries? Who has redacted recipes for
>strawberries?

The recipe below was used as part of a Collegium class. The first part was to
try to translate the recipe and the second part was to try to prepare it. The
first set of notes came from the original class, the second set after I tried to
make it again but slightly differently. The dish comes out like a thickened
soup.
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>From Harleian MS. 279 - Potage Dyvers 15th century

Cxxiij. Strawberye. Take Strawberys, & waysshe hem in tyme of yere in gode red
wyne; Þan strayne Þorwe a cloÞe, & do hem in a potte with gode Almaunde mylke,
a-lay it with Amyndoun oÞer with Þe flowre of Rys, & make it chargeaunt and lat
it boyle, and do Þer-in Roysonys of coraunce, Safroun, Pepir, Sugre gret plente,
pouder Gyngere, Canel, Galyngale; poynte it with Vynegre, & a lytil whyte grece
put Þer-to; coloure it with Alkenade, & droppe it a-bowte, plante it with Þe
graynys of Pome-garnad, & Þan serue it forth.

Translation
Take strawberries and wash them in time of year in good red wine (a good vintage
year?); then strain through a cloth and put them in a pot with good almond milk,
add wheat or rice flour and make it stiff and let it boil, and add currants,
saffron, pepper, sugar in great plenty, powdered ginger, cinnamon, galingale;
sharpen it with vinegar and put a little lard into it, color it with alkinet and
put it in a bowl (?), place pomegranate seeds on it and serve it forth.

Recipe
 
1 pint strawberries, green parts removed
½ cup red wine
½ cup almond milk
¼ cup granulated sugar
2 tbs. whole wheat pastry flour
¼ cup dried currants
small pinch of saffron, crushed
1/8 tsp. ground pepper
¼ tsp. ground ginger
¼ tsp. ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp. ground galingale
½ tsp. red wine vinegar
1 tsp. lard
3 drops red food coloring 

Put the strawberries in a small pot with the red wine and heat for 5 minutes.
Strain out the wine and push the strawberries through a conical sieve. Put the
sieved strawberries into a pot with the almond milk and add the flour. Bring to
a boil and let it bubble for about 15 minutes. Add the currants, saffron,
pepper, sugar, ginger, cinnamon, and galingale and simmer together for a few
minutes. Add the vinegar, lard, and food coloring, mix together, pour into a
bowl and serve.

Notes
There were a few difficulties working out this recipe, the major problem being
the phrase "in tyme of yere in gode red wyne." We couldn't figure out what red
wine had to do with washing strawberries except to perhaps flavor them a bit, so
we blanched the strawberries in the wine. The wine we had was made by one of the
cooks which had not turned out to be very drinkable and since we didn't add any
wine to the recipe, we decided it would work for the washing part. The phrase
itself was unintelligible; did it refer to the time of year for strawberries
(which is spring) or did it refer to a good vintage year for the wine? Given the
proportions of ingredients given, the mixture did not thicken much even with
additional cooking time. Perhaps if the pulp of the strawberries had been added
and additional flour, it might have thickened up more. Once we discovered that
alkinet dye isn't good to consume, we chose food coloring instead. The mixture
without coloring is a pleasant but dull shade of pink; the coloring brightened
it somewhat and more could be added if a brighter red color is desired.
Pomegranates were not in season when we tried the recipe so were not used.
However, the seeds would make this a very visually attractive dish. We also
couldn't figure out what the lard was supposed to do in the dish, nor how much
to use except that it wouldn't be much.

The last difficulty was deciding how this dish was to be consumed. It is in the
potages section which would indicate that it could be eaten on its own. We
chose, however, to use it as a sauce for the roasted chicken. Then we put it on
the apples, some bread, and even on the fritters. It was very tasty on all of
them. We decided that it would be good on a lot of things although not on the
peas. It's probably a little too sweet by itself but some of the cooks suggested
passing out straws to drink it like a milkshake (with a chorus of "mmmmm" from
the assembled people).

Notes addendum
We didn't use wine the second time to wash the strawberries and it made a minor
difference in flavor. I suspect that washing them in wine both cleaned them and
added some wine flavor to the recipe. The second time the dish was made, a mesh
sieve was used instead of a conical sieve so more of the strawberry pulp ended
up in the dish. It did make the result thicker. Do not, do not, DO NOT leave out
the lard. It provides a very necessary "mouth feel" which makes this dish
delectable. Leaving out food coloring does make it look duller, too. The almond
milk we originally used for this dish was made with water and "black sugar" for
which we used turbinado sugar (turbinado is cane sugar without the molasses part
removed, brown sugar is cane sugar with the molasses part removed and then put
back in). The second time we made almond milk without sugar and the strawberye
wasn't nearly as good an end product. 

I find it interesting that in today's world strawberries and pomegranites are
not availabe at the same time. I wonder how they were available together then?

Cedrin
Princess Oertha