SC - Horrendous article about period food.

[Decker, Terry D.]

In towns, baking was done by the baker's guilds, which provided ready made
bread or baked for fee.  Villages generally had communal ovens.  Cloche
ovens and stack ovens have been built since Antiquity and are suited for
small farm baking.  I doubt that Europe lost the ability to bake when Rome
fell, since the Romans imported their bakers from Greece and the Gothic
tribes.  

Milling technology capable of producing reasonable fine flours was available
across much of Europe for most of the period.  I've been looking at the
papers on a double head horizontal wheel mill in 7th Century Ireland and
it's as good as anything I've seen prior to modern commercial milling.
Milled grain would be served as puls, polenta or bread.

The one statement I might agree with was that the common bread was
unleavened, as the primary grain for much of Europe was barley.  But there
is nothing particularly wrong with unleavened flat breads.

In my opinion, the author is expressing opinions without examining the
records and is overstating their case for effect.

Bear

> Hello, I'm new to the SCA and hopeing to become a great feastcrat.  I'm
> not 
> that knowleged
> in period food, but the author of this article is refering to "plain 
> peasants' fare".  I can beleive most of what they wrote, and agree about
> the 
> bread.  Also, it is possible to cook bread on a hearth. Though some small 
> villages had community ovens, it was highly unlikly that anybody had a 
> suitable baking oven in their home.  If anyone can find it documented 
> otherwise, please let me know.  I'd hate to stand by a missinformed
> statement.
> 
> Antonio de Navarre
>