SC - Re: Welcome and Any help for the Irish?

[alysk at ix.netcom.com]

Hauviette wrote:

>And last but not least (and not a period recipe) a Recreation of the Castle 
>Carrickfergus in cake and as large as I can muster.
>I am looking for some input and suggestions, especially in the area of 
>finding additional research material and recipes for the cake (I hope to find 
>something even late period that will work for the building and the icing).
>Any ideas?

Digby, Markham, May and others have closer-to-period cake recipes.  However, 
I don't recall seeing any information that these were used to make edible
buildings.  Icing (sugar and a liquid, usually rosewater) was a late period
addition to marchpanes.  A model of St. Paul's Cathedral on a marchpane
was reportedly served to Queen Elizabeth, though the report didn't say what
it was made of.  Common modeling foods then were sugarpaste (modern gum paste),
gingerbread and marzipan.  Buildings were also constructed out of non-food
items with some parts made of food.  I presume you could make part of the
building of wood, cloth or plaster and insert edible parts - a tower filled
with X??X, for example.  Open up the top or remove the lid, and there is the
food.

Anyone else??

Alys Katharine