SC - Cressee discussion summary

[Stefan li Rous]

Ras replied to my questions:
> << I thought you (Ras) were very much into doing a dish exactly as
>  the recipe is written and not deviating.>>
> 
> I am.
> 
>  <<Wouldn't assuming that
>  colored cheeses would be available and using one, much less two
>  different cheeses of different colors go against this?  >>
> 
> Possibly. But since I came into the thread rather late and have no way of 
> knowing what transpired before I have no way to answer this question. I do 
> know we made butter all the time when I was growing up and it was definitely 
> yellow. I am just wondering why everyone is assuming that the cheese is white 
> and not yellow. Apparently I missed that part of the thread. The delete key 
> can be a cruel mistress......

Ahh. ok. Master Cariadoc posted the original recipe and his redaction
for this Cressee recipe. He had posted a copy of a picture of the
dish on a website. When I went there, the cheese looked pretty yellow.
Someone else suggested putting white cheese on the white pasta and
yellow cheese on the yellow pasta. I then made suggestions that I
didn't think this a good interpretation because the recipe doesn't
mention two different cheeses. Others have suggested that the pasta
be more brightly colored with more saffron or a different grain be
used. Another comment I suggested was that perhaps medieval folks just 
didn't expect a bright color differentiation between the interleaved
yellow and white pasta.

Ok, actually it was Adamantius that posted the original recipe back
on June 22:

> Constance Hieatt and Robin Jones, "Two Anglo-Norman Culinary Collections
> Edited from British Library Manuscripts Additional 32085 and Royal
> 12.C.xii", Speculum v. 61, October 1986, pp 859-882.
> 
> The original recipes are in 13th-century French, with an English
> translation by Hieatt and Jones. Here's what it sez for cressee,
> translated from Add. 32085 :
> 
> "5. Cressee [crisscross of noodles]. Here is another dish, which is
> called cresee.Take best white flour and eggs, and make pasta dough, and
> in the pasta dough put fine, choice ginger and sugar. Take half of the
> pastry, (which is or should be) colored with saffron, and half (which is
> or should be) white, and roll it out on a table to the thickness of your
> finger; then cut it into strips, then cut it into strips the size of a
> piece of lath; stretch it out on a table as illustrated [see diagram,
> one color is presumably to be crossed over the other]; then boil in
> water; then take a slotted spoon and remove the cressees from the water;
> then arrange them on, and cover them with, grated cheese, add butter or
> oil, and serve."
> 
> The diagram is a rectangular grid 4 squares high by eight wide.  

Here is a snippet from Master Cariadoc's message giving the URL
of his picture and some of his comments:
> http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Medieval/cressee/cressee_recipe.htm
 
> One problem with the recipe is getting enough contrast in color 
> between the plain and the yellow strips. One way is by using a lot of 
> saffron--but the result looks better than it tastes, unless you 
> really like saffron. Another possibility that Elizabeth suggested but 
> that I have not yet tried is to use the egg yolks in what will be the 
> yellow dough and the whites in what will be the plain dough.

I hope this gives you a reasonable summary of things.
- -- 
Lord Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
Mark S. Harris             Austin, Texas           stefan at texas.net
**** See Stefan's Florilegium files at:  http://www.florilegium.org ****