SC - Cressee webbed

[david friedman]

Great story--I had forgotten that anecdote. But the safflower is 
being used in water that isn't being drunk at all, so I'm not sure it 
is relevant to the question of whether it was used as a substitute 
for saffron in cooking.

At 7:14 PM -0400 7/3/00, Jenne Heise wrote:
>  > >True saffron was sometimes adulterated with safflower.  (Perhaps Francesco
>  > >Sirene has more info on this practice?) Safflower gives a good yellow
>  > >color, but no flavor that I can detect. It also has the benefit of being
>  > >inexpensive.  I prefer using it in all my dishes that call for saffron.
>  > Do we know that this was done in period?
>
>I believe that we do. Certainly Safflower was a known adulterant and cheap
>substitute. Obviously the substitution would be difficult to conceal, but
>it was sometimes used by the parsimonious in cases where the color was
>more important than the taste.
>
>To give a period reference,
>
>the Internet sourcebook:
>Al-Tankh:
>Ruminations and Reminiscences, c. 980 CE
>http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/980al-atanukhi.html
>
>"     Mutawakkil [Caliph, r. 847-860] desired that every article whereon
>his eye should fall on the day of a certain drinking-bout should be
>colored yellow.
>      Accordingly there was erected a dome of sandalwood covered and
>furnished with yellow satin, and there were set in front of him melons and
>yellow oranges and yellow wine in golden vessels; and only those
>slave-girls were admitted who were yellow with yellow brocade gowns. The
>dome was erected over a tesselated pond, and orders were given that
>saffron should be put in the channels which filled it in sufficient
>quantities to give the water a yellow color as it flowed through the pond.
>This was done, and as the drinking-bout was protracted their supplies of
>saffron were exhausted and safflower was used as a substitute, they
>supposing that he would be intoxicated before this was exhausted, or they
>could incur reproach."
>
>
>Jadwiga Zajaczkowa, mka Jennifer Heise	      jenne at tulgey.browser.net
>disclaimer: i speak for no-one and no-one speaks for me.
>    "My hands are small I know, but they're not yours, they are my own"
>
>
>============================================================================
>
>To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to
>Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".
>
>============================================================================

David Friedman
Professor of Law
Santa Clara University
ddfr at best.com
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/