SC - Re: Fennel from Platina

[ChannonM at aol.com]

People have asked for the recipe so here is my rendition. Please note that 
Platina describes oil as having warming properties and salt drying ones. I 
have considered also that he describes food to be eaten in the first course

(P)What should be eaten first
There is an order to be observed in taking food, since everything that moves 
the bowels and whatever is of light and slight nourishment, like aples and 
pears, is more safely and pleasantly eaten in the first course. I even add 
lettuce and whatever is served with vinegar and oil, raw or cooked. Then 
there are eggs, especially the soft-cooked kind, and certain sweets we call 
bellaria, seasond with spices and ine nuts or honey or sugar. These are 
served very appropriately to guests. 


Recipe
Roasted Fennel- basted with olive oil, salt and fresh cracked pepper, roasted 
on a fire if the weather permits, if not, then served raw, sliced very thin 
with a light sprinkling of red wine vinegar.

(P) Book 3 # 18

Pliny calls fennel ferulaceum because it grows out of rods [feruli] just as 
many others do. It has warm and dry force but yet is not simple, for its 
taste reveals that bitterness is mixed in it. It has been said that snakes, 
to which fennel is very pleasant, shed age upon eating this herb and lay 
aside weakness of eyesight, which they contract by a long stay in 
subterranean places, by rubbing their heads on fennel-stalks.

We use this vegetable both raw and cooked, not without reason, for it 
generates good humors, helps the chest, and opens the clogged courses of 
veins.

Hauviette