SC - Waffles and Books

[Huette von Ahrens]

- --- david friedman <ddfr at best.com> wrote:
> At 9:45 AM +0200 6/30/00, Cindy M. Renfrow wrote:
> >Jeff,
> >
> >IIRC, Le Menagier gives several recipes for
> 'crisps' batter. Waffles,
> >wafers, crisps, whatever you want to call them are
> very old.
> >
> >Cindy
> 
> I think there are three different things here:
> 
> 1. Funnel cakes (the Two Fifteenth Century Crispes,
> and various other 
> things elsewhere, such as mincebek in _Two Anglo
> Norman_. )
> 
> 2. Wafers (served with hippocras in Menagier):
> Presumably waffle 
> pattern, but more like a crisp cookie, at least as I
> have seen them 
> made.
> 
> 3. Modern waffles: Waffle pattern, but thick with a
> pancake like texture.
> 
> Off hand, I am not sure I have seen anything that is
> clearly made 
> like a modern waffle. One thing worth checking is
> whether there are 
> any surviving wafer irons, and if so if the
> separation between the 
> plates is thin, as in a modern wafer iron, or thick,
> as in a waffle 
> iron.
> 
> David/Cariadoc
> http://www.daviddfriedman.com/

>From "De Verstandige Kock" [Dutch 1667, the preface
says that many of the recipes in this cookbook copy
those from "Eenen Seer Schonen/ende Excellenten
Coc-boeck" published in 1589.  This is the only period
Dutch cookbook that has been translated into English.
There are many paintings of pancakes and waffles that
are pre-1600.  

If you look at the commentary in the fifth recipe, you
will see that it refers to make the batter the same
thickness of pancake batter.

>From all of the painting and drawings I have seen, my
opinion is that the Dutch waffles/wafers/etc. are
thick.


1) To fry common Pancakes.

For each pond of Wheat-flour take a pint of sweet Milk
and 3 Eggs.  Some add some sugar to it.

2) To fry the best kind of Pancakes.

Take 5 or 6 Eggs with clean, running water, add to it
Cloves, Cinnamon, Mace, and Nutmeg with some Salt,
beat it with some Wheat-flour as thick as you like,
fry them and sprinkle them with Sugar; these are
prepared with running water because with Milk or Cream
they would be tough.

3) To fry Groeninger Pancakes.

Take a pond of Wheat-flour, 3 Eggs, a quarter pond of
Currants and Some Cinnamon, this is fried in Butter. 
Is good.

4) To fry Waffles.

For each pond of Wheat-flour take a pint of sweet
Milk, a little tin bowl of melted Butter with 3 or 4
Eggs, a spoonful of Yeast well stirred together.

5) To fry Wafers.

Take a pond Wheat-flour, a loot Cinnamon, a half loot
Ginger, 2 Eggs, a half beer glass Rhenish-wine, a
stuyver Rosewater, a small bowl Butter without Salt, a
little Sugar; beaten with some lukewarm water until
the thickness of Pancake [batter] and fried in the
iron.  Is delicious.


Here are two URLs that show paintings of period
waffles:

 
http://www.lepg.org/gallery.htm

or, more specifically:

http://www.lepg.org/veggirl.jpg

This painting by Pieter Aertsen, from 1567, is called
"Market woman with vegetable stall."  To the viewers
left are three waffles laying around.

also:

http://www.lepg.org/waffles.jpg

This painting by Joachim de Beuckalaer was painted
sometime during 1550-1560. It is called, most
appropriately, "Making waffles."  To the viewers lower
right, you will see several waffles laying on a table.
However, more importantly, you will see, in the center
of the painting, a young woman holding a waffle iron
in one hand and just about to ladle some batter from a
tureen with a wooden spoon in her other hand. 

>From Katie Stewart's book "The Joy of Eating",
pages 86-87.  Unfortunately, Ms. Stewart does not give
us the name of the artist or the name of the painting,
but the painting appears to be dated 1560.  We see a
multigenerational family, grandparents, parents and
baby. Next to the grandfather is a plate of waffles,
next to the mother is a plate of pancakes.  The
grandmother is making the pancakes in the background,
using a skillet to make the pancakes.  The skillet is
suspended over the fire by a large ring attached to a
set of chains. 

>From Peter Rose's book, "The Sensible Cook", we find
these paintings:

Page 2: Jan Steen, "The 12th Night Feast"
Jan Steen 1626-1679.
Page 15: Willem Buytewech, "Interior" 1610.
Page 22: Jan Steen, "The St. Nicholas Celebration"
Page 77: Nicholas Maes, "The Pancake Maker"
Nicholas Maes 1634-1693.
Page 117: No artist or date: "Sweet meal"

I am sure that Cariadoc will dismiss these as being
"Early Modern", but I think that they are still within
SCA period.

It is hard to say if whether or not they were served
to the nobility in Holland.  Most paintings show
common people making them.  Others are in still lifes.

Huette





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