SC - Kuskenole - was, Authenticity, philosophy, and advocacy

[david friedman]

At 10:39 PM -0400 6/21/00, Philip & Susan Troy wrote:

>The differences are more than that. As you say, one is
>3x3, one is 3x5. One (the 3x3) lacks the mysterious dots found in the
>other, 3x5 version, which I believe you have interpreted as indicating
>the presence of filling. Could be. We don't seem to know.

Assuming that you, like me, are relying on the version published in 
Speculum, I don't think we can make confident statements about the 
details of the figure--as shown it's pretty small. Are images of the 
original manuscript accessible somewhere? We may both be basing 
parts of our argument on how 20th century people decided to represent 
the 13th or 14th c.  figures.

Also, suppose we assume that Anglo-Norman doesn't have dots and 
Diursa does. One possibility is that the figure in Diuersa was drawn 
by someone who knew more than we do about what the recipe 
meant--perhaps he had frequently eaten cuskynoles--and was improving 
the figure to make it clearer.

What strikes me about the comparison between the figures in the two 
sources is that the drawing in Diursa is substantially larger and 
clearer than either of the drawings in Anglo-Norman. But I don't know 
if that is actually a difference in the manuscripts, or only in the 
modern editions. Does anyone else here know?

>One (the 3x3) is
>clearly not in the proportions stated in the recipe, _unless_ it
>represents a single unit with the sheet of pastry folded in half over
>the filling.

I don't know what the evidence is on the meaning of "hand," but an 
obvious guess seems to be that it is the width of a palm, since that 
way "finger" is a natural subdivision--four fingers to the palm. On 
that reading the piece starts 6 fingers by 3 fingers. You fold it in 
half lengthwise, giving a square 3 fingers by 3 fingers. Then, on my 
interpretation, you press down on that square with the back edge of a 
knife or something similar twice in each direction, giving a 3x3 grid 
of squares, each 1 finger square. You now have a single square piece, 
as shown, with the pattern impressed on it, as shown.

The 3x3 picture doesn't seem to make any sense if we instead assume 
that the picture represented the dough as cut. If that is what is 
going on,  we should be seeing a 3x6 piece of dough, marked with 
squares (or rectangles if each is going to be folded in half to give 
a square raviole). Nor does it work if we instead assume that the 
figure shows the constructed ravioles sitting in the position in 
which they had been cut. If that is what is going on, either they 
should be 3x6 rectangles (if each raviole is assembled from two 
pieces of dough) or they should be 3x3 squares, separated by 3x3 
blanks, since each 3x6 piece of dough has now been folded in half.

I think you offered both of those conjectures as possibilities in the 
earlier round of the discussion.

>The other (the 3x5) does seem to be in proportion to the
>hand (or palm) and a half by three fingers,

Which fits your conjectures better than mine, no? On my theory, the 
pattern is embossed after the dough is folded, and the picture is 
showing the pattern. So the dough has already been folded in half and 
should be square.

The only way I can think of to fit the 3x5 to the text and my 
interpretation is to assume that you are taking two 3x6 pieces, 
putting bits of filling in a 3x5 pattern on one, putting the other on 
top, and sealing along the lines. I wouldn't describe that as "fold 
together," but then I'm not a native speaker of Middle 
English--perhaps "veld" included sticking things together. I looked 
up "weld" in the OED, but couldn't find any evidence that "veld" 
could be a variant of it.

>  but it also bears more
>resemblance to the illustration in the cressee recipe (in 32085) than it
>does to
>the kuskenole recipe (in 32085).

So you are suggesting that the kuskenole recipe in Anglo-Norman, 
whose picture fits my theory, has the correct picture, while the 
picture in Diursa is miscopied from cressee? That's fine with me.

But I'm not sure I find it convincing, much as I would like to. It's 
true that the figure in Anglo-Norman for cressee is shown orthogonal 
rather than diagonal, like the figure for cuskynoles in Diursa. But 
it is also true that the figures for cuskynoles in the two 
manuscripts are 3x3 and 3x5, while cressee is 4x8. Miscopying a 3x3 
grid as 3x5 strikes me as at least as likely a mistake as 
simultaneously assigning the figure to the wrong picture and 
miscopying 4x8 as 3x5--probably more likely.

And note that the figure with cressee doesn't have dots in the 
squares--at least as shown in Speculum.

>Even assuming the illustration is of one
>kuskenole, rather than several, which I had theorized as a possibility,
>there is no indication of where the filling is, and whether it is in all
>nine squares of the 3x3 grid, or simply in the center square. If that's
>one kuskenole, it's quite possible that the illustration represents a
>filled square made from a roughly two-inch-by-four rectangle, with egg
>wash or water brushed on one half of it, the filling added, and the
>pastry folded over (reducing the measured rectangle to a square,
>roughly) and crimped around the four sides (leaving four pressure
>marks/lines from a stick, the edge of a hand, or even the back of a
>heavy kitchen knife).

You are now almost to my interpretation. In both our versions, if we 
label vertical lines 0-3, lines 0 and 3 are the edge of the 
cuskynole, while 1 and 2 are linear impressions made by something 
like the back edge of a knife (what I actually use for making 
cuskynoles). But in your version, all of the filling is between lines 
1 and 2, while in mine it is between 0 and 1, 1 and 2, 2 and 3 (and, 
of course, between the corresponding horizontal lines as well). Yours 
is possible, but there are two problems with it:

1. The figure, so far as we can tell (Diursa is clearer, because 
bigger, although I don't know if that represents a difference in the 
manuscript or only the modern publication), shows equally spaced 
lines. That makes sense for my version. But on yours, you would 
expect a close double line along the edge (edge and crimping--between 
lines 0 and 1 and lines 2 and 3), and a significant space between 
lines 1 and 2 where the filling is. Don't you think it odd to use a 
symmetrical drawing for such an unsymmetrical situation?

2. Your explanation doesn't explain why the figure exists in the 
first place, since the figure isn't telling you anything beyond "fold 
it into a square and seal down the edges." But on my interpretation, 
the figure is actually necessary to explain the pattern of what is 
being done.

Finally, coming back to the figure in Diursa, the pattern of dots 
suggest that whoever drew that figure thought all the little squares 
represented the same thing.

>Anyway, what I have, in fact, said with tiresome frequency is not that
>the illustration should be ignored, but that it does not, could not,
>depict the recipe (originally we were talking about the early
>14th-century English version) as written, without a moderately complex
>set of added instructions helpfully manufactured by His Grace out of
>thin air. (See? Now I'm doing it.) We are instructed, in His Grace's
>adapted recipe, to spread the filling onto the dough, either folding it
>over or adding a second layer, sealing the edges, and then pressing a
>grid of
>additional sutures onto the upper surface with the back of a heavy knife
>(presumably and sensibly so as not to cut the pastry) to subdivide our
>pop-tart-like structure into something resembling a Cadbury fruit bar, a
>large rectangle divided into several smaller cells.

You have accurately rendered my interpretation. But since both 
versions have some form of "fold it together the way the picture 
shows," I don't see anything unreasonable in taking a simple (not 
complex) guess at what the picture is showing.

>The fact that this
>is somewhat chancy in a bulk cookery setting (in boiling, the internal
>seals would have a powerful tendency to burst open, turning the cake
>back into a single cell),

Surely that depends on details such as ratio of filling to dough and 
how well the lines are sealed together.

>added to the fact that no such instructions
>are given in either recipe, make me suspect that there is perhaps a
>better interpretation. Note that I'm not saying that the above is not
>how the dish was made, I'm saying that it _may_ have been made that way,
>and that it _may_ have been made another way. His Grace, ever resembling
>Saint Jerome in these matters, politely suggests I am full of poop.

I have no objection to the statement "it may have been made another 
way." I only object to "other ways" that either don't fit the figure 
or provide no explanation of why the figure is there in the first 
place.

>Originally, having seen only the later English recipe with the 3x5 grid,
>I had envisioned the possibility that the illustration depicted several
>cuskynoles grouped as in the sheet they are cut from. The problem with
>this is that that would indicate that the instructions aren't followed
>in sequence (instructions are to roll out dough, cut into pieces, fill
>and fold/seal). However, since there are other examples in the
>recipe corpus that show instructions clearly given out of sequence
>(thicken the sauce with eggs, sprinkle with good spices, serve, don't
>let the sauce come to a boil, and in Lent you can use almond milk --
>that sort of thing), I'm prepared to accept a calculated risk, which is
>exactly what His Grace has done in postulating the whole "back of a
>heavy knife" thing.

Except that your version provides no reason why the figure would be 
there--and be specifically referred to in the text of the recipe.

>As it
>happens, the earlier illustration, despite spurious claims from those
>who should know better, could not possibly represent the dimensions as
>stated in the recipe, unless folded (or cut) in half, which is how you
>would get a near-square from the rectangle described. So, in either
>case, the "back of the heavy knife" thing is an unnecessary
>complication. That doesn't mean it's not how it was done. But then
>Darwinism is not period.

But the recipe says to fold it. The recipe says to make it 3x6 units 
(assuming a palm is four fingers). Having told you that the piece of 
dough is 3x6 and then told you to fold it like the figure, and given 
a square figure, it seems pretty obvious that you are folding it into 
a 3x3 square.

Then the remaining problem is why does the square have lines on it. I 
have offered a possible explanation. In this post you offer an 
alternative, although one that (for reasons discussed above) I find 
less plausible. But note that that alternative also requires work 
with the back of a knife or something similar, so is no simpler than 
mine.

>Bottom line is that I have failed to convince you (Are you shocked? I
>am shocked!) that the recipe plus illustration _could_ represent
>_either_ a
>Cadbury Fruit Bar or something shaped like a ravioli.

And here you were just getting indignant about my accusing you of 
wanting to interpret it as ravioli.

I apologize if I have misinterpreted you--but after looking through 
the old postings, I don't think I have, although I have certainly 
engaged in rhetorical excess where I thought it would be 
entertaining. I don't really think you plan to interpret cressee as 
Lasagna, for instance. Although I suppose, if one painted a 
basketwork pattern on it with saffron, ...  .

>  My leaning towards
>the ravioli interpretation is based on years of experience filling large
>quantities of pasta sheets and boiling them (question: how many times
>have you actually cooked this dish?), combined with a fair amount of
>experience with the ways in which medieval recipes can be incomplete
>or confusing, and why, along with the most telling argument, that the
>simplest explanation that can be made to fit a given set of
>circumstances is, more often than not, the correct one. You have not
>logically proven
>this idea wrong, in spite of the fact that I'm perfectly prepared to
>admit your interpretation is possibly correct, and have never seriously
>criticized it (well, perhaps not until now) except to say it is not the
>only viable explanation. Hey,
>I'm doing some of your work here!

I agree that I have not proved that your original interpretation 
(ravioli structure, with the picture showing a bunch of ravioli lying 
together in the position in which the dough was cut) is impossible. 
And I agree that you have far more experience than I do in cooking 
for large numbers of people. But my fundamental objection to the 
ravioli version remains--it doesn't explain why the figure is 
provided.

>Adamantius, who admits to simply not knowing for sure, but who also is
>not pathologically terrified that the dish might in some way resemble a
>modern food

A Cadbury fruit bar, perhaps? They couldn't use chocolate, so  did 
the best they could with pasta.

My lady wife adds:

P.S. Many new people on the list have been asking about Cuskynoles. 
Now you know. It went on for weeks last time.

David/Cariadoc
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/