SC - Starter Recipes

[Alderton, Philippa]

Lady Brighid ni Chiarain skrev:

>Two things I've found helpful, as a non-intuitive cook of middling
>experience.  Good basic cookbooks, like "The Joy of Cooking" will
>explain a lot of essentials about ingredients and cooking techniques.
>Many of them have illustrations or even photographs to explain certain
>points.

Yes, exactly. My mother started me out with the Better Homes and Gardens
Cookbook when I first moved out on my own, just as my grandmother had
started her out. Since then, I've found a number of excellent cookbooks and
have expanded my library to a rather ridiculous extent. I didn't get the Joy
of Cooking until fairly recently, about 10 or 15 years ago, as a gift from a
non-cooking friend, and about the same time found a general cookbook written
in 1952, which used a lot of fresh ingredients, and puts spaghetti in its
small file of "Foreign Foods".

To get started, find good basic cookbooks, and read them. Avoid the exotic
ones like "How to Microwave Royal Thai Food for One or Two" or whatever, and
try to find some which discuss good, basic cooking, and Read them. One of
the great pleasures of "Joy" and the one from 1952, is that they're very
informative about the foods and techniques they expect you to use, and they
help to take the mystery out of our Art.

As you get a bit more advanced, Julia Child is great- she has a discussion
on the "simple" egg that is worthwhile for anyone to read. Also, the "New
York Times Cookbook" is very informative about somewhat more luxurious
American Cookery. Chef Paul Prudhomme is a good read, as are The Frugal
Gourmet, Jeff Smith's, books. Just keep in mind, that as a beginner, you'll
want to look at their first books published, rather than their latest, as
the earlier books tend to be a lot more basic- they were just starting to
write cookbooks, and you're just starting to read them ;-) If you're
interested in game, LL Bean's game cookbook is the best I've found on the
subject, for an overall view of game meats. LL Bean, btw, is not a person,
but rather a company which sells high quality (and high priced) outdoor
gear.

Myself, I'm a newbie to Medieval Cooking, but not to cooking in general, so
I've started on the original sources, but there are some sources available
like, as have been mentioned, Cindy's "Take 1000 Eggs", Master Huen's
website, Cariadoc's Miscellany, and Stefan's Florilegium. Stefan's
Florilegium is particularly useful because being a new Cook, he asks good
questions that many of us, knowing cooking as we do, often don't think to
ask. Myself, I tend to ask poor, abused Adamantius, because what I might ask
is most likely a bit more esoteric than you might ask.

So, ask, look, and listen, try some things, and ask again ;-)

Phlip

Nolo disputare, volo somniare et contendere, et iterum somniare.

phlip at morganco.net

Philippa Farrour
Caer Frig
Southeastern Ohio

"All things are poisons.  It is simply the dose that distinguishes between a
poison and a remedy." -Paracelsus

"Oats -- a grain which in England sustains the horses, and in
Scotland, the men." -- Johnson

"It was pleasant to me to find that 'oats,' the 'food of horses,' were
so much used as the food of the people in Johnson's own town." --
Boswell

"And where will you find such horses, and such men?" -- Anonymous