Duke's powder (was Re: SC - saffron)

[Robin Carroll-Mann]

And it came to pass on 31 Mar 00,, that Philip & Susan Troy wrote:


<color><param>0000,0000,0000</param>> Robin Carroll-Mann wrote:

> > 

> > This is his comment at the end of a recipe for "Duke's powder", a spice

> > mixture:

> 

> Whoa... is this the same Duke's Powder that Le Menagier mentions as

> pre-sweetened hippocras spice?

> 

> Adamantius


I don't know.  Possibly.  It certainly contains sugar, and appears just 
after de Nola's recipe for a hippocras spice mixture.  I'm translating the 
1529 edition of de Nola, BTW.  There is a slightly different version of this 
mixture in the 1525 edition, plus a second recipe which does not appear 
in the 1529.  Here are the recipes:


</color>Source: Roberto de Nola, _Libro de Cozina_ (Spanish, 1525)

Translation: Brighid ni Chiarain (Robin Carroll-Mann)


<color><param>0000,0000,0000</param>POLUORA DE DUQUE -- Duke's Powder


Cinnamon, half an ounce; ginger, half an ounce; cloves, one eighth; 
sugar, one pound; all this well ground and strained through a hair sieve 
so that it should be quite delicate and subtle, or at least just like the 
one for the sauces.


POLUORA DE DUQUE DE OTRA MANERA -- Duke's Powder in 
another manner


White ginger, two ounces; galangal, one eighth of an ounce; cinnamon, 
one ounce; long pepper, one ounce; grains of paradise, one ounce; 
nutmeg, one ounce; fine sugar, one pound; all this should be well 
ground and strained through a delicate hair sieve.


[The paragraph on weighing spices follows]



</color>Source: Ruperto de Nola, _Libro de Guisados_ (Spanish, 1529)

Translation: Brighid ni Chiarain (Robin Carroll-Mann)


POLVORA DE DUQUE - Duke's Powder


	Half an ounce of cinnamon; an eighth of cloves; and for the lords 
cast in nothing but cinnamon, and a pound of sugar; if you wish to make 
it sharp in flavor and [good] for pains in the stomach, cast in a little 
ginger.

	And the weights of the spices in the apothecary shops are in this 
manner: one pound is twelve ounces; one ounce, eight drachmas; one 
drachma, three scruples: another way that you can more clearly 
understand this: a drachma weights three dineros; a scruple is the 
weight of one dinero; and a scruple is twenty grains of wheat.


- - - -


How do those compare to the Menagier's recipe?  Or doesn't he give 
one?  (I have a copy somewhere, but don't want to hunt through an 
unindexed book before I finish my second cup of coffee.)



<nofill>
Lady Brighid ni Chiarain
Settmour Swamp, East (NJ)
mka Robin Carroll-Mann
harper at idt.net