SC - Sweet Spinach Tart

[Olwen the Odd]

Bear, did you serve this hot or cold?  Would it make much difference?  Did 
you try it both ways or just one?  I'm just wondering if this may make a 
good pic-nic type of item cold at the Baronial Pavillion at the Tourney 
field.
Olwen


>From: "Decker, Terry D." <TerryD at Health.State.OK.US>
>Reply-To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
>To: "'sca-cooks at ansteorra.org'" <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
>Subject: SC - Sweet Spinach Tart
>Date: Wed, 20 Sep 2000 10:59:59 -0500
>
>I'm testing some of the recipes I will be preparing for Protectorate.  I
>tried out the Spinach Tart on the unsuspecting populace last night.  The
>spinach lovers liked it.  Most of the spinach haters refused it, although a
>couple who tried it declared it almost edible.
>
>The crust turned out to be very light and flaky.  I'm wondering whether 
>this
>is the period intent or whether they worked the dough more to make a
>heavier, crisper crust.
>
>You will note that rosewater has been left out of the finished recipes.  
>The
>Baroness and I have decided that for the feast, rosewater is a scribal
>error, much as saffron is for Cariadoc.
>
>Bear
>
>
>Sweet Spinach Tart
>
>A Spinnage Tart.  Take a good store of Spinage, and boyl it in a Pipkin,
>with White Wine, till it be
>soft as pap; then take it and strain it well into a pewter dish, not 
>leaving
>any part unstrained; then
>put to it Rose-water, great store of Sugar and cinamon, and boyle it till 
>it
>be thick as Marmalade.
>Then let it coole, and after fill your Coffin and adorn it...
>
>				Gervase Markham
>				The English Hous-wife, 1615
>
>1 pound spinach (fresh or frozen) cleaned and chopped
>1/2 cup white wine
>1 cup water
>1/3 cup sugar (or more)
>1 teaspoon cinnamon
>
>Boil spinach in wine and 1/2 cup water until very soft.
>Press through a colander or run through a food processor to mince large
>pieces of spinach.
>Combine sugar and 1/2 cup water in a pan  and bring to a boil.
>Stir in spinach and cinnamon.
>Reduce heat to medium and cook until almost dry.
>Put spinach into pie shell.  Cool.
>
>After cooling the tart can be adorned with fruit, powdered sugar, crystal
>sugar, etc.  One
>tester suggested sliced hardboiled eggs.
>
>Notes:  One third cup of sugar sweetens the spinach without being cloying.
>A cup of
>sugar would make a thicker syrup and make the spinach closer to the
>marmalade of the
>original recipe.
>
>One teaspoon of fresh cinnamon provides a nice bite without being
>overpowering.
>
>Fresh spinach may require additional water or wine in the first boil.  I
>used frozen spinach
>for availability and speed.  I used Malavasia wine, which is fairly strong,
>and cut it with
>water for expedience.  The spinach absorbed much of the liquid.
>
>
>Elizabethan Pie Shell
>
>Another Way.  Then make your paste with butter, fair water, and the yolkes
>of two or three Egs, and
>so soone as ye have driven your paste, cast on a little sugar, and
>rosewater, and harden your paste
>afore in the oven.  Then take it out, and fill it, and set it in againe.
>
>			The Good Huswifes Handmaid, 1588
>
>
>1/2 cup butter
>1 1/2 cup flour (approx.)
>2 egg yolks
>1/3 cup water
>sugar
>
>In a bowl, cut butter into 1 cup of flour, until it crumbs.
>Add egg yolks and cut into mixture.  Add additional flour a Tablespoon at a
>time until the
>moisture is absorbed into the crumbs.
>Add the water and cut into mixture.  Add additional flour a Tablespoon at a
>time, as
>needed, until the moisture is absorbed into the crumbs.
>Push the crumbs into a ball, working the dough gently for a few seconds to
>smooth it.
>Let the dough rest for 15 to 30 minutes.
>Roll out the crusts on a floured surface and transfer to pie pans.  The
>recipe makes two 8
>or 9 inch pie shells.
>Prick the pie shells to let air vent from between the shell and the pan.
>Sprinkle sugar on the shell before baking.  I used about a scant 1/4
>teaspoon granulated
>white.
>
>If the shell is to be filled after baking, bake the shell at 325 degrees F
>for about 35
>minutes or until very light brown.
>If the filling needs to be baked in the shell, bake the shell at 325 
>degrees
>F for about 10
>minutes, remove, fill and continue baking as per the filling recipe.
>
>Notes:  This recipe makes very light, crisp pie shells.  If the dough is
>worked minimally,
>the result is flaky and very similar to modern pie shells.  The more the
>dough is worked,
>the more the pie shell resembles a crisp or cracker.
>
>By taste, salt is noticeably missing from the crust, but the sugar modifies
>the taste.  A fine
>ground white sugar or a brown sugar might present interesting differences.
>
>As written, this recipe appears to be for a dessert shell, but it might 
>also
>represent an
>interesting contrast for a savory filling.
>
>
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