[Sca-cooks] Seeking Improvement

[lilinah at earthlink.net]

bill mayfield wrote:
>    According to the More skilled and vastily superior Laurel
>     person the only sugar available to the noble households
>    of the 12-14th century were Date and Beet Sugars,my unskilled
>    and poorly read self believe that cane sugar was available
>     to them,mostly as a "medicinal" yet also in food-stuffs
>    preperation.
>   May I ask for suggestons on where to find documentation
>    on Cane sugar,if it was used,and how was used in Medieval cookery.

Well, i'm afraid i don't have citations at my fingertips. But i do
know that the Medieval Near Eastern Muslims at first imported sugar
from India and then began to grow and refine it themselves. If I
remember correctly, it was grown in al-Andalus (aka Spain). Europeans
had much trade with the Arabs and certainly imported cane sugar. It
came in "cakes" - cylinders or cones - which had to be broken up to
use. There are references to this practice in both Arab and European
cookbooks.

Date sugar is not mentioned often in Medieval Arab cookbooks because
it is less desirable than cane sugar, something less affluent people
use. I cannot recall a single mention of it in a European cook book.

Beet sugar!?!?! As far as i know, this was not used in the Medieval
or Renaissance periods anywhere.

Sorry to be so vague, but, well, the aforementioned Laurel is not correct.

Anahita
who had the audacity to criticize a costuming Laurel from another
kingdom who baldly stated that the clothing and embroidered and woven
designs of the Near East and of India hadn't changed in thousands of
years (and they meant just about everything everywhere, not a few
specific elements). Apparently this "research" was one of their
culminating discoveries and among other things led to their being
Laureled. What a load of hooey. However, i also know a few Laurels
who i deeply respect.