[Sca-cooks] A redaction of Platina's Hemp Dish

[Underground Cooks Collective]

Some dishes from period sources are rarely going to be attempted by modern
cooks. These include, for obvious reasons, Platina's two recipes involving
hempseed. Taking advantage of a small quantity of seed which recently made
itself available, we recently decided to produce a version of his "Cibarium
Cannabinum" (Hemp Dish) (VII:49).

Millham's translation is as follows:

"Make a hemp dish for twelve guests this way: cook a pound of well-washed hemp
until it splits open. When it is cooked, add a pound of almonds. When it has
been pounded with breadcrumbs in a mortar, moisten it with lean stock and stir
it into a pot through a seive. Then, when it has been placed on the hearth,
stir it frequently with a spoon. When it is almost cooked, put in half a pound
of sugar, a half ounce of ginger, and a little saffron with rose water. When
it is cooked and apportioned on serving dishes, sprinkle with rather sweet
spices. I think this is very similar to the _baricocoli_ of the people of
Sienna, for an extraordinary dish has been made from many ordinary things, but
it is also difficult to digest and creates squeamishness and pain."

Our version, with quantities unfortunately constrained by the available seed:

hemp/cannabis seeds: 2/3 oz
ground almonds: 2/3 oz [1]
soft breadcrumbs: 2 tbsp
meat or vegetable stock: 3 tbsp
sugar: 1 1/2 tsp
ginger: 1/8 tsp
saffron: 3 threads, powdered
rosewater: 1/8-1/4 tsp [2]
1/8 tsp cinnamon, pinch cloves and pinch mace for spice mix, or your favorite
poudre douce

Wash the seeds and boil them [3] until they split open (a bit over half an
hour in our case, but may very depending on the seeds). Place the seeds,
almonds and breadcrumbs into a mortar and pound until the seeds are well
crushed.

Mix in the stock, put the mixture into a fine seive and press it through the
seive into a pot. This may take a bit of work, as the mixture is fairly thick.
[4]

Gently cook the mixture until it thickens up (around 15 minutes). Stir in the
sugar, ginger, saffron and rosewater and cook for another few minutes.
Transfer to a serving dish and sprinkle lightly with sweet spice mix before
serving.

This gives a pleasant-tasting, smooth dish, almost reminiscent of a mousse in
texture, though heavier. The tasters did not notice the squeamishness or pain
alleged to accompany it.

[1] If you like pounding away with your mortar and pestle, whole almonds are
presumably intended in the original.

[2] We incautiously used 1/2 tsp, which was far too much and tended to obscure
other flavours. 1/8-1/4 tsp would probably have been about right, depending on
personal taste.

[3] We deliberated on what cooking method to use, and decided boiling was most
likely to burst the seeds as required.

[4] We believe that this step is intended to separate out the outsides of the
seeds, giving a much smoother dish. For this reason, we think that using a
blender instead of a mortar and pestle is not a good idea, as it may chop up
the outside of the seed fine enough that it can get through the seive. We
actually used a two-step process with a coarse and a fine seive, but this is
probably unnecessary if you have a big enough fine seive to start with.

Production would probably be easier if one had more seeds available, as
procedures were a little fiddly with such small quantities and we really only
got enough for a small dish for one person.

Platina's other hemp recipe (VII:67) is fairly similar, with the seeds again
being pounded with almonds, moistened and cooked with sugar and rosewater. It
specifies a longer cooking time than we used, but does not start with cooked
seeds. It's interesting to note that hemp seeds count as an "ordinary thing".
Does anyone know of other recipes using them (aside from the versions of these
two in Martino, whence Platina copied them)?

We're interested in suggestions for substitutes for hempseed, as this dish is
well worthy of being served more widely. Those living in areas where
cultivation of industrial hemp (low-THC cannabis) is legal might be able to
get access to seeds of that variety and thus be able to serve a fully
authentic version of the dish, but it would be useful to know of other grains
which might serve as well.

Disclaimer: The posession and consumption of hempseed may well be illegal
where you live. The quantities required to get a reasonable amount of this
dish may be enough to attract svere penalties. In addition, this is probably
an inefficient means of ingesting THC if that's what you're actually after.

The Underground Cooks' Collective

(Our apologies for the anonymity, but it's probably wiser not to publicly sign
names to this...)

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