[Sca-cooks] Need Reference info

[Mark.S Harris]

Baron Master Cahan Kyle said:
> Next Year, either Memorial Weekend or the weekend of May 31-June 2, I will be
> cooking a special feast for Montevale's Annual Stag event.  I am currently
> looking for a good source for Spanish Cooking from 15th to the early 17th
> century.

Well, I think you could hardly do better than Lady Brighid's
translation of Nola's work now found in the new FOOD-MANUSCRIPTS
section of the Florilegium, although I think such feast food is a
far cry from ship food:
Guisados1-art    (220K)  5/28/01    A translation of Ruperto de Nola's
                                       1529 "Libre del Coch", part 1 of
2
                                       by Lady Brighid ni Chiarain.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD-MANUSCRIPTS/Guisados1-art.html
Guisados2-art    (116K)  5/28/01    "Libre del Coch". part 2 of 2.
                                       Lenten recipes.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD-MANUSCRIPTS/Guisados2-art.html

> The idea behind the feast is a ship's voyage. The 1st remove will be tasty
> food on the day of departure, 2nd remove will be food after being at sea the
> first week of the voyage (fresh ship's biscuits, boiled pork, cabbage, etc.),
> 3rd remove will be food served during the last week of the voyage (stored
> ships biscuits, chickpea, dried fish and possibly beef jerky), and then the
> 4th remove will be food upon arrival in port which will be East Indian or
> Oriental Food.

This is for a "feast"? Sounds more like something for my punishments-msg
file. :-) However, I'm not one to say all SCA events or study should
only
be centered around the fancy feasts of the nobility. I still wonder if
you
will find people willing to pay money (or even eat) an authentic
shipboard
meal from the late Middle Ages. But in the interest of broadened
knowledge,
take a look at these files in the Florilegium.

In the TRAVEL section:
ships-msg         (90K)  5/24/01    Ships and shipbuilding. Sailor's
food.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/TRAVEL/ships-msg.html

In the FOOD-MEATS section:
stockfish-msg     (93K) 12/12/00    Period preserved fish. Dried, smoked
and
                                       salted fish. Recipes.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD-MEATS/stockfish-msg.html

> If we do the long weekend I will also be cooking a second feast which will be
> a liberty feast (those of you who are ex-sea service will understand
> '"liberty") which will more than likely be of Spanish or English nature, I
> haven't thought that through yet.  It may even be a mixture of dishes from
> several different "ports of call" countries.

Well, this is complicated by the fact that in the US at least, SCA rules
don't allow you to provide alcoholic beverages, although in the pursuit
of authenticity, I guess these could be really cheap stuff. :-)

However, for the flavor of this maybe this file:
fish-msg         (109K)  5/26/00    Medieval fish dishes. Fish in the
SCA.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD-MEATS/fish-msg.html
fish-pies-msg     (11K)  5/ 3/01    Period fish pies. Recipes.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD-MEATS/fish-pies-msg.html
seafood-msg       (77K)  4/20/01    Medieval non-fish seafood. Recipes.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD-MEATS/seafood-msg.html

But would sailors on "liberty" really want fish? or something as far
from the sea as you could get it, like beef or lamb?

Stefan li Rous
stefan at texas.net