[Sca-cooks] Re: Early Pastries

[James Prescott]

At 12:44 -0400 2001-06-27, Druighad at aol.com wrote:
> I was looking for general info really. I had run  across some references to
> "subleties" and was interested if that  meant  something out of marzipan,
> pastillage, or jellies. I read that they were typically shaped to depict
> scenes and was wondering what materials were used, and how they were
> kept/stored, if they were eaten or just displayed like modern pulled/blown
> sugar pieces.

There is a range of meanings (varying with time and place), from dishes
served as part of the course, to dishes presented individually with
fanfare, to theoretically edible constructions presented individually,
to inedible constructions, to human tableaux, to human performances.

The root meaning of the French word that is often translated into
subtlety is "between dishes", though it is used in Viandier to apply
both to items presented between courses and to ordinary dishes.

- A dish which is presumably slightly special in some way, though to
  the modern culinary sensibility there doesn't seem to be any obvious
  reason why it should have been classified by the medieval cookbook
  author amidst other dishes which are much more clearly 'subtle'.

  I speculate that the medieval cook may have thought of some of the
  dishes as 'palate-cleansers', or at least changes of pace, served
  after the end of a course.  In modern France you might be served
  some small elegant appetiser between dishes.  These go by various
  names including 'amuse-bouche', literally 'mouth pleaser'.  The
  modern serving of a scoop of sorbet between dishes would fall into
  this category.  I further wonder whether there might not be, at
  least for some medieval cooks, a choice of foods which were
  especially well balanced and mild in the humours, or especially
  prescribed to ease the digestion.  Has Scully said anything about
  this?

- A dish made to resemble something which it is not, and intended to
  fool at least until it is tasted, as blancmanger cunningly made to
  resemble whole cooked fish.

- A dish that isn't going to fool anyone at close range, but which
  does resemble something which it is not, such as meat stuffing made
  in the shape of a vase with flowers.

- A dish that is decorated or altered in some non-trivial way, such
  as a blancmanger dyed quarterly, or a cockentrice, or hedgehogs
  (urchins).

- A dish of edible ingredients but possibly not intended to be eaten
  by the spoonful in quite the same way as any of the preceding, such
  as a decorated boar's head or a castle in sugar, marzipan, cake, or
  other ingredient (modern kitchen ice sculpting).  These were
  presumably at least partly consumed by someone, though perhaps not
  always by the diners at the feast.

- The same, but made of partially or entirely inedible ingredients,
  could include something like a dragon's head breathing flame, though
  still presented on a small scale.

- The same, but on a human scale, with humans included such as for St.
  George, a dragon, and a maiden; or a castle under seige.  The actors
  may have remained immobile, or they may have mimed or even spoken a
  few lines.

- The same, but with a full theatrical performance, probably differing
  from a company of strolling players only in being presented under
  the aegis of the head cook rather than by some other officer of the
  household.


Thorvald