indigo [was Re: [Sca-cooks] Puritans, was: Canadian Friends]

[Philip & Susan Troy]

Pixel, Goddess and Queen wrote:

> What he said. And I still haven't found any sources that tell me whether
> it's safe to use inert indigo (the dyeing process involves oxidation) to
> color one's pottage, as mentioned in the Anglo-Norman sources, or if they
> just meant indigo-colored, ie, blue. And in that case, what are my options
> for blue? I mean, I can very easily saunter over to the tackle box of joy
> and find the blue icing color, but that doesn't tell me what my period
> counterpart would have used.

Tournesole ( a bugloss relative, apparently) can produce an allegedly
edible blueish-purple, and it's mentioned fairly often in
fourteenth-century English recipe sources. And there's at least one
fifteenth-century recipe that calls for a green coloring to be mixing
infusions of saffron with "ynde wawdeas", which could conceivably be an
indigo reference, or perhaps woad. And then there's the simple expedient
of making an almond-milk-based mawmenny with certain types of red wine,
which, again, produces a somwhat more purple shade than a blue. It's
also possible that the medieval color sense was slightly different from
ours, and that some purples were regarded as blue.

Adamantius
--
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com

"It was so blatant that Roger threw at him.  Clemens gets away with
things that get other people thrown out of games.  As long as they
let him get away with it, it's going  to continue." -- Joe Torre, 9/98