[Sca-cooks] Looking for picnic side dish

[Maggie MacDonald]

At 08:59 AM 4/12/02,Harris Mark.S-rsve60 said something like:
>One of my brothers will be in town this weekend. One of the
>plans is to eat hamburgers over at my other brother's house
>on Saturday evening. I have been asked to bring a side dish
>of some type.
>
>They liked the baked beans that I brought last
>time, so they requested something like that. They will already
>have a salad. If I can find some fresh horseradish, I might
>try the fried horseradish strips (given on this list by
>Balthazar of Blackmoor). I will also bring a variety of
>mustards for the hamburgers. Not medieval mustards, as I
>never think of this far enough in advance and they need
>to age some.
>
>Anyway, does anyone have any suggestions of a period dish
>that would work as a sidedish/fingerfood with hamburgers?
>Yes, this is part of my scheme to introduce the mundane
>world to medieval foods when I can.
>
>Thanks,
>   Stefan

I've had great luck with a cheese straws type recipe.

It's Raynolles (pg 252 in Take a 1000 eggs), the redaction reads: Take
seethed pork and cheese, and seethe together, and cast thereto good
powdered pepper, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, maces, and close thine mixture
in dough and fry it in fresh grease right well, and then serve it forth.

There's another one that my kids really loved, though for the life of me I
can't remember what it was in. You basically cut a harder cheese into
chunks, encase in a dough made with flour, wine, water (&egg?), then they
advised you fry it.   I tried that with a batter, and with a piecrust
consistency dough, both baked and fried.  The one that was received best by
the cub scout age boys was the baked in piecrust-type-dough one. I had
taken monterey jack cheese and a sharp cheddar, cut them into short french
fry size pieces, then enclosed them and baked them. It was a bit of work,
for each little cheese. The baked product stayed 'crisp' longer than the
fried one (which is why that one ended up more preferred).

Good luck!
Maggie MacD.