[Sca-cooks] Potluck Contribution - French Toast

[Christine Seelye-King]

So, I'm walking through MY Giant Eagle (I am convinced our Pennsic dollars
have bought that beautiful new store in New Castle), wondering what I could
fix for the potluck the next day.
	 As an aside, did anyone else catch the banners for the Kingdoms of the
East and Middle on the inside of the dairy cooler?  The 'Welcome SCA'
stickers were everywhere, but these banners were 3 feet long vertically, and
printed out in color with the kingdom's arms, taped up on either end of one
of the store's main coolers.  You gotta love local enthusiasm like that.
	I said "you would think I could come up with a period recipe off the top of
my head, hm, what do we have in camp?" and the thought of French Toast
popped up, at the same time as the realization that we had about 10 pounds
of unwanted white bread in camp, 3 dozen eggs or so, and most of the other
ingredients needed.  I decided on three versions (all of which are webbed in
the Florilegium, under "From Lost Bread to French Toast"), Platina's Golden
Balls, Panfoundew, and French Toast from Robert May, which is the first time
we see it called that in English, and is toasted dry bread dunked in a wine
sauce made with orange juice, sugar, and spices (I ended up drinking the
rest of that as sangria later that night - urp!). I went over to SPCA to see
if anyone could remember the recipe for Brown Fries, Phlip produced Cury on
Inglish, Avraham and Fredrick volunteered to help, and soon we had a French
Toast party in my kitchen.  The Golden Balls went so fast, I think it was
Anne that said they weren't out when she started around the table, and by
the time she got all the way around, they were gone.  They are my favorites,
heavy on the egg yolk, saffron, and sugar in the batter, and then drizzled
with saffron, rosewater and sugar to finish.  YUM.
I ended up making a mostly egg white omlet with basil and sundried tomato (a
dried spice mixture one of my camp mates had just bought) that was totally
non-period, but I had this whole bowl of frothy egg whites, and I couldn't
let them go to waste.  I thought it was pretty good, actually.
My favorites on the buffet were the Cumin Chicken, the Heathen Peas, the
Peach Pits (of course) and the anisette(?) cookies, the Byzantine cake, the
tomato dish, and I could go on and on, I liked everything I tasted.  I
didn't end up getting any of the lamb soup, I missed the fact that it was
still over the fire.  I only got one brussel sprout, but it was tasty. I
ended up having to cut up the last cuskynole, but I made sure that even
though I was cutting along the score lines, essentially making an Adamantius
Cuskynole from a Cariadoc Cuskynole, I asked His Grace for permission first,
and he granted it before I ever touched it. :)
As usual, the food was wonderful, and no one seemed to have a hard time
finding something to talk about.
	Now, I can spend some time going over my purchases from Devra, including
the second Anglo Saxon Food book (Production and Distribution), the Anglo
Saxon Food in England, and a household reciept book from the 18th century.
I also got a translation of several treatises on Women's medicine from the
period, which I have not even cracked, but am looking forward to.
I had great fun the whole time I was there, but not being able to be there
for the whole thing definitely makes me want to be there for about 3 weeks
next year!
Christianna