[Sca-cooks] TASTES OF ANGLO-SAXON ENGLAND

[Philippa Alderton]

--- Wanda Pease <wandap at hevanet.com> wrote:

> The author gives no original sources.  She mentions
> that the Anglo Saxons
> left no cookbooks but it easy (!) to determine what
> they ate in general
> terms.  She then goes on to combine those known
> foodstuffs into recipes in a
> manner we would all recognize as "well, they had the
> ingredients, so they
> could have put them together this way" cooking.
> I've used that approach in
> years past, and I'm sure other members of the list
> have too (and sometimes
> still do!).  Still, it's disappointing.

Well, it's simply obvious that the author hasn't had
the benefits of folk like Cariadoc or Adamantius to
either A) Drive her crazy or B) keep her honest. It's
a shame, though- the more good books we have, and
commentary on them the better- OTOH, the more bad ones
we have to deal with, the more misapprehensions we
hafta deal with as to what we're trying to do with
Medieval cooking.

Which reminds me- has anyone come up with a definitive
FAQ for "Why we're so AR about following the
originals, and not making up our own recipes from
"period" ingredients?" I'm sure some of us are tired
of typing the whole thing out, every time someone new
comes on the List.

> By the way, honeybutter is declared "Period" and a
> recipe given.

Honey-butter IS period- I have a reference to it being
used in/near Byzantium about 477-478 CE. The trouble
is, that we don't have much documentation of it being
used as a condiment with bread- someone, I believe,
recently quoted one reference at a certain time/place
recently, but that doesn't really cover the entire MA.

My reference (Anthimus) has it used as a medicine,
specificly for lung disease, and I'm sure her recipe
is as valid as any other, including mine, as long as
it says, "Mix honey and butter" and doesn't add
anything else. I would assume her proportions give a
texture which is pleasing to her, just as my
proportions give one pleasing to me (although my exact
proportions vary, depending on what kind of honey I
have to play with today).

Phlip

=====
Never a horse that cain't be rode,
And never a rider who cain't be throwed....

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