[Sca-cooks] Chyryse or Syrosye

[Karen O]

> >From "Forme of Cury" p. 33,
> 1 cup unblanched almonds
> 1/2 cup cherries (I used water pack canned cherries)
> 6 oz. chicken broth
> 4 dinner rolls
> 1 tsp. powder forte
> 1/2 tsp. salt
> anise seed
>
> Grind almonds and cherries.  Add chicken broth and grind some more.  Bring
to a rolling boil, reduce heat, and simmer for about 30min.  Cool.  Process
again.  Cut dinner rolls into cubes and place in the bottom of a casserole.
Sprinkle with powder forte and salt.  Cover with cherry mush.  Sprinkle on
anise seed.  Bake at 350 for 25 min.
> Notes:  Next time I'll make almond milk with the almonds, and strain out
the nuts.
> I also want to try this as a sweet dish.  Pegge says in his introduction
that "powder" could be taken to mean sugar in some dishes.
> Lady Anne du Bosc
> Known as Mordonna The Cook

    This is what I have made, and entered into  A&S exhibitions:

To make a syrosye               (#33,  III: Utilis Coquinario  Curye in
Inglysch  p.90 )

Tak cheryes & do out the stones & grynde hem wel & draw hem thorw a
streynoure & do it in a pot. & do therto whit gres or swete botere & Myed
wastel bred, & cast therto good wyn & sugre, & salte it & stere it wel
togedere, & dresse it in disches; & set theryn clowe gilofre & strew sugar
aboue.


My Redaction:
Take  cherries and stone them, grind them until the pulp can be strained.
Put the mixture in a pot with white grease or sweet butter and mild (sweet)
white breadcrumbs and good wine, sugar and salt.  Stir this well, and cook
until thickened.   Pour the mixture into bowls, and place upon it whole
cloves sprinkle with sugar.


Recipe:
1 lb.  sour  cherries, pitted
½ cup fresh breadcrumbs (preferably a sweet white bread)
2 Tbs. Sugar (plus a bit more to sprinkle)
1-2 Tbs butter
½ cup - ¾ cup white wine
whole cloves

Grind the cherries into puree.  In a large pot pour in the cherry puree,
wine, butter, and sugar.  Stirring well, bring to a slow boil and slowly add
the breadcrumbs a little at a time.  Continue to stir and cook the mixture
to the desired consistency of a strong dense pudding consistency: when the
spoon is drawn through the mixture, the bottom of the pot is seen (about
30 - 45 min).  Pour into a well-oiled 2 cup mold.  Chill.  Unmold, and dot
with cloves.  Sprinkle sugar on it, and serve.
 Serves 4.

Commentary:
This is a true "to taste" recipe.  Quantities of ingredients used have a lot
of variables: how sweet are the cherries, how juicy, the density of the
breadcrumbs, how much texture is wanted, how tart/sweet the end product is
wanted, etc.   Care should be used when adding the sugar  -- one doesn't
want to make the dish so sweet that the tartness of the cherry is lost.
"Dresse it in disches" has also given me pause for thought.

 Similar recipes found in Curye On Inglysch ,  have directions that state:
"Make it so that  it be stondyng,"   ( Chyryse,  IV: Form of Cury, # 59)  or
"wan it is wel ysodyn & ydressyd in dyschis , stick therin clowis of
 gilofre" (II: Diuersa Servicia, #77 ).  The index & glossary for Curye On
Inglysch describes  the dishes as "thick  cherry pottages."  The recipes all
say,  "to stick" into the mixture cloves, and that also lets me think this
may be a dense enough dish to mold.

The other recipes noted above, also have given hints on the type of cherry:
"tak chiryes at the fest of Seynt Iohn the Baptist,"  The feast of St. John
the Baptist is June 24th.  This is the harvest time for the fruit we know as
sour/pie cherries.  I have used frozen and canned (pie) cherries, with an
eye to the finished product, have been pleased with the results for texture
& flavor.   When using canned cherries, I have reserved the water they were
packed in, and reduced it by half & used it along with the white wine for
the liquid called for in the recipe.   Once stoned, the cherry is a soft
fruit with a thin, soft skin, and grinding it well enough to "draw thorw a
streynoure"  is to puree it well, be it with a food mill, a  hand masher, a
blender or food processor.

"Myed wastel bred" is defined in the Glossary as high quality white bread.