[Sca-cooks] Adventures in redaction...LONG

[Carol Eskesen Smith]

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[ Picked text/plain from multipart/alternative ]
OK, the reason you don't want to chop the onions before boiling is that the recipe says not to.  And you'll lose some of the flavor if you do, too.
BTW, it doesn't sound like a "failure", just not a total success.
Regards,
Brekke

----- Original Message -----
From: Laura C. Minnick
Sent: Sunday, April 27, 2003 2:15 AM
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
Cc: Karlinda at teleport.com
Subject: [Sca-cooks] Adventures in redaction...LONG

Allright- I have two tales- one a success, one, er, well...

First one was last week. Regina and I were going to dinner at a friend's
house (y'all in Caid might remember Jill Blackhorse) and it was potluck.
Main dish was ham, so I decided a sweet/savory sauce would be good, and I
made Erbowle (#98 in _Forme of Cury_).

Text says: "Erbowle. Take bolas and scald hem with wyne, and drawe hem
thorow a straynour; do hem in a pot. Clarify hony, and do therto with
powdour fort and flour of rys. Salt it and flourish with whyte aneys, &
serue it forth."

Pretty straightforward. I'd made it once years back, and it's sorta similar
to the Syrosye, so I just assembled ingredients and went for it.

Bolas are plums. The tree in the backyard puts out some really nice ones,
and Regina halves them and freezes them (those that we don't scarf down
straighway, that is ;-). So I got a bunch of plums out of the freezer- I
filled the big stewpot about halfway.

Scald them with wine- I rustled around in the other room and came up with a
bottle of apple wine from her brother's farm in Coos Bay. Slopped something
like half the bottle in the pot, brought it to a boil.

As to drawing through a strainer- you *have* to be kidding! I did that a
couple of times a few years back (one especially memorable one was the
'Perre', peas mush? Oh god. Never again) and was not interested in doing it
again. So I got out the Cuisinart. I ran the plum slop through in small
batches, and just kept rotating it through until all the of plum halves
were mooshed. Oh man, did it smell good! Returned it to the pot, turned the
heat down to med low. Added a little more wine.

There was a jar in the pantry with about 1/2" of honey in the bottom, also
from Bill's place in Coos River. I pulled that out, put in in a small pot
of water, and set it to boil (It was pretty firm in the jar.) When it had
melted I skimmed a little foam off the top, and dumped a little (1 tsp?)
powder fort in there and mixed it up. There wasn't any flour of rys in the
house, so I fell back on a little flour of wheat. it worked. I mixed it all
up in the honey jar, and then put it in the plums. I let them boil down and
thicken for a bit, then turned it into a big glass bowl to take to Ralph
and Jill's. I didn't add white anise- mostly because we didn't have any
(and mine is at Dad's house 180 miles away, natch) and partly because
people can be really weird about anise/licorice sometimes and as it was a
'florissh' I figured I could leave it out.

It was a hit. Jill used some to baste the ham (ooohhhh...) and we ate it
with the ham and slathered on just about everything else (except the potato
chips). It was great just spread on bread.

I think the only thing I'd do differently is to do it with rice flour or
amydon, just to see what the difference, it any, would be. Other than that,
I'd do this one again, you betcha!

Second one was today. It was an Onion or Shallot Tart, #77 in _The Medieval
Kitchen_.

Now this recipe is one of the reasons I don't trust these folks with their
redactions. A couple of years ago, I tried this recipe and it SO didn't
turn out. When I read back through, I discovered that the original recipe
specified that the onions be boiled well, then cut up and put in the tart.
Their redaction left out the boiling part completely, leaving my with a
tart burnt on the edges with raw onions in the middle. Nobody would eat it
(and this was in a camp full of teenagers!) and I ended up throwing the
pies out.

Also, in their note between the recipe and their redaction, they drop in
this little gem: "We have decided to follow the letter of the recipe and
interpret it as simple as possible." WHAT?! Like you usually don't? Oh dear...

Now, for the sad story.

First- do not attempt to redact a recipe when you feel like something that
ought to be scraped off the bottom of your shoe. Give it up, go back to
bed. I know most of the mistakes I made were because I was foggy and not
thinking clearly.

Now, the translated (not redacted) recipe:

"Torta of shallots, or of onions, etc. If you want to make a torta of these
two things, take whichever you like and boil it well. Frist thoroughly
remove the water with a sieve, and then chop them fine, and take good pork
fat and chop it well; take eggs and fresh cheese and saffron and chop them
together, and make the torta."

First- the onions. As the recipe clearly states (and I double-checked the
Italian), boil the onions well, then chop them. I peeled five medium
onions, quatered them, put them on to boil.

Next- the crust. I was just going to make up my standard 'rich' crust,
flour, butter, salt, a little milk, and an egg. Ok, but I only wanted one
crust, and my recipe makes two. No problem, I can cut the recipe.

Did I mention I was not thinking clearly? I cut the flour in half. I cut
the salt in half I cut the milk in a little less than half because you
can't cut an egg in half.

I forgot to cut the butter in half.

I thought the dough was softer than usual, but I thought I was just leading
a charmed life I guess- I usually have trouble with the crust, and this one
pressed into the pan easily. I poked it all over and put it in the over to
pre-bake.

Now to the cheese mixture. It said 'fresh cheese', which I'm guessing is
not aged cheese, so I used ricotta and a little goat cheese that we had
left from something else. I added two eggs, beat it a bit, and added some
saffron.

The original recipe also says to add pork fat. Here's another example of
whow stupid I was. The redaction, which I re-read trying to figure out what
went wrong the last time, calls for pancetta. Why, I don't know, becasue
the Italian clearly says LARD. So my foggy head says 'pancetta. I'll
substitute bacon'. Which may work, but it doesn't substitute for lard! I
cut up five pieces of thick bacon and put them in the bowl with the cheese.

Now to check the crust.
Oh. My. God.
It had all slid down into the pan and looked like crust sludge deep-fried.
All I could see was the bubbling butter. I pulled it out and set it on the
stove and cried not to cry. I knew right away what had happened. I tried to
shove the crust back up the sides with a spoon. They weren't going. So I
put it back in the oven, figuring it might as well finish deep-frying.

Now I took the onions off the boil and set them to drain. When they'd
stopped dripping, I cut them up. This was easier said then done, because
they were cooked now, and slimy/slippery. And they were hot. Finally got
them cut up, mixed in with the cheese.

Pulled the 'crust' out of the oven, let it stop bubbling for a bit, dumped
the onion/cheese mixture in, and put it back in the oven. By now I know it
is a disaster as a redaction, but hey- cheese, eggs, onions, bacon, and
butter- it can't be that bad!

The good news is that is tastes good! The bad news is that it is not a
period onion tart. The good news is that it has bacon in it! The bad news
is that the period version does not. The good news is that it has butter!
The bad news is that it is swimming in it.

What I know to do different next time:

Don't cook when I feel lousy. Don't cook when I feel lousy. Did I mention
don't cook when I feel lousy?

I think with the corrected recipe, the crust would be fine.

The onions- they have to be boiled ahead. Can they be diced ahead also, or
is there a reason why not? (Back of my head says there is, but I can't
think of it.)

The bacon. Tastes great. But that's not what it is supposed to taste like.
Leave it out. I will think about the lard. Any ideas how much?

The cheese and eggs. I think I would use more eggs and a little less
cheese. It is very crumbly and not holding together. Not at all like a
quiche, more like a cheesecake with onions in it (don't all gag at once!).

Other than everything I did wrong with it, it was a pretty good experience.
And I learned not to cook when I feel lousy...

Comments/questions welcome and encouraged, of course.

'Lainie

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Sometimes Life makes drastic changes without our permission...
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