[Sca-cooks] On Topic, Welserin's Pear Mustard (long)

[Barbara Benson]

>JadwigaSCA-Cooks, I like you all, but dieting, mundane holiday cooking, and
computer stuff seem to dominate the list for the last year. Is there any
way to revitalize the period cooking part of the list? I don't mind
deleting but when I'm deleting nearly everything and/or even the
interesting topics peter out into diets, I'm not sure whether this list is
worth it.

Greetings,

I was going to wait until I had totally finished the documentation, but
seeing this plea made me decide to just go ahead.

I am working on an A&S entry for this weekend, long story short, starting at
one spot ended up with me making a variety of mustards, one of them being
Welserin's Pear. There are many different redactions on the web, and even
several that were posted here I hope what I have done will add at least a
little interesting to the corpus. The following is the second Appendix to my
research that discusses the Pear Preserves I used to make the Mustard, I
have just copied and pasted so it is in "documentation" speak.

Appendix B
The Welserin recipe calls for pear preserves. I did not want to purchase
ready made preserves (assuming they could be found), but neither Welserin
nor her contemporary Rumpolt saw fit to provide us with a recipe for pear
preserves. Instead of moving to a parallel source from another region of
Europe I decided to look back in time to earlier German manuscripts, hoping
to keep the continuity of the region.

Luckily the Teutonic cookbook provides us with a sort of pear preserve.
18. Wilthu ein gruneß von Huzellen machenn:
so wasche die Huzell gar schone und stos sie clein und streich sie durch
mytt Wein und seidt sye dann woll und thu dan darein guett Hoengk und wurz
genuck und wer es zu din, so reib Prott darein und thu es in ein Haffenn so
bleybett es dir 4 ader 6 wochen guett. das magst kallt ader warm gebenn und
stre(u) Zucker daruff und Zimettrindenn.
18. If you want to make a green (dish) of pears
Wash the pears nicely and pound them finely. Pass them through a sieve with
wine, boil them well and add good honey and enough spices. If it is too
thin, add ground breadcrumbs. If you put it into a crockpot, it will last
for 4 to 6 weeks. It can be served cold or hot. Sprinkle it with sugar and
cinnamon.
In keeping with the theme of this line of research I chose to update the
recipe to coincide with what I have found by comparing the texts, namely
that the use of honey had been all but phased out by the 16th century in
most things. So, to this end I substituted sugar for honey in the recipe and
I utilized the same Reisling wine that I chose for the end sauce.

To determine what spices to use I reviewed the Welserin manuscript and
identified five recipes that were for dishes in which pears were the main
ingredient. The break down of the seasoning was: two with cinnamon only; two
with cinnamon and cloves; and one with cinnamon, ginger and cloves. The
original recipe calls for cinnamon at the end, so I chose to go with
cinnamon and cloves to fulfill the mandate of "enough" spices.
Lastly, the issue of pears, I went to the market and looked at all of the
pears available to me. Of all on display the ones that were labeled
 "Forelle" looked the best in quality, so those are what I bought. Upon
returning home I decided to see what I could find on the pear, fully
expecting it to be a modern variety, but hopefully better than a Bosc. What
I was able to find was fortuitous:
      "Forelles are a very old variety, and are thought to have originated
sometime in the 1600's in northern Saxony, Germany. The name Forelle
translates to mean "trout" in the German language. It is believed that the
variety earned this name because of the similarity between the pear's
brilliant red lenticles and  the colors of a Rainbow trout.."
           Pear Bureau Northwest. Forelle Pears - History.
http://www.usapears.com/
http://www.usapears.com/varieties_forelle.php#history
With no further research to substantiate this claim, I would not hold it as
fact. But possibly luck was with me that day.
Ingredients:
      6 small Forelle Pears
      ¾ C Reisling Wine
      1 ½ C Sugar
      1 t Cinnamon
      pinch Cloves
Peel pears and cut in half, remove seeds and chop coarsely. Place in food
processor with wine and process until smooth. Force mixture through a sieve
into non-reactive cooking pot. Add spices and sugar, stir to combine. Bring
to a boil and hold at a low boil for 30 minutes. Stir frequently to avoid
scorching. Refrigerate or can using sanitary methods.

There have been plenty of redactions of the mustard itself posted, so unless
someone wants it I will not make this any longer. One point that I was a bit
confused on tho, in most of the redactions by SCA'ers that I have seen they
have added vinegar. In the Welserin it calls for wine. I was wondering why
people added the vinegar.

Glad Tidings,
Serena da Riva