[Sca-cooks] Kitchen Scene by Campi

[Phil Troy/ G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach Stefan li Rous:
>Olwen said:
>>I was thinking grating bread for crumbs.  Doesnt' look like a cheese grater
>>to me.  Looks like a boot scraper type thing which would work for scraping
>>stale or toasted bread across.
>Yes, I would agree that this is probably bread, because of the small resulting
>
>particles. It could be a very hard, crumbly cheese, but I think bread crumbs.
>I don't know what you mean by "boot scraper". I think the scraper looks
>like many modern cheese graters, although of heavier material than the sheet
>steel that I usually see. I can see multiple cavities/scraping areas on the
>plate.

I think the reference to a boot scraper was in regard to the fact
that it looked (to me, anyway, and possibly to Olwen) like the
surface had little teeth on it, rather than holes in it, like a
modern grater. In other words, more like a file (which might support
the idea of breadcrumbs, since recipes have been known to refer to "a
rasping of breadcrumbs", or just plain "raspings"). I imagine you
could heat an iron plate (the device pictured looked rather thick,
heavy, and black, like an iron utensil) and give it teeth with a
chisel, just as a smith might do to make a file.

Reading the above, Stefan, I'll throw this in just in case: a boot
scraper is a gizmo, usually cast iron, that you bolt to the floor of
your porch, vestibule, foyer, etc. The ones I've seen are in the form
of a rectangular framework, maybe six or seven inches square, with a
series of toothed bars. You scrape the soles and heels of your boots
on the toothy bars, to remove impacted mud or snow, which falls
between the bars, rather than being tracked into the house.

Adamantius