[Sca-cooks] Some general info on Apicius for the newcomers

[Phil Troy/ G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach Anne duBosc:
>In 1936, an American professional cook, J.D. Vehling published a
>translation of one of these manuscripts.  It is rather flawed, in
>that Vehling was often more interested in producing what seemed to
>him a more palatable recipe than in actually translating the Latin.
>In 1958, Flowers and Rosenbaum, two women culinary historians,
>studied several of these Medieval manuscripts and published an
>English Language translation called "The Roman Cookery Book."  I
>have found this translation much more dependable than the Vehling
>work.
>
>These are the first two known English Language translations of
>Apicius.  There were several others at that time in other languages,
>and there have been several more recent ones in English that I have
>not yet had the opportunity to read.

John Edwards' version is okay, I guess. From a scholarly standpoint,
it's okay, but some of his culinary judgement calls are more English
than Roman, possibly due to ingredient availability, or simply what
he and his readers might be used to, so you get things sauteed in
butter, for example (IIRC). OTOH, the background information and the
cookery-related quotes from people Martial, Juvenal, Terence and
Plautus are pretty darned cool.

I guess I'd call it a flawed work in a great package.

Adamantius