[Sca-cooks] Origin of the "spice to hide taste of rotten meat" myth?

[a5foil]

In the introduction to Stere Hit Well (1972) which is an edition of Pepys
1047, a late 15th century English compliation, Delia Smith -- who apparently
despises medieval food, and certainly does not understand it -- says, after
commenting on the "totally indiscriminate use of spices and herbs" that "It
is commonly thought that such heavy seasoning was essential to disguise the
smell and flavour of decaying flesh." Now I don't know where *she* got the
idea, but it is definitely there, in print, in 1972.

Cynara








----- Original Message -----
From: "david friedman" <ddfr at daviddfriedman.com>
To: "Cooks within the SCA" <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Sent: Thursday, July 24, 2003 3:37 PM
Subject: [Sca-cooks] Origin of the "spice to hide taste of rotten meat"
myth?


> In the course of a Usenet discussion, someone raised the question of
> when and where the belief that medievals used lots of spices to hide
> the taste of rotten meat originated. The best I could do was point at
> the reference to the strong stomachs of our ancestors in the
> introduction to _Two Fifteenth Century Cookery Books_, done about
> 1890--but that says nothing about rotten meat. I said I would put the
> question to this list.
> --
> David/Cariadoc
> http://www.daviddfriedman.com/
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