[Sca-cooks] period beverages

[Christine Seelye-King]

Here are the recipes from the Miscellany, none of them calls for mint.  I
have also had syrups of violet (wonderful), rose (ok, but could get
cloying), carrot, tamarind, and others.
Experiment and have fun!
Christianna

Syrup of Simple Sikanjabîn
(Oxymel)
Andalusian p. A-74

Take a ratl of strong vinegar and mix it with two ratls of sugar, and cook
all this until it takes the form of a syrup. Drink an ûqiya of this with
three of hot water when fasting: it is beneficial for fevers of jaundice,
and calms jaundice and cuts the thirst, since sikanjabîn syrup is beneficial
in phlegmatic fevers: make it with six ûqiyas of sour vinegar for a ratl of
honey and it is admirable.

This seems to be at least two different recipes, for two different medical
uses. The first, at least, is intended to be drunk hot. In modern Iranian
restaurants, sekanjabin is normally served cold, often with grated cucumber.


Syrup of Pomegranates
Andalusian p. A-74

Take a ratl of sour pomegranates and another of sweet pomegranates, and add
their juice to two ratls of sugar, cook all this until it takes the
consistency of syrup, and keep until needed. Its benefits: it is useful for
fevers, and cuts the thirst, it benefits bilious fevers and lightens the
body gently.

Use equal volumes of sugar and pomegranate juice (found in some health food
stores). Cook them down to a thick syrup, in which form they will keep,
without refrigeration, for a very long time. To serve, dilute one part of
syrup in 3 to 6 parts of hot water (to taste).


Syrup of Lemon
Andalusian p. 279 (trans DF)

Take lemon, after peeling its outer skin, press it and take a ratl of juice,
and add as much of sugar. Cook it until it takes the form of a syrup. Its
advantages are for the heat of bile; it cuts the thirst and binds the
bowels.

This we also serve as a strong, hot drink. Alternatively, dilute it in cold
water and you have thirteenth century lemonade. All three of the original
recipes include comments on medical uses of the syrups.


Hippocras
Goodman p. 299/28

To make powdered hippocras, take a quarter of very fine cinnamon selected by
tasting it, and half a quarter of fine flour of cinnamon, an ounce of
selected string ginger, fine and white, and an ounce of grain of Paradise, a
sixth of nutmegs and galingale together, and bray them all together. And
when you would make your hippocras, take a good half ounce of this powder
and two quarters of sugar and mix them with a quart of wine, by Paris
measure. And note that the powder and the sugar mixed together is the Duke's
powder.

4 oz stick cinnamon
2 oz powdered cinnamon
"A sixth" (probably of a pound-2 2/3 ounces) of nutmegs and galingale
together
1 oz of ginger
1 oz of grains of paradise

Grind them all together. To make hippocras add 1/2 ounce of the powder and
1/2 lb (1 cup) of sugar to a 2 quarts of boiling wine (the quart used to
measure wine in Paris c. 1393 was about 2 modern U.S. quarts, the pound and
ounce about the same as ours). Strain through a sleeve of Hippocrates (a
tube of cloth, closed at one end).