[Sca-cooks] licorice, was food on St Val's day

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach AEllin Olafs dotter:
>Speaking of anise (well, I am, anyway),  I was, in preparation for a 
>dessert board this June, looking at sweets recipes in Markham (I 
>found that I seem to  need to go late for much sweet stuff...)  Boy, 
>either he really liked anise, or it was very popular at the time! 
>This is going to be interesting...

Here's a little thinking-cap project:

Make a list of all the spices you can think of. Separate them into 
two columns -- ones which are native to Europe and will grow there, 
and ones which have to be imported from Asia.

Look at your European list. It'll have stuff like mustard, caraway, 
cumin, coriander seed, anise, fennel, one or two others. Now (with 
the exception of mustard), these aren't the only ones that were 
candied and otherwise preserved, and used in quantity in baking, and 
which figure heavily in Markham, but that list comes pretty close, 
doesn't it?

Adamantius