[Sca-cooks] Doreures et leschefrites

[Alex Clark]

At 04:05 PM 2/21/2004 -0500, Adamantius wrote:
>FWIW, Scully has "doreurs" in his glossary for his edition of Taillevent, 
>and he translates it as "glazings". I agree that this could easily be a 
>yolky-saffron-ey mixture designed to go  on pommedorry. Now, note that he 
>_also_ translates pets d'Espaigne as Spanish Pots or Spanish Farts (as in 
>farce or stuffing): think of those English recipes where you make your 
>pommedorry mixture into shapes with molds such as sacks or flowerpots, 
>then remove, roast and glaze them. I believe there are also English 
>recipes that use the same stuffing for castle-shaped subtleties (although 
>I think there's also pastry involved in that one). That might serve as 
>_some_ evidence, at least, to interpret the expression to mean something 
>like, "a gilt-glazed course of 'little apples', 'Spanish flowerpots', and 
>'castles'".
>
>Unless instead of castles it has something to do with chestnuts, but I'd 
>doubt it.

Thanks! Maybe I should read _Curye on Inglysch_ every time I have questions 
about _le Menagier_. :-) It seems like "doreures de pommeaulx et de pe`s 
d'Espaigne et de chastellier" might translate pretty well to "English" as 
"pomme dorryse and potte wys and chastletes". That's IV 182, IV 185, and IV 
197. This raises a new question: the recipe for chastletes seems to 
distinguish between the fillings that retain their natural color and those 
that are colored with saffron, saunders, or something green (parsley, 
perhaps); does this mean that only the fillings are colored, or should the 
pastry be colored too? Taillevent isn't helping -- he wants to cover his 
tower with linen, which suggests that it's not for eating.

BTW, Scully's Taillevent is now on my shopping list.

Henry of Maldon/Alex Clark