[Sca-cooks] Cardamom?

[lilinah at earthlink.net]

Daniel wrote:
>Was written:
>  > I'm just curious, because there are so many other Asian spices that
>  > were used in Europe that are no longer, such as long pepper,
>  > galangal, and grains of paradise. Why not cardamom?
>
>Excuse me, perhaps I misunderstand,

Yes, i think you do :-)

>is it being suggested that cardamom is
>not still in use in traditional European food?

Nope. I'm am asking about SCA-period, i.e., before 1601.

>If so I know for a fact
>that cardamom is still in use in traditional Finnish baking and the results
>are quite tasty.

I'm familiar with the use of cardamom in 20th (and no doubt 21st) 
century Swedish baking.

Perhaps i was not explicit enough. I guess sometimes i'm just too terse.

My original message:
>I was wondering whether anyone has found SCA-period European recipes
>that call for cardamom. While I have found SCAdians' "redactions"
>that use it, especially in spice blends, I can't think of any period
>European recipes that actually call for cardamom.

In my first paragraph, I say i cannot recall any SCA-period recipes 
using cardamom. And i ask if anyone knows of any Medieval or 
Renaissance European recipes that use cardamom. I mention also that i 
have seen modern SCA redactions that interpolate cardamom into 
various spice blends, but that i don't recall cardamom being 
mentioned in any Medieval or Renaissance European recipes.

>I'm just curious, because there are so many other Asian spices that
>were used in Europe that are no longer, such as long pepper,
>galangal, and grains of paradise. Why not cardamom?

My second paragraph was meant to point out that a number spices now 
obscure in Modern Europe were used in the Medieval and Renaissance 
periods. The final sentence is meant to ask, in a very truncated 
form, "Why was cardamom not used (or not more common) in Medieval 
and/or Renaissance Europe?" In other words, if Medieval and 
Renaissance Europeans could get such a wide range of spices as they 
did, why didn't they have cardamom?

Anahita