[Sca-cooks] Period or no?

[Madylyne Sparkes]

>There are plenty of rich filling soup-type things in the medieval recipes,
>but nothign that equates to modern stew with meat, onions, and root 
>vegetables
>such as carrots and potatos.  Lots with meat onions, wine or vinegar, and 
>dried
>fruit, though, and they are yummy!

This lack of stews in period has stumped me recently...  I'm doing my third 
kitchen
this coming weekend and was specifically asked to do stews.  The event is
An Tir's Kingdom Bardic Championship, and the hosting group (the Barony of 
Lions Gate)
is doing a potluck on Saturday evening, with the barony providing 2 main 
dishes - a
meat stew and a vegetarian one.

Because I'm stubborn and don't want to be doing non-medieval food at an event,
especially at a Kingdom event, I'm going with "plausibly period", and 
making up
my own recipe, based on what I know about what ingredients were available and
the types of stuff medieval people liked.

For the meat stew, I am doing a dish which is mainly beef, barley, onions 
and mushrooms
in a beef broth.  What kinds of spices would people suggest to go with this?

For the veggie option, I am still a little stumped.  I am going to do 
something which is
primarily root veggies (carrots, turnips, parsnips) with some sort of 
lentils (which I'm not
sure if they're period or not, but I'm just really stumped and on a REALLY 
tight budget), and
probably orzo pasta, in a vegetable broth.  If anyone has any suggestions 
on this one,
it would be appreciated.  I don't do much vegetarian cooking even at home.

Madylyne



---------------------------------------------------------------
Lady Madylyne Sparkes, AoA ~ madylyne at renaissancewoman.net
Apprentice to Mistress Seiglynda of Elphinstone
Mistress of Arts for the Barony of Lions Gate
Barony of Lions Gate, Principality of Tir Righ, Kingdom of An Tir
(mka Vancouver, BC, Canada)
http://www.renaissancewoman.net