[Sca-cooks] Rotten meat and spices...

[Chris Stanifer]

--- "Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius" <adamantius.magister at verizon.net> wrote:
> Also sprach Jadwiga Zajaczkowa / Jenne Heise:
> >  > That's reading quite a bit into it, I think.  The mention of 
> >bacon alone indicates that she did
> >>  have ample pork as a protein source,
> >
> >Gies and Gies and other sources indicate that bacon and other small
> >portions of meat were often given to day laborers as hire or given out
> >among the customary exchanges for harvest help. So she might not have
> >had a pig in order to have bacon.
> 
> Flitches of bacon were apparently being given out as prizes for 
> various competitions and achievements in English county fairs in the 
> 20th century... I wouldn't be at all surprised to find this was a 
> very old custom.
> 
> Adamantius
> -- 


Sure.  But the Chaucer tale indicates the widow had a few pigs, so I am assuming she had them for
food or (as Lainie mentioned) for breeding/selling purposes.  However, I'm more inclined to think
that they were on hand for the food they supplied.  And, a good part of me (yes, there is at least
one) wants to think that she would have kept more than just a rasher or two of bacon.

Willy d.

Through teeth of sharks, the Autumn barks.....and Winter squarely bites me.


		
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