[Sca-cooks] Riso con lo zafferano and rice puddings

[Christiane]

This is kind of hitting two questions at once.

For the saffron rice one, I took a look at Clifford Wright's footnotes, and the historian citations he uses are good ones. The big problem is that most of the gastronomical scholarly stuff has only been produced by Italian scholars, in Italian. In poking around on the Web, I found lots of recipes for the Milanese version, which calls for a type of pork sausage, but I've seen modern-day Sephardic saffron risotto recipes that are of course pork-free. In Italy and Spain, the surest way to demonstrate that you weren't a "secret Jew" was to eat pork. Pork entered Sicilian cuisine with a vengeance when the Spanish took over the island. For Serena, I suggest that if you can find a Sephardic Jewish recipe for saffron risotto, that should be very close to what the Jews on the island ate. 

Now, for the rice puddings for 100 question, I found a feast listing for Messisbugo:

BANCHETTO ORGANIZZATO DAL MESSISBUGO PER 104 INVITATI, A FERRARA NEL 1529 (Banquet organized by Messisbugo for 104 guests, at Ferrara in 1529), take a look at the fourth course:
 
 IV° vivanda
 Capretti ripieni arrostiti; capponi in pasta; piccioni ripieni alla lombarda; arrosto con salsa francese; lucci al sale ricoperti di salsa gialla, trote al vino alla ungherese con fette di pane; rombi fritti, coperti di salsa e mostarda; sarde fritte con arance e zucchero; pasticci di pasta reale ripieni di riso alla turca, fritti e ricoperti di zucchero.

"Pasticci di pasta reale" = mess of royal pasta, i.e. marzipan
"ripieni di riso alla turca" = stuffed with rice made in the Turkish fashion (royal Ottoman kitchens were famous for their rosewater-flavored rice puddings).

You may only have to use half as much rice pudding if you're making individual servings encased in marzipan. That's still a helluva lot of rice pudding and a lot of pots to use to make it, though. As well as some very strong arms needed to stir the pots and keep the bottoms from sticking. I'd like to see Messisbugo's recipe for this.

Might just baked rice puddings serve? Figure a large pan can serve 8 to 10, and it's something you can make ahead of time and freeze?

Gianotta