[Sca-cooks] RE: Plums

[Radei Drchevich]

Sorry to be late with this question.

You reference Cato, but do not make the distintion of which, the Elder or
the Younger? just curious. thanx

joy

radei

  ----- Original Message -----
  From: "Stefan li Rous"
  To: "SCA-Cooks maillist SCA-Cooks"
  Subject: [Sca-cooks] RE: Plums
  Date: Wed, 10 Aug 2005 01:33:46 -0500


  Lyse commented:
  > Kool! So it was the reg. plumes/prunes that were used and not the
  red.
  > My question is, did the Norse have access to the prunes/plums?
  > As was stated, "....but otherwise it fits what I know about
  > Hiberno-Viking
  > cooking. I've read that they loved plums."
  > I was wanting docs. because Norse is one of my areas of interest
  and
  > would
  > love to increase the variety to the "smorgasbord". :)

  Well, here is what Baron Akim Yaroslavich has to say about plums in
  his article on period fruits in the Florilegium:
  Period-Fruit-art (60K) 1/13/02 "Fruit of Period Times" by Baron
  Akim Yaroslavich.

  Unfortunately, it doesn't give you much direct info on plums and
  the Norse, but perhaps it will give you some references to check
  from.

  >>>>>>
  PLUMS
  Plums (Prunus domestica) also originated around Armenia in Asia
  Minor and are only botanically distinguished from cherries by
  their size. Plums were first cultivated in western China (89).
  Wild plums, the Bullace (90) (Prunus instititia), Cherry Plums
  (91) (Prunus cerasifera) and the Sloe (92) (Prunus spinosa) now
  grow wild throughout Europe and have hybridized extensively.
  Cultivated plums arose as a cross between the sloe and the cherry
  plum in the Caucasus region (93). Damsons are a variety of bullace
  plum well known in Roman times, and imported from Damascus in
  Syria, hence its name (94). At the time of Cato, Romans were
  familiar with prunes but not the plum tree itself (95). Besides
  the Damson, Pliney described 12 varieties of plums growing in
  Italy in the 1st century A.D. (96). Plums have been cultivated in
  Europe since the 8th century and are recorded in England from the
  13th century. Chaucer described a garden with "ploumes and
  bulaces" in 1369 (97); "Damaske or damassons" (damson) plums are
  mentioned in the 1526 Grete Herball of Peter Treveris (98).
  The Sainte Catherine, a white plum, was an old French variety grown
  for drying and sold as the famous Pruneaux de Tours (99).
  The Morocco plum was a sweet black plum listed by Parkinson in 1629
  (100) as an old plum of unknown origin.
  Blue Pérrigon or the Précoce de Tours was both a blue-black prune
  and dessert plum grown in Italy and France near the Basse Alps. It
  was first imported to England in 1582. (101)
  The Mirabelle de Nancy was a bullace plum grown in France in the
  15th century. (102)
  Another French bullace was the Reine Claude (103), dating in France
  from the reign of Francis I (1494-1547). It came from Italy,
  where it was called Verdocchia (104); it came to Italy from
  Armenia via Greece. This plum is better known by its English name
  of Greengage.
  <<<<<<<

  You'll have to go look at the article to get all the footnotes.

  These two files might also be worth checking:
  plums-msg (24K) 2/ 6/04 Period plums and plum recipes.
  fd-Norse-msg (61K) 7/ 3/05 Norse and Viking food.

  Stefan
  --------
  THLord Stefan li Rous Barony of Bryn Gwlad Kingdom of Ansteorra
  Mark S. Harris Austin, Texas StefanliRous at austin.rr.com
  **** See Stefan's Florilegium files at: http://www.florilegium.org
  ****



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