[Sca-cooks] Okay Harlien MS 279 & Harl. MS 4016

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach Micheal:
>Actually I was looking for more primary and secondary sources then 
>the 2 15th century cook books. Which although very good books are 
>the source for multitude of other papers of the same topic. I have 
>copied or downloaded the books them selves or at least what's up on 
>their web pages. Thank you I will hunt your Florilegium some more as 
>well for other sources. Although you should stick a visit counter on 
>that work you may be surprised how much it is used. Is there any 
>topic you don`t have in there as articles.
>Da

Perhaps the "dead end" you're running into for finding earlier 
references to Great Pies is that the concept may not be English, 
originally. There appear to be somewhat older recipes for the kind of 
huge pies with multiple filling ingredients, but they're in French, 
Italian, and perhaps ultimately, Middle Eastern sources.

I know that Chiquart writes extensively on Pies of Parma in Du Fait 
de Cuisine (he gives long, huge, and very detailed accounts for both 
meat and fish-day versions), and that's just a little bit earlier 
than the T15CCB references to Grete Pyes/Pyes of Parys. There seems 
to be no reference to such a dish in The Forme of Cury, which is 
surprising, but there's a recipe for Tourtes Parmerienne in the 
Viandier de Taillevent (late 14th-century French), and I vaguely 
recall some reference, at least, to them in the Enseignements, which 
is earlier still.

I remember reading, a couple of years ago, I guess, a fascinating 
article in Petits Propos Culinaires about the origins of the huge, 
multi-layered pie (I forget exactly when, or which issue... Johnnae? 
Can you help us out with a pointer here?). Anyway, the article 
suggested the origins of the dish could, originally, be Greek or 
Middle Eastern, if I'm remembering it correctly.

Adamantius
-- 




"S'ils n'ont pas de pain, vous fait-on dire, qu'ils  mangent de la 
brioche!" / "If there's no bread to be had, one has to say, let them 
eat cake!"
	-- attributed to an unnamed noblewoman by Jean-Jacques 
Rousseau, "Confessions", 1782

"Why don't they get new jobs if they're unhappy -- or go on Prozac?"
	-- Susan Sheybani, assistant to Bush campaign spokesman Terry 
Holt, 07/29/04