[Sca-cooks] Re: Spun Sugar

[adamantius.magister at verizon.net]

> On Jul 14, 2005, at 7:17 AM, Elise Fleming wrote:
>
>
>> Adamantius wrote:
>>
>>
>>> I'm pretty sure the thread-spinning technique was used to determine
>>> sugar-boiling temperature / candy state in some 15th-century English
>>> recipes, but whether that was used in period as a construction
>>> material, I don't know.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> I would agree that it was used to determine sugar temperature in  
>> period.  I suppose some folk might say that if they could dip  
>> their finger into hot syrup and make a thread between thumb and  
>> finger that they could have extrapolated that to using an  
>> instrument to wave sugar threads around into a pattern, but one  
>> thing doesn't necessarily follow another - or we'd have had lots  
>> more inventions earlier on.  I haven't seen any evidence in  
>> English books, nor references to things made like that.  The  
>> "faulty translation" reference that Johanna gave was the only one  
>> I'd seen for "proof".
>>
>
> Yeah, well, that was more or less the point I was trying to make,  
> too. At least in your example (which comes from Hugh Plat, I  
> think???) the sugar syrup is spun (in its mold, at least) ;-) Not  
> that that's the meaning of "spun" in this usage set, but hey...
>
> 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
>
>
>





"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