[Sca-cooks] Brussels sprouts was Re: Sca-cooks Digest, Vol 29, Issue 12

[kingstaste at mindspring.com]

So, if you are to use olive oil in Lent, what sort of oil are they calling
for the rest of the time?  Could it be interpreted as an animal-based oil
such as bacon grease or butter?
I usually make my russel brouts with onion and bacon, rendered down, then
cooked with some vinegar and honey - a taught to me by a German butcher.
Without the honey and using the vinegar and oil, this sounds close.  What do
you supposed "serve them very thick" means?  Not just without water, that
wouldn't make them 'thick', do you suppose they are cooked down to a mush?

Greetings,

Please allow me to push that date back to 1393. The following is from
Le Menagier de Paris, Power's translation, page 255:

"Cabbage hearts at the end of the vintage. And when the heart of the
cabbage, which is in the midst, is plucked off, you pull up the stump
of the cabbage and replant it in fresh earth, and there will come forth
from it big spreading leaves; and the cabbage takes a great deal of
room and these cabbage hearts be called Roman cabbages and they be
eaten in winter; and when the stumps be replanted, there grow out of
them little cabbages which be called sprouts and which be eaten with
raw herbs in vinegar; and if you have plenty, they are good with the
outer leaves removed and then washed in warm water and cooked whole in
a little water; and then when they be cooked add salt and oil and serve
them very thick, without water, and put olive oil over them in Lent…

HTH,

Cindy