[Sca-cooks] Spices in England

Volker Bach carlton_bach at yahoo.de
Sun Dec 31 23:31:09 PST 2006


Am Samstag, 30. Dezember 2006 21:19 schrieb Suey:
>   I stand to be corrected. Now I too find no evidence that Protestants
> prohibited spices. Stefan I believe it is in Robin Howe's, edited
> version of Mrs. Groundes-Peace’s Old Cookery Notebook (which I do not
> have at hand) in which he states that her 15th Century household
> received something like a spoonful or less of sugar per month while
> Americans in the 20th Century were consuming ? lbs per person per month,
> the figure is extraordinary in comparison. Perhaps Queen Bess had all
> the sugar she wanted but I doubt her subjects saw much of it . . .
> Certainly that was not the case of Iberia where sugar cane flourished in
> the south and the Canaries.

The fifteenth and sixteenth century are the time when sugar starts becoming a 
real sweetener rather than just another spice. The plantations first on the 
Canary Islands, then in the Caribbean and South America ('Pernambuco sugar' 
becomes a trademark in the latter half of the sixteenth century) lead to 
increasing supply and dropping prices in spite of rising demand. Now, I can 
not spoek comprehensively to England, but I have a reasonable collection of 
German cookbooks from that era and the use osf sugar increases dramatically 
between the early fifteenth and the late sixteenth century examples. Since 
there appears to be a Northern European cookrey tradition continuum (tmy 
current project, the 1571 Lübeck Koekerye, has many parallels with the Newe 
Booke of Cookerye), I'd be surprised if we didn't see this in England. 


> Now in the 16th Century we have a waining of Italian merchants, the rise
> and fall of Portuguese importation of spices to Europe and if I remember
> correctly there was English embargo on their goods at some point which
> did include importation of spices they brought from the Far East.
> As I say I only dabble with the 16th Century so please don't quote me or
> ask for references as that the job of someone who is into it. One thing
> I do see, as per Frederick Lane, is the price increase of pepper and
> other spices from the 15th to the 16th Centuries with the increase of
> silver imported into Europe from the Americas. 

AFAIR the *comparative* porices of spices to other goods did not increase. It 
was a matter of general inflation, with wages not keeping pace. Spices 
certainly did not disappear from cookery, though it sees fashions changed.

> So while Queen Bess
> flourishes on mazipan and traditional medieval spiced sauces and other
> delicacies did her subjects as well? How much nutmeg were they receiving?

Probably more than earlier. The example of the Levant Company is telling. It 
was founded in the sixteenth century to trade with the Levant, which then 
mostly meant bringing spices and oriental goods from Egyptian and Syrian 
ports to England. By the early seventeenth century, the company - still going 
strong - was bringing spices bought in Europe (mostly IIRC in Amsterdam at 
that point) *to* the Levant. Clearly, availability can not have been a major 
issue, though of course - what else is new - wage earners were getting the 
sjort end of the stick compared to capital owners, so the clientele probably 
did not then include anyone who sold his labour. 

> I've lost something here. So now you can explain to me what happened? -
> Lainie mentions the Roundheads and the Puritans. Did English cooking
> become tasteless with them? 

Not if the (spuruious) 'Cookbook of Jane Cromwell' is anything to go by. Or, 
for that matter, the other cookbooks published in the latter half of the 
seventeenth century. 

> But then Charles II marries Catherine of
> Portugal gaining major parts of India. Did English cooking improve then?
> Looking at the size of his stomach compared with his father's, something
> did happen. But why is it today that one must drag an Hispano to England
> to convince him that English gourmet cookery is delicious and not post
> World War II gruel?

Reputations can be most unfair. One of the best meals I ever had was in Wales, 
and my unalloyed worst dining experiences an Italian restaurant in Rome and 
an Irish family table in Rath Eanaigh. Interstingly, though, there is an 
eighteenth-century commentary from a German traveler who states that the 
English (upper classes, whom he hobnobbed with, being an aristo), while 
conoisseurs of wines and spirits, were remarkably uninterested in their 
foods. Mind, his standard of compariuson were French and German aristocrats, 
but there may be something cultural at play. Think back to English society 
novels and compare the praise lavished on fine cognac, port or claret with 
that acorded a good roast, fine stew, or grilled fish. 

Interestingly, English cuisine in 19th century Germany was infamous not for 
its blandness, but for its excessive use of hot spices, above all the 
pre-prepared 'englischen Saucen' which many doctors considered unsafe outside 
of tropical latitudes. Miss Beeton (the *real* Miss Beeton) gives recipes for 
mushroom katsup, tomato sauce, hot pepper sauce, and mango chutney without 
mangoes, so there has got to be something to it.

Giano 




	
		
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