[Sca-cooks] Re: Sca-cooks Digest, Vol 32, Issue 49

[ekoogler1 at comcast.net]

Another of Scully's books, , The Art of Cookery in the Middle Ages, also has excellent descriptions of the organization of the kitchen in the High MA...including descriptions of each position, responsibilities, etc.  All of this is drawn from period documents.

Kiri
 -------------- Original message ----------------------
From: "Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius" <adamantius.magister at verizon.net>
> 
> On Jan 17, 2006, at 5:36 PM, Jadwiga Zajaczkowa / Jenne Heise wrote:
> 
> > Servers would be grooms and gentlemen in waiting, and other  
> > employees of
> > the host. Generally, clothing or lengths of cloth were part of such
> > servants' hire, though it might not match. Since most people had very
> > few suits of clothes, presumably those would be the clothes they would
> > serve in. I checked OED, and the use of the term livery for  
> > distinctive
> > clothing of employment (or guild membership) does date to period:
> 
> I STR that in the introduction to Scully's edition of Chiquart,  
> there's an account from the household books of the Duke of Savoy,  
> featuring the names of various employees in the households of the  
> Duke and the Duchess, and their respective salaries and liveries. Of  
> course, this is using the term in an English translation, but the  
> concept appears to be period.
> 
> >
> >>   But huge chunks of meat carved at high table were not common.  Most
> >> of the recipes we have for meat tell us to start with a roast,  
> >> then do
> >> things to it.
> >
> > Carving meat at table, however, is mentioned consistently in all the
> > manners texts. Looks like one 'mess' (serving for one table group) for
> > each of the higher tables would be carved at table. Birds in  
> > particular
> > were carved. (see _The Little Babee's Little Book_, Libro de Cuoco,
> > etc.)
> 
> True. It's also frequently illustrated in places like the Bayeux  
> Tapestry. In addition, you can look at the menu references to gros  
> char (which is just a big ol' hunk-o'-meat, like beef, pork or  
> mutton), sliced into manageable pieces and served with sauces. Some  
> of the sauce recipes you see in medieval sources omit references to  
> which meat they're to be served with, but in fact appear to be sauces  
> for those big hunks of meat.
> 
> 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
> 
> 
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