potatoes and personal "issues" ; )....was RE: [Sca-cooks] suggestions

[Johnna Holloway]

This depends of course by when one dates the Renaissance.
Are you dating it as 1300 or later, as in the 15th century?
Or are you dating it as the modern age of the 16th century?
I think most historians would suggest that 1500 is the start of the 
modern period.

Potatoes (non-sweet) are at best post mid-late 16th century. Maybe Ireland
right around the turn of 1600. (They are mentioned in a lease
dated 1606 in Ireland.) Were they commonly eaten? No. So One has to ask:
Is this a menu for Ireland of 1606? Or Germany using those sources that 
possibly
mention potatoes? Is it problematic to serve them in the SCA? Yes!

Bear summed it up nicely in 2003--

What is the documentation placing potatoes in Ireland in the late 16th
Century?

To my knowledge, the earliest documentable reference to potatoes in Ireland
is from early in the 17th Century (thank you Johnna).  Sir Walter Raleigh is
said to have planted potatoes there in 1585, but there is no proof of the
tale.  Potatoes are believed to have been found by Europeans no earlier than
1536.  The earliest reference to potatoes in Europe is from Spain in 1573.
John Gerard and the Prefect of Mons both received samples of white potatoes
in 1586.  Carolus Clusius received his first sample in 1587 and he spread
samples to botanists in Northern Europe.  So the potato was basically
unknown in Northern Europe prior to 1586.  There are some references to
eating potatoes and recipes from the 1590's, but the white potato wasn't
widely cultivated in Europe until the 18th Century.

The sweet potato on the otherhand was well-known, is documented in period
accounts and recipes for it exist.

Bear


Johnnae

otsisto wrote: snipped

>-----Original Message-----
><Since it's a Medieval/Ren organization, why bother with non-period or even
>period-ish ingredients at all?>
>
>*Potatoes are late Renaisanse and maybe mid Renaissance
>
>Lyse
>
>
>  
>