[Sca-cooks] Oranges was *Sigh* That tomato thing - again

[Johnna Holloway]

So would you want a food basket at the demo that reflects what was 
available to a 10th
century Dane?
I think we could come up with a list for that. The hard part of that one 
would be the
proper fish prepared in the right fashion and some of the wild plants 
that we don't see.
Also some of the grains might be hard to get hold of.
Could be done though.

I keep adding material to the oranges stuff. Right now I am also waiting 
until
I move and unbox the collection. Then I can do a final version. There's
something like 10,000 cookbooks in the boxes that I want to look in before
I surrender the project. Maybe I will release it on a .pdf eventually.
Having the Concordance out in a commercial edition has made me very aware
of what goes into a published book. That isn't what the oranges book was 
ever
intended to be. It started as a recipe and research on candied oranges.
It grew from that.
I am returning to Elizabethan material for the next book, hopefully 
commercial.
Then I am committed, I think, to another medieval project.

Johnnae

morses3 at aol.com wrote:
> The point I was making  (perhaps badly) wasn't that oranges were unknown, but that the oranges commonly available in our grocery stores right now probably weren't a commonplace food to the average person during the whole time span the SCA covers. Frankly, I don't know what's on the shelf at Food Lion today, but I doubt that it resembles anything that was seen by a 10th century Dane, and hence, that their use at a demo should have the same background information that would be needed if a tomato were used to provide correct background context. And that we shouldn't say that oranges are "not period"  and preclude their use at a demo just because that same 10th century Dane didn't have a written recipe detailing their use as a common foood source.
>  
> I'm impressed by the mention of your research regarding the orange, is this information available to the public in some form? I'd be interested in reading it.  
>  
> Geffrei
>