[Sca-cooks] Frog's eggs addendum

[Johnna Holloway]

Some actual Italian recipes for the dish can be found at
Baroness Helewyse's website.

A recipe that Baroness Helewyse translated from the Italian
Libro di cucina/ Libro per cuoco (14th/15th c.) (Anonimo Veneziano)reads:
http://www.geocities.com/helewyse/libro.html

*XXIV Maize dish (Frumenty) good and very useful.*
If you want to make frumenty, take the wheat berries, and grind/beat it 
well until the husk lifts, then wash it well. Put it to boil in water, 
but don’t boil it too much, then pour away the water. Then add inside 
the fat of whichever animal you wish, and you want to make sure that you 
don’t add too much. Add sweet and strong spices, and saffron, and if you 
don’t have wheat then you can take rice, and it will be good.

Based on previous discussions here on SCA Cooks, she also did a paper 
titled on coarse wheat dishes as found in Scappi.

Period Italian Maize recipes 
<http://www.geocities.com/helewyse/maize.html>- There are three recipes 
in Scappi which use a grain referred to as "formentone" which has been 
identified as maize by Italian culinary historians. Currently there is 
still some doubt about this identification. My doubts notwithstanding 
the three recipes are transcribed and translated here.

Johnnae


Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius wrote:
>
> On Aug 22, 2008, at 1:33 PM, Christiane wrote:
>
>> This sound a lot like cuccia:
>> http://splendidtable.publicradio.org/recipes/main_cuccia.shtml
>> Of the recipes I have found, I like the last one the best for being 
>> the most "medievaloid." 
> Do you think the Italian cheesecake with the soaked wheat berries 
> eaten at Easter is meant to be made with cuccia as a filling, or is it 
> just made with soaked wheat with coincidental resemblances to cuccia?
>
> Adamantius