[Sca-cooks] Beverage experiments

[Michael Gunter]

> Thank you. I'd enjoy seeing an email copy of the class
>notes if it's already typed in or could look it up if it's
>on the web somewhere. 
The notes aren't on the web but a lot of information can
be found out there. I suggest checking Cariadoc's Miscellany
since he has translated a lot of Arabic recipes.
 
Digby's "Weak Honey Drink" won acclaim at Kingdom A&S this 
weekend.
Weak Honey Drink
(More commonly called Small Mead)
Digby p. 107/147
 
Take nine pints of warm fountain water, and dissolve in it one pint of pure White-honey, by laving it therein, till it be dissolved. Then boil it gently, skimming it all the while, till all the scum be perfectly scummed off; and after that boil it a little longer, peradventure a quarter of an hour. In all it will require two or three hours boiling, so that at last one third part may be consumed. About a quarter of an hour before you cease boiling, and take it from the fire, put to it a little spoonful of cleansed and sliced Ginger; and almost half as much of the thin yellow rind of Orange, when you are even ready to take it from the fire, so as the Orange boil only one walm in it. Then pour it into a well-glased strong deep great Gally-pot, and let it stand so, till it be almost cold, that it be scarce Luke-warm. Then put to it a little silver-spoonful of pure Ale-yest, and work it together with a Ladle to make it ferment: as soon as it beginneth to do so, cover it close with a fit cover, and put a thick dubbled woollen cloth about it. Cast all things so that this may be done when you are going to bed. Next morning when you rise, you will find the barm gathered all together in the middle; scum it clean off with a silver-spoon and a feather, and bottle up the Liquor, stopping it very close. It will be ready to drink in two or three days; but it will keep well a month or two. It will be from the first very quick and pleasant.
 
Mine was aged I think 10 days.
 
> For people that have done the beverages for feasts or other large
>groups, what's the most favorite ratio for adding water back to
>the syrups? 
That is definately a matter of taste and the intensity of the syrup.
It also depends on how the drink is to be used. If it is to be cold
and refreshing, like for drinking around a hot tourney field, you
might prefer it be weaker but maybe stronger when drunk with
a meal.
 > Does anyone else like to make different kinds of beverages? 
I'm really trying to push non-alcoholic period drinks here and get
people away from iced tea, powdered lemonade and sodas.
 
Coffee, however, is sacred.
 > Rose 
Gunthar
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