[Sca-cooks] Bizcochos, was At the Metropolitan Museum

[Lilinah]

Vittoria wrote:
>Obligatory food content: Everything we ate on vacation was delicious, but
>none of it historical.  Instead, here's a food-related request on behalf of
>the bf's parents, who are coming out to California for his elevation (in two
>weeks!!).  They love to cook and bake and volunteered to bring something for
>his vigil.  I was going to send them a selection of recipes to choose from
>-- some late-16th c variations on biscuits/biscotti/cookies, something that
>would survive a plane ride from NYC without refrigeration.  I am
>particularly fond of Digby's excellent small cakes (yeah, I know, that's
>17th c!) and Granado's (I think?) bizcocho.  Anyone else have any favorites
>to recommend?

Well, i'm helping cook for the Tavern... but let 
may pipe in and say i don't like the bizcocho 
recipe with anise seeds. There's one with orange 
flower water i'd prefer. But, hey, it's not my 
Vigil and not my Tavern, i'm just sayin'...

ORIGINAL
Diego Granado, Libro del Arte de Cozina (1599)
trans. by Lady Brighid ni Chiarain

Take twelve eggs, and remove the whites from four 
of them, and with a little orange-flower water 
beat them a great deal, and grind a pound of 
sugar, and cast it in little by little, always 
beating quickly, and cast in flour, or powdered 
wheat starch, and beat it with force. Having cast 
in the said flour, when they see that it is 
necessary, and very fine, and the dough must 
remain white, just as for fritters, and then cast 
it in your pots, and carry them to the oven, and 
when half-cooked remove them, and dust them with 
well-ground sugar, and cut them to your taste, 
and return them to the oven, and let them finish 
baking a second time: and if they wish when they 
beat them, cast in as much white wine as an 
eggshell, it will be good.

The Recipe Broken Out
(not a modern redaction)

8 whole eggs
4 egg yolks
some orange flower water
an eggshell of white wine
1 pound sugar (about 2-1/4 cups)
(not sure how much) white wheat flour (1 lb = about 4 cups)
powdered sugar, as needed

1. Preheat oven to 450° Fahrenheit
2. Beat eggs and orange flower water together 
well, adding an eggshell of white wine.
3. Add sugar little by little, beating constantly.
4. Add flour and beat with force.
5. Put the dough in a baking pan - it should make a loaf a couple inches high.
6. Bake them to the oven.
7. When half-cooked remove them, and dust them 
with well-ground sugar, and slice them to your 
taste.
8. Then return them to the oven, and let them finish baking a second time.

Anyway, i'm not a frequent baker, so i'm not sure 
how much flour should be in this...

But this sounds much better than bizcochos with anise (patooey!).

Plus, bizcochos are meant to be hard, really 
hard, because they are meant to be dipped in wine 
(or some other beverage). When i made some, 
people did not read the card i placed on the 
bizcocho tray and complained about how hard they 
were - and i had the hypocras right next to them!
-- 
Urtatim (that's err-tah-TEEM)
the persona formerly known as Anahita

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