[Sca-cooks] period pickles and preserves
Daniel & Elizabeth Phelps
dephelps at embarqmail.com
Wed Sep 3 13:27:47 PDT 2008
Was written:
>>I'm new to SCA, but not new to cooking. One of my fav things to do is
>>preserves and pickles. Can someone point me to some period recipes
>>sources for same? Also, where do I start to learn- sites, books etc
>>to understand redaction?
Might be of use if one were to state contry/region and/or a time span of
interest. Be that as it may, preserves suggests to me "candying" with sugar
while pickling suggests to me preserving in vinegar. With that in mind I
will have a go at pickling in my library and memory as I think it the more
difficult to come by recipes for.
Try "Pickled, Potted and Canned, a History of Food Preserving" by Sue
Shepard for some history of such. According to the book there was a Baltic
god of pickled foods. Cannot recall his name however. Try also "Food in
History" and "The History of Food".
In addition to "preserves" I think that there might be some pickling recipes
in Karen Hess's translation/edition of "Martha Washington's Book of
Cookery". Much of the recipes there in were late period English. Could
someone check, I've mislaid my copy? The recipe for Na'an Mukhallal in "In
a Caliph's Kitchen" which consists of period recipes edited/translated by
David Waine might be useful. It is a vinegar mint sauce which also appears
to have been used to pickle garlic? "The Sensible Cook, Dutch Foodways in
the Old and the New World" translated and edited by Peter Rose has some
recipes that were published, albeit just out of period, for pickling gerkins
and quinces. The first recipe uses vinegar the second one does not.
"Penn Family Recipes, cooking recipes of William Penn's Wife Gulielma"
edited by Evelyn Abraham Bennson is another family recipes book passed down
like Martha Washington's that may be of interest. Unfortunately the recipes
that I could find are for candying rather than pickling in vinegar. Check
out one of the more complete verisons of Elinor Fettiplace's Receipt Book as
it is another family recipes book that was passed down might be some
pickling recipes therein.
Daniel
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