[Sca-cooks] What kind of class would you attend?

[Johnna Holloway]

And if you want to really study Middle English recipes and track 
versions across centuries
you might want to invest in or use this book again by Hieatt and a couple of
other ladies. ;-)

Hieatt, Constance B., J. Terry Nutter, with Johnna H. Holloway. 
*Concordance of English Recipes. Thirteenth Through Fifteenth 
Centuries.* Tempe, Arizona: ACMRS (Arizona Center for Medieval and 
Renaissance Studies), 2006. Medieval and Renaissance Tests and Studies, 
Volume 312. [Paperback. Introduction and Foreword Material: pp. 
vii-xvii. Sources: pp. xiii-xv. Concordance: pp. 1-105. Glossary: pp. 
107-125. Appendix: pp. 127-135.]

The work is a /Concordance/ which means that it is by definition “an 
alphabetical index of the principal words in a book or the works of an 
author with their immediate contexts.” In this case it’s a recipe 
concordance. It doesn’t include the recipes; it just helps you locate 
the recipes! It’s better to think of it as a cross-index. On a basic 
level, it’s a companion tool to identify types of recipes and to serve 
as a quick way to identify which collection to look in for certain 
recipes. Plus it also has a glossary and bibliography.

It's received glowing reviews in publications like Gastronomica, PPC, 
Food History News, Medium Aevum, and even mentioned on a French 
gastronomical website by
Bruno Laurioux.

Devra might have a few copies for sale.

Johnnae

lilinah at earthlink.net wrote:
> Shoshanna wrote:
>   
>> I would like to see a class on reading and understanding period recipes.
>> I can hold my own with cooking (usually) and my food turns out pretty tasty
>> (usually) but I know that when I start to read period recipes - either in
>> English, old English, or any other language my eyes begin to glaze over and
>> I loose my concentration because it is not familiar to me.
>>     
>
> As far as i know, we don't have any cookbooks or recipes in Old English - that's the language of Beowulf. Generally, Middle English is considered to begin after the Norman Conquest of England in 1066 and to extend well into the 15th century, some date it to 1470 or thereabouts.
> We do have a number of cookbooks in late Middle English, such as Forme of Curye, circa 1390. snipped
> The other is the fabulous edition, "Curye on Inglysch" by Constance B. Hieatt and Sharon Butler. It has a very comprehensive glossary which helps with obscure words.Urtatim (that's err-tah-TEEM)
>