[Sca-cooks] Arts and Sciences; bread

[Antonia Calvo]

Terry Decker wrote:

>>> I took the original, converted weight to cups and divided the whole  
>>> by 12 ... giving me a recipie that started with 10 cups of flour  
>>> instead of half a busheland 1.5 cups of water instead of one gallon. 
>>
> Malkin appears to have used the recipe from "The Good Huswife's 
> Handmaid for the Kitchen" (1594, and appended below)..
>
> I would like a little more detail on how the conversion was calculated.'


>> From my calculations, she used the weight of a Winchester bushel (70 
>> lbs.) 
>
> and failed to account for the removal of the chesill.  If Malkin had 
> used one of the smaller Elizabethean bushels, I would have expected 
> her results without subtracting the chesill to be between 8 and 9 cups 
> of flour and with the chesill removed to be between 5 and 7 cups of flour
>
> In any event, the recipe worked, which is what counts.  As a baker, I 
> can only applaud the win.


Personally, I find it's best not to worry too much about measuring the 
flour-- I just measure the liquid and add flour 'til it be enow.

10 cups of flour does sound like an awful lot to mix with just 1.5c. of 
water, though... just on a notional basis, I would have said ~5c. would 
do it.


-- 
Antonia di Benedetto Calvo

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Habeo metrum - musicamque,
hominem meam. Expectat alium quid?
-Georgeus Gershwinus
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