[Sca-cooks] Bronze Cookware

[Elise Fleming]

Greetings!  Concern has been expressed regarding the warning on the web 
page where the reproduction bronze cookware is for sale.  I sent a query 
to the Hampton Court cooks, asking if they tinned the cookware or had 
concerns about using it.  I received a brief response (with an 
indication that a longer explanation might be forthcoming) which said 
that, no, they didn't have the cookware tinned because there was no 
indication that it would have been tinned in period.  The responder, one 
of the cooks who eats the food prepared in the cookpots, said that he 
had a complete blood workup last year where he specifically asked to be 
tested for heavy metals.  His blood was normal, no indication of heavy 
metals in it.

Another person, not one of the cooks, said that he believed that, if the 
food was immediately removed from the pots (not left to cool in them), 
there would be no problem with lead leaching out into the liquids.

If/When I hear more from Hampton Court, I'll pass it on.  At this point 
it sounds as if they use the pots and don't have any problem with lead. 
  A subsequent post by a non-Hampton Court cook posited that period 
bronze cookware could have lead content up to 20 or 30 percent.  That 
would make the current 5 percent fairly low.

Alys K.
-- 
Elise Fleming
alysk at ix.netcom.com
http://home.netcom.com/~alysk/