[Sca-cooks] Thoughts on Adam Gopnik's Sweet Revolution in the New Yorker

[Daniel Myers]

While I wouldn't deny the possibility that Europe learned to mix sweet
and savory from the Persians or Ottomans, I find the claim that it was
introduced in the 14th century with the dish of "tavuk gögüs" to be
questionable.

There is a recipe in the "Harpestreng" cookbook (Codex Q - northern
Europe, probably pre 1300) that is clearly a similar dish and is likely
a precursor to Blancmanger.

"Recipe XXXII - One should take hen's meat from a boiled breast and chop
it small.  Add almond milk to it in a pot, and a quarter as much of
sugar as there is meat, and as much lard as there is sugar, and salt. 
Let it cook together on the embers, and stir it continually."

There's also a dish from De re coquinaria (Apicius, Rome ca. 400) that
involves adding honey to a chicken dish, which could conceivably be some
sort of precursor.

Does Gopnik present any strong evidence that blancmanger came from
Persia or the Ottoman empire?

- Doc


> -------- Original Message --------
> From: "James M. Dorsey" <james.m.dorsey at gmail.com>
> Date: Thu, December 30, 2010 7:48 pm
> 
> L.S.,
> 
> Adam Gopnik’s excellent piece on the evolution of desert and the role of
> pastry chefs in culinary innovation raises interesting questions. Based on
> interviews with prominent Catalan chefs who see themselves as the inheritors
> of the French mantle of desert, the article explores the relationship
> between savory and sweet. That exploration, however, dates much further back
> in history to the Persian and then the Ottoman kitchen, with its high degree
> of specialization and separate guild for pastry chefs. Sweet and savory was
> not limited to deserts but played a prominent role in Persian and Ottoman
> main dishes. But to stick to deserts, Europe was exposed to Ottoman playing
> with sweet-savory combinations as far back as the 14th century when it
> became enchanted with tavuk gögüs (chicken breast), shredded chicken in a
> sweet milk pudding. Known as blanc manger or white pudding, tavuk gögüs
> maintained its chicken content in contemporary Turkish cuisine but lost it
> in Europe over the centuries.
> 
> James