[Sca-cooks] Questions on coffee

[edoard at medievalcookery.com]

> -------- Original Message --------
> From: "Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius" 
> 
> And in the end, some of this might be akin, in terms of social impact, to finding
> that buried Tudor banana peel; are we, as researchers, looking for the "gotcha"
> experience, neener neener, or a more accurate overall representation of everyday
> life in our period?

Add to this that the blanket question "Is [x] period?" can be so
generalized as to be pointless - it leaves out the important specifics
of where and when.  If you use "average medieval Europe" as a guideline
then no, coffee is not period.  It wasn't consumed in the typical
European culture throughout the middle ages.  If you use "ever consumed
anywhere that had any contact with Europe in the time period before
1650" then coffee (along with just about any African, Asian, or American
foodstuff) is "period".

I find the whole "Ferderic of Lyon once wrote in his journal that he had
pifflefish while visiting Lilliput in 1648, so pifflefish is period!" to
be a disingenuous exercise for the sole purpose of justifying the
individual's choices in the SCA context.

- Doc (who's feeling cranky today)