[Sca-cooks] Seal meat

[Sam Wallace]

Stefan,

The only recipes I have for seal or similar are from Nuevo Arte de 
Cocina. It was first published in 1758, so perhaps not a work we would 
normally consider on this list. I apologize in advance for the following 
rough translations. Just the same:

//Sollo pescado, y lobo.
Para componer gustosamente el Sollo, le cortarás la cabeza, que no es 
afrenta, y sazonarás un cocimiento de agua, sal, vino y vinagre; ponle 
buena manteca de baca fresca, échale de todas especias y cantidad de 
yerbas, peregil, un poco de hinojo y oregano, y con todo esto lo 
cocerás, y mojarás unas rebanadas de pan tostado; y de este modo aun 
despues de tan mortificado, te dará el pobre sollo un buen plato.

Pike fish, and wolf.
To compose gladly pike we cut off the head, so that no-one is affronted, 
and season a concoction of water, salt, wine and vinegar; put good fresh 
cow butter, take all spices and quantity of herbs, parsley, a little 
fennel and oregano, and bake all this, and wet several slices of toasted 
bread, and in this way after such mortification, pike will give the poor 
a good meal.

Lobo de mar asado.
Entre los pescados, que conocemos en este Reyno de Aragon, es uno el 
llamado lobo; y por haber de tratar tan poco de él, le ingerimos con el 
sollo. Su figura es como saboga; el mejor modo de componerle para 
nuestro mantenimiento, es asado en esta forma: hecho trozos se pondrá 
sobre unas hojas de laurél, en vasija espaciosa, freirás unos ajos y los 
echarás sobre el pescado, tendrás prevenido en una cazuela peregil 
picado con ajos, pimienta y agrio, y le irás dando con un manojo de 
peregil por encima, le pondrás mas fuego arriba que abaxo, despues le 
volverás y le darás por la otra parte con la salsilla, y despues lo 
podrás servir á la mesa.

Roast sea wolf.
Among the fish, we know in this kingdom of Aragon, is one called the 
wolf, and having to deal with so little of him, eat it with the pike 
[fish]. His appearance is like twait [a European shad], the best way to 
compose for our alimentation, is roasted in this manner: slices will be 
put on some bay leaves in a spacious vessel, fry some garlic and throw 
them over the fish, have ready in a pan chopped parsley with garlic, 
pepper and sour [perhaps lemon or lime juice], and you will give him a 
bunch of parsley on top, you will put more fire up than down, then turn 
it and give him the party with salsilla [tropical vine having edible 
roots sometimes boiled as a potato substitute], and after you serve it 
to the table.

I thought that perhaps lobo de mar might be a wolf fish, but it 
translates as fur seal from contemporary Spanish, comes up with lots of 
seals when I do an image search on-line, and wolf fish is something 
entirely different in contemporary Spanish. Neither really looks like 
shad to me. So these may or may not be a recipe for seal.

Bon appétit,

Guillaume

*****************
So what DOES seal meat taste like? How was it cooked?

I do have this Florilegium file, but there haven't been enough people 
here to have held any discussion on seal meat. Even when Nanna (from 
Iceland) was here.
whale-meat-msg (12K) 2/ 2/10 Use of whale and porpoise meat in period. 
Recipes. Substitutions.

http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD-MEATS/whale-meat-msg.html

Stefan
--------
THLord Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
    Mark S. Harris           Austin, TexasStefanliRous at austin.rr.com
**** See Stefan's Florilegium files at:http://www.florilegium.org  ****