[Sca-cooks] Soft Shell Crab

[Johnna Holloway]

There are a few crab recipes in medievalcookery.com.
Here's an assortment.
This is an excerpt from Gentyll manly Cokere (MS Pepys 1047)
(England, ca. 1500)
The original source can be found at James L. Matterer's website

To dyght A crabe. Take owte all yn the Crabe and lay hit yn a lityll  
vyneAgyr take And put A litell rede Wyne ther to and streyne all  
throwgh A streynner take pouder of gynger synamome and sugure and  
menge hem all togeder And put hym yn the shell And set hit on the fyre  
tyll he boyll and when hit ys boyled take hit of and cast pouder of  
synamome and sugure A pon and serue hit furth.

This is an excerpt from A Noble Boke off Cookry
(England, 1468)
The original source can be found at MedievalCookery.com

To dight crabe or lopster tak crabe or lopster and stop hym at the  
vent with one of the litille clees and sethe hym in clene water or els  
stop hym in the same manner and cast hym in an ovene and let hym bak  
and serue it with venygar.

This is an excerpt from Ouverture de Cuisine
(France, 1604 - Daniel Myers, trans.)
The original source can be found at MedievalCookery.com

Stuffed Lobster or Crab. Take lobster or crab, & make them boil like  
little lobsters, then take all the meat out, without breaking at all  
the shells thereon, then chop all the meat, & put therein chopped  
marjoram, nutmeg & pepper, three or four egg yolks, & fry all in  
butter, & put them back into the shell thereon, & all the little legs  
fried in butter, & put together.

This is an excerpt from Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books
(England, 1430)
The original source can be found at the University of Michigan's  
"Corpus of Middle English Prose and Verse"

Crabbe or Lopster boiled. Take a crabbe or a lopster, and stop him in  
the vente with on of hire clees, and seth him in water, and no salt;  
or elles stoppe him in the same maner, and cast him in an oven, and  
bake him, and serue him forth colde. And his sauce is vinegre.

Johnnae





On May 10, 2010, at 4:44 AM, Stefan li Rous wrote:

> Has anyone spent any time looking through period crab recipes?