[Sca-cooks] Another TV-inspired cooking contest

[Terry Decker]

While you probably won't see a reference to a "sculpted cake," the period 
equivalent is a baker's masterwork, the journeyman baker's demonstration of 
skill to be advanced to master.  Shaped and carved breads are specialty 
items.  Bunches of grapes, wheat shocks, other fruits and veggies and even 
edible village of houses and people have appeared in masterworks. 
Occasionally, elements of a masterwork are used to decorate artisan loaves 
in Europe.  I understand the tradition still occurs in the London Baker's 
Guild.

A number of years ago, the German baker (now retired) in Oklahoma City had 
some shaped and dyed breads that looked like pumpkins and other squash that 
he had done as decorations for Thanksgiving one year.

Bear


> Brangwayna Morgan wrote:
>
> >HRH Jana of the East has announced a Cake Sculpting contest for 
> >coronation.  The theme is "Medieval".  Cakes may be any combination of 
> >layers and flavors, with a minimum height of 2 feet and a maximum height 
> >of 4 feet.  They must be transported from the work table to the display 
> >table intact. There is a "Most Fun" category, as well as a "Historically 
> >Accurate" category, for which documentation MUST be provided.
>
> >Am I wrong in thinking that there is NO period documentation for doing 
> >this sort of thing with anything we would recognize as cake?  In that 
> >case, I can only assume the documentation is for what you sculpted it to 
> >look like.
>
> Johnnae provided some examples of period cakes, but stacking them isn't 
> the same as sculpting them.  I have not ever seen any reference to a 
> "sculpted cake".  Cakes were fairly heavy things (Johnnae mentioned great 
> cakes).  The consistency is not like modern cakes.  Nor are wafers or 
> krasekake like a modern cake.  Unless I'm mistaken (a common occurrence 
> lately!), trying to sculpt those two would result in a bunch of crumbs.
>
> There certainly were edible things that were tall, but "cake" was NOT one 
> of them.  The question would remain, does His Eastern Majesty have 
> documentation that what he is proposing actually existed?  How could he 
> tell what's historically accurate?  He'd have to have enough knowledge to 
> judge the accuracy of the documentation.  Might be something interesting 
> to "fake"!
>
> Now, on another aspect, does he mean by "sculpting" what the TV shows mean 
> when they say "sculpting"?  I am assuming so since he refers to 
> combinations of layers.  Another problem: I haven't seen any reference to 
> medieval or Renaissance "cakes" being made of layers.
>
> Your Eastern Majesty, how about a tournament using light sabers?  Points 
> to be given for documentation during medieval times?  Or speed texting?
>
> Alys K., feeling rather obstreperous this morning
> -- 
> Elise Fleming
> alysk at ix.netcom.com
> alyskatharine at gmail.com
> http://www.flickr.com/photos/8311418@N08/sets/
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