[Sca-cooks] Another TV-inspired cooking contest

Susan Lin susanrlin at gmail.com
Thu Nov 18 19:48:35 PST 2010


And Martha Stewart had a guy come on her show a few years back and make a
santa out of bread.

On Thu, Nov 18, 2010 at 8:32 PM, Terry Decker <t.d.decker at att.net> wrote:

> 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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>>
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