[Sca-cooks] Leche Lumbard was Gingerbread Playhouse

[James Prescott]

There are several somewhat similar recipes in Viandier.  They have
ground almonds, which is a major difference.

Here is the closest.

Lenten slices.
Take peeled almonds, crush very well in a mortar, steep in water 
boiled and cooled to lukewarm, strain through cheesecloth, and boil 
your almond milk on a few coals for an instant or two. Take some 
cooked hot water pastries a day or two old and cut them into bits as 
small as large dice. Take figs, dates and Digne raisins, and slice 
the figs and dates like the hot water pastries. Throw everything into 
it, leave it to thicken like Frumenty, and boil some sugar with it. 
To give it colour, have some saffron for colouring it like Frumenty. 
It should be gently salted.


Thorvald



At 9:45 PM +1030 10/23/10, Claire Clarke wrote:
>  ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>  ------------------------------
>
>  Message: 4
>  Date: Fri, 22 Oct 2010 07:22:05 -0400
>  From: Johnna Holloway <johnnae at mac.com>
>  To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
>  Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Gingerbread Playhouse
>  Message-ID: <8E923598-29BC-4E1B-8874-07C01B162220 at mac.com>
>  Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed; delsp=yes
>
>  Google would have quickly pointed you to
>  http://www.medievalcookery.com/recipes/lechelumbarde.html
>
>  There are English versions. Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books, T. 
>  Austin (ed.) and the FoC feature versions.
>
>  Johnnae
>
>  On Oct 22, 2010, at 1:30 AM, Stefan li Rous asked about :
>>  ----
>>  Is this a medieval dish? Do you have some references or period 
>>  recipes? Do these references talk about it being molded in period, 
>>  or is this just something that can be done, but wasn't necessarily 
>>  done in period?  For some reason the name sounds French to me, but 
>>  the use of the dates sounds Middle Eastern. Or were dates readily 
>>  available in France?
>
>  Exactly. There are a few different versions in the Two fifteenth century
>  cookbooks. I've not seen any French version (or an equivalent in any other
>  cuisine I'm familiar with) so I think it is just an English dish called
>  'lumbard' to make it sound exotic ('lombard' and similar being an adjective
>  associated with Lombardy, which is why you think it sounds French). There is
>  no suggestion in the recipes that it was moulded. The recipes only say to
>  make it very stiff and slice it. It's then usually served with a syrup made
>  of spiced wine.
>
>  It is actually not really sticky at all (not the way gingerbread is in that
>  super tacky way)  - once you have mixed the dry ingredients in. The dates
>  boiled in wine are pretty gloopy and sticky. I ended up with brown goo
>  splashed all over my kitchen the one time I made it, and it's really hard to
>  get off if you let it dry.
>
>  Angharad
>
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