[Sca-cooks] Peacock

[Sharon Palmer]

>Witteveen also says that there are only two recipes for peacock 
>(roasted and in a pie) in that book but that there are 20 for 
>turkey, thus showing that peacock was on the way out.  He notes that 
>by the middle of the 1500s, the fashion of roasting a peacock on a 
>spit and redressing it in its feathers came to an end.  Peacock was 
>now served in a pie but still sometimes decorated with the tail, 
>wings, head and neck affixed to the top crust.

Actually there are three recipes for peacock, roasted with sauce, in 
a pie, and a cold roasted peacock, served with its feathers in an 
aspic as a "Schauwessen" or showpiece.

I find it more striking that peacock isn't mentioned once in the 40 
pages of menus, while turkey is mentioned 10 times.

Ranvaig