[Sca-cooks] Organization of German Feasts, ~1500

[Volker Bach]

--- Guenievre de Monmarche <guenievre at erminespot.com> schrieb am Mi, 24.8.2011:
> One of the things I've been working on for the past few
> years is
> understanding how dishes would be arranged as part of a
> meal in
> medieval French and English menus, rather than just cooking
> single
> dishes. I'll be branching out a bit and cooking a
> circa-1500 German
> feast in January, and have realized that while I have some
> clue as to
> where to look for recipes, I have *no* clue as to where to
> look for
> sample menus or information on how the dishes would be
> presented. Does
> anyone have any sources they might recommend? Flandrin's
> "Arranging
> the Meal" only has French with a bit of English and
> Polish...

A lot of our best material is well past 1500, unfortunately. Rumpoldt, as has been mentioned, the travel accounts of Montaigne, the amazingly detailed sample accounts of the landgrave of Hesse-Kassel (giving food budgets for each grade of mess for each day of the week). De Rontzier also says a little something about meals. Hieronymus Tragus "Deutsche Speyskammer" has some details, but it's also 1550s. The Ars Magirtica is strictly speakiung Swiss, but it might be useful - the same goes for the memoirs of  the Platter  family . Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie studied them in great depth in Le  siecle des Platter, 1499-1628. There are also records from the travels of patriarchal envoy Santonino to the German-speaking Alps, giving an interesting Italian perspective on 1480s German food. The records on the Landshut wedding also have been published, though that is very far from a normal feast - more like a once-in-a-century extravaganza. There must be the occasional
 feast records out there, but I haven't found them yet. If you want, I can send you the relevant draft chapter of my upcoming "Landsknecht's Cookbook", which focuses on the 1500-1550 period, but there isn't a lot more in there. 

YIS

Giano