[Sca-cooks] Which wine for mallard recipe

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

On 03/06/2012 06:52 AM, Sharon Palmer wrote:
> Take Conyng, Hen, or Mallard, and roste him al-moste ynowe; or elles 
> choppe hem, and fry hem in fressh grece; and fry oynons myced, and 
> cast al togidre into a potte, and caste there-to Canell; then stepe 
> faire brede with the same broth, and drawe hit thorgh a streynour with 
> vinegre. And when hit hath wel boiled, caste the licour thereto, and 
> pouder ginger, and vinegre, and ceson hit vppe, and then thou shall 
> serue hit forth.
>
> I don't see why the redaction has wine.  It's not mentioned in the 
> original. (Neither are cloves and mace, except as "season it up"). 
> Unless they were looking at other versions of the recipe too.

I doubt "licour" is a reference to wine -- that seems to be a relatively 
modern usage for the most part; more often than not liquor is water 
something was boiled in, or boiled water, so most often (speaking 
generally) liquor is a bouillon or the hot water used for, say, mashing 
malt to make ale, or the warm water for making bread, etc. Now, wine can 
be an ingredient in something later referred to as liquor, but I suspect 
the equation of liquor with alcohol is modern, and possibly early 20th 
century.

As for why wine appears in the redaction, I'm gonna guess and say it 
might be added to compensate for the fact that modern vinegars are 
distilled. On the other hand, they're also diluted, so it is a tough call.

I'm curious about this "same broth". Where did we get that broth from, 
if it is the "same" as [some other] broth? Is this a reference to pan 
juices from frying or roasting the meat (sometimes recipes call for "the 
broth from the same" in such cases), or the broth from a previous recipe?

Adamantius