[Sca-cooks] Fwd: [Norsefolk_2] New Cookbook: from Stone Age toVikings:

[Terry Decker]

Since I can't get the URL to work, I have no idea about the information on 
the website.  From what is stated here, these are recipes that were basicly 
developed from ingredient lists probably assembled from archeological and 
historical sites.  That means any recipe is likely very speculative.  My 
questions would be are these recipes produced in comparison with modern or 
historical recipes or descriptions and if historical, what sources?  Were 
these recipes prepared by cooking methods contemporary to the assumed 
period?  From the little I see, this may be valid experimental history, but 
it is not necessarily accurate historical recreation.  While I might 
consider a feast from this source, I would hesitate to declare it period.

The issue with any historical cooking is the degree of accuracy.  With an 
actual historical recipe, I can produce an interpetation of that recipe that 
will simulate the actual historical dish with a reasonable degree of 
accuracy.  Every assumption I must make about such a dish decreases the 
accuracy of my product.  Errors tend to be multiplicative so as the number 
of assumptions one must make about a dish rises, confidence in accuracy 
declines.  The assumptions in this type of histrorical endeavor tend to be 
rather high.

Bear


----- Original Message ----- 

Okay, a question for the scholars, here.  How many of you would/would not
consider this valid justification for considering a dish "period?"

On Tue, Mar 27, 2012 at 6:32 PM, Kathleen Gormanshaw

> New Cookbook: from Stone Age to Vikings:
>
> http://www.pasthorizonspr.com/index.php/archives/03/2012/new-cookbook-from-stone-age-to-vikings
> Recipes based on archaeological soil samples. One of the authors,
> Sabine Karg, archaeologist, botanist and guest researcher at the
> University of Copenhagen’s Saxo Institute, explains how they managed
> to figure out which raw materials people used in ancient times.