[Sca-cooks] new book At the King's Table: Royal Dining, Through the Ages

[Elise Fleming]

Johnna Holloway quoted and wrote:

 >>> At the King's Table: Royal Dining Through the Ages is now out.
 >
 > The author is SUSANNE GROOM who is a consultant curator Historic
 >Royal Palaces, London.
 >
 > So has anyone else seen it?
 >
 > I was disappointed and didn't think it was as well done as Food and 
 >Cooking series of pamphlets by English Heritage or Sara 
 >Paston-Williams’ *The Art of Dining: A History of Cooking & Eating.*

I'm reading it right now and have gotten as far as the chapter on the 
Restoration. As a quick, general comment, I'd say it's more of a "coffee 
table" book than an in-depth book. If a person didn't know all that much 
about dining rituals, there might be something to learn, but to me those 
are only tidbits. The photos are good and they are plentiful.

I've got some questions about a few of the statements in the chapters 
I've read. On page 21, there is an illustration of a baker, convicted of 
giving short measure, being drawn on a hurdle with a round thing hanging 
under his neck. She says it's a whetstone. I had read that it was a loaf 
of his underweight bread.

On page 19, she says that Richard II's menu had a soup or thin pottage 
called "jelly". That seems odd. On page 28, she says there were 
subtleties created in "spun sugar" in the 1300s. Johnna and I have tried 
to find proof that "spun sugar" existed even as late as 
Tudor/Elizabethan times and have found none. I wonder what her 
documentation is - or if she's just repeating some of the faulty 
translations that seem to be out there.

On page 48, she wrote that "Katherine of Aragon...introduced marmalade, 
a thick orange or apricot jelly." I don't think that is accurate. If 
she's defining marmalade as she implies, then it is of quinces, not 
oranges or apricots.

Sara Paston-Williams' book that Johnna mentioned above has much more 
detail and costs only a little more. Maybe my problem with "King's 
Table" is that I hoped to learn a lot from it and I didn't.

Alys K.

-- 
Elise Fleming
alysk at ix.netcom.com
alyskatharine at gmail.com
http://damealys.medievalcookery.com/
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