[Sca-cooks] Prince-Bisket Question

[JIMCHEVAL at aol.com]

Looking at the recipe, it's distinctly a sweet (like another English recipe 
 for "French bread" which bears no resemblance to French bread of the 
period) and  so was probably smaller. Another recipe in what appears to be the 
same  collection talks of "thin low Coffins" which makes me think of the kind 
of low  circular dish used for things like creme brulee.
 
Jim  Chevallier
_www.chezjim.com_ (http://www.chezjim.com/) 

FRENCH BREAD HISTORY:  Seventeenth century bread
http://leslefts.blogspot.com/2016/02/french-food-history-seventeenth-century
.html









In a message dated 7/23/2016 12:28:59 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time,  
t.d.decker at att.net writes:

>From the  instructions as given, I would say that a ceramic loaf pan is 
called  for.  However, no size is given.  Generally, loaf pans tended to be 
 
small, while larger ceramic coffins tended to be round.  And this  does not 
rule out smaller ceramic molds that would be similar to the  biscuit molds 
of 
the 18th Century.  In terms of getting the proper  crispness practically, I 
would either use a loaf pan then slice the result  and do a second bake as 
for biscotti or use a flat mold to produce a thin  crisp cookie.

Linguistically, the issue is that Platt doesn't actually  call for a second 
bake.  It may be that this is the period where the  English usage of 
biscuit 
changed from referring to a twice baked bread  product to meaning any small 
hard baked cookie or cracker.  If that  is the case, we can't rule out your 
interpretation of small biscuits on a  baking sheet.

Bear


I haven't made prince-bisket for many  years but thought I would do a
batch for this year's Pennsic, since it  keeps. Looking over the recipe,
it occurred to me that I had interpreted  "biscuit" as something close to
the size and shape of a modern biscuit. The  term actually means "twice
cooked," although the Hugh Platt recipe I use  doesn't actually say to
cook it a second time. It does say to "bake it in  coffins, of white
plate, however, which sounds to me closer to a loaf pan  or pie tin than
to the 3" biscuits on a cookie sheet that we used to  make.

Any opinions on how one should interpret the final part of the  recipe?

---

Take one pound of very fine flower, and one
pound  of fine sugar, and eight egges, and two
spoonfuls of Rose water, and one  ounce of
Carroway seeds, and beat it all to batter one
whole houre: for  the more you beat it, the better
your bread is: then bake it in coffins, of  white
plate, being basted with a little butter before you
put in your  batter, and so keep it.


-- 
David  Friedman
www.daviddfriedman.com
http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/

_______________________________________________
Sca-cooks  mailing  list
Sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org
http://lists.ansteorra.org/listinfo.cgi/sca-cooks-ansteorra.org