[Sca-cooks] Millet

Fri May 6 15:27:00 PDT 2016

I tried a bajri no rotlo recipe which is essentially the Spanish one from Benavides-Barajas' with sesame seeds and anise added to the basic cake of millet flour and water. I made the mistake of making 4 at one time. They should be done one at a time. I fried two and baked two. By the time I had the four ready, the ones for frying fell apart before making it to the frying pan - that’s the expression! - Benavides says -deteriorate- but in English we say fall apart, I think - The baked ones took an hour and turned out as hard as stone. 

I found them tasteless. They need something to liven them up. 

Groan any more advise before I go back to the drawing board?

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> Message: 1
> Date: Thu, 5 May 2016 15:24:28 -0500
> From: Nazirah Garrison <nazirah.garrison at gmail.com>
> To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
> Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Millet
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>> 
>> So Sara has hit it on the head with her interpretation of the recipe -
>> cook immediately to prevent dough from drying out and cracking. - A
>> thousand thanks!
>> 
>> You're most welcome -- my experience with that comes from the Indian
> flatbread mentioned -- bajri no rotli -- it is terribly finicky and the
> dough is prone to drying out. For that reason, we generally mix the millet
> with other flours (generally wheat or chickpea) to mitigate some of the
> issues, and apply a thin coating of cooking oil or melted ghee to the dough
> ball to help retain moisture.
> 
> And FWIW, my grandmother would have used terminology that would translate
> to "spoiled" or "deteriorated" when referring to the effects of leaving the
> dough unattended for a period of time.
> 
> 
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> Message: 2
> Date: Thu, 5 May 2016 16:04:27 -0500
> From: "Terry Decker" <t.d.decker at att.net>
> To: "Cooks within the SCA" <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
> Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Millet
> Message-ID: <823DE2CFBBA24334B5734011E613C5D0 at Vishnu>
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> 
> Deteriorar - deteriorate, damage, wear, spoil.  Might I suggest "spoils."
> 
> Tapioca flour, yeast, baking powder and xanthan gum are not part of the 
> original recipe you presented.  The are used in some modern recipes for 
> millet bread.  For historical recreation of the recipe, I wouldn't use them. 
> For practical reasons, I might use yeast and pea or bean flour as additives 
> for the "thick" version of the bread, but would forget about them in the 
> "thin" version.
> 
> As to your added ingredients, tapioca flour is high in starch and will 
> require greater hydration than millet flour.  I suspect that without added 
> fats it may promote cracking in the final product.  Yeast will lighten the 
> final product, but without gluten there is no particular need to let the 
> dough rise.  Ten or fifteen minutes to activate fully is all you really 
> need.  The result you get will be primarily in the oven spring.  Baking soda 
> and cream of tartar would be a better bet than baking powder, which has a 
> delayed, heat activated effect that may dry the final product.  Xanthan gum 
> is a modern additive used to produce a leavenable plasticity in gluten free 
> dough, which might be of value if using yeast (the rise should be 45 minutes 
> to 1 hour).
> 
> I would point out that examining the references to Bajri no Rotlo, are not 
> so much about historical research, but about learning how to prepare the 
> recipe.  Use it as your starting point, then work with the other ingredients 
> if you wish to modernize the recipe.
> 
> Bear
> 
> We all wrote -
>> 
>> I wrote:
>> "Make dough with millet flour, salt and a little water, kneading it into a 
>> round shape. Make it thick if it is to be baked and thin if fried. Cover 
>> the outer layer with sesame seeds, anise and green anise. Cook immediately 
>> before the dough deteriorates.?
>> 
>> I see that when originally translating this recipe, I had a typo and wrote 
>> think not thick. This is a direct translation from Barajas-Benavides? 
>> Spanish version of "The Alhambra,? p 96. I did have a copy of the English 
>> version but it was not good and I must have misplaced it.
>> 
>> What would be a better word than ?deteriorates?? - I don?t like it either.
>> 
> The original text reads: deteriore. The full sentence is: Cocinar enseguida 
> para que la masa no se deteriore - translated that is - Cook immediately so 
> the dough does not deteriorate.
> 
> Tis interesting because we criticise medieval manuscripts because the 
> scribes were not cooks so their notes were transcribed directly with no 
> interpretation. Now the Barajas-Benavides book is a 20th publication and 
> still we find people like me and other official translators doing the same 
> until or unless we actually try the recipe. So Sara has hit it on the head 
> with her interpretation of the recipe - cook immediately to prevent dough 
> from drying out and cracking. - A thousand thanks!
> 
> Interesting, in the end I let the dough rise for 2 hours. After baking, it 
> cooled and cracked. Perhaps I should have watched them more carefully and as 
> soon as it stopped rising due to whatever items I used which included- 
> tapioca flour, yeast, baking powder and xanthan gum.  I am not a cook, but 
> an historian trying to interpret ancient recipes into modern terms.
> 
> Members of our group mention an Indian flat bread - Bari no Rotio. It is 
> possible that mijo bread descend from the Indians, then went to Bagdad and 
> on to Spain. That?s a little too far for my research.
> 
> 
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> ------------------------------
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> Message: 3
> Date: Fri, 6 May 2016 12:25:06 -0400
> From: Elise Fleming <alyskatharine at gmail.com>
> To: sca-cooks <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
> Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Millet
> Message-ID: <0fda20f2-755f-ed04-9296-70ef3719b3dc at gmail.com>
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> 
> 
> Susan Lord wrote:
> 
>> "Make dough with millet flour, salt and a little water, kneading it 
>> into a round shape. Make it thick if it is to be baked and thin if 
>> fried. Cover the outer layer with sesame seeds, anise and green anise. 
>> Cook immediately before the dough deteriorates.?
> (snipping)
>> ... in the end I let the dough rise for 2 hours. After baking, it 
>> cooled and cracked. Perhaps I should have watched them more carefully 
>> and as soon as it stopped rising due to whatever items I used which 
>> included- tapioca flour, yeast, baking powder and xanthan gum.  I am 
>> not a cook, but an historian trying to interpret ancient recipes into 
>> modern terms.
> 
> Where did the mention of yeast or baking powder come from? Baking powder 
> wouldn't have existed in the time period of the original recipe, but I 
> don't see any mention of yeast in the translation, either. Why would you 
> have used either of them, especially in a medieval recipe?
> 
> Alys K.
> -- 
> Elise Fleming
> alyskatharine at gmail.com
> http://damealys.medievalcookery.com/
> http://www.flickr.com/photos/8311418@N08/sets/
> 
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