[Sca-cooks] Rampion Bellflower

[Terry Decker]

I don't recall seeing a recipe for rampion.  I have been apprised that it was listed as being in monastic garden in England prior to the Dissolution of Monasteries, but have not located the reference.  John Evelyn comments on the plant in his Acetaria:  A Discourse of Sallets (1699).  I haven't chased down the reference made by Falstaff in Shakespeare.  I did come across this reference to Micheal Drayton's Poly-olbion (1622) .

"Rampion (Campanula Rapunculus).
The Citrons, which our soil not easily doth afford,The Rampions rare as that.
Polyolbion Song, xv.
De Gubernatis tells a most curious story from Calabria almost exactly that of Cupid and Psyche, but it begins[78] by saying that the maiden, wandering alone in the fields, uprooted a rampion, and so discovered a stair-case leading to a palace in the depths of the earth.
One of Grimm’s fairy tales is called after the heroine, Rapunzel (Rampion), for she was given this plant’s name, and the whole plot hangs on Rampions being stolen from a magician’s garden. There is an Italian tradition that the possession of a rampion (as that of strawberries, cherries, or red shoes), would excite quarrels among children, which would sometimes go as far as “murder.” Even in a land of quick passions and southern blood, it can hardly be thought that this tradition had much ground to spring from, and I have not heard of it as existing further north. Parkinson says that the roots may be eaten as salad or “boyled and stewed with butter and oyle, and some blacke or long pepper cast on them.” The distilled water of the whole plant is excellent for the complexion, and “maketh the face very splendent.” Evelyn thought Rampions “much more nourishing” than Radishes, and they are said to have a “pleasant, nutty flavour”; in the winter the leaves as well as the roots make a nice salad. Even if it is not grown for use, it might well, with its graceful spires of purple bells, be put for ornament in shrubberies. Parkinson has said of Honesty, that “some eate the young rootes before they runne up to flower, as Rampions are eaten with vinegar and oyle”; but Evelyn warns us apropos of this very plant (with others) how cautiously the advice of the Ancient Authors should be taken by the sallet gatherer (Parkinson was probably quoting from the “Ancients” when he said this); “for however it may have been in their countries, in England Radix Lunaria is accounted among the deadly poisons!” One cannot help wondering if Parkinson or Gerarde ever knew those hardy individuals they allude to as “some,” and who tried the experiment!"

Lady Rosalind Northcote, The Book of Herbs, 1903

Note:  The Radix lunaria appears to be a reference to Lunaria annua AKA Honesty (although the name is applied to most members of the genus).

The recipe appears to describe rampion as cold and moist, thus requiring wine and hot spicing to offset the deleterious effects.

Now you have me wondering about where to root out more information.

Bear 

On 5/21/2020 10:52:30 PM, Sam Wallace <guillaumedep at gmail.com> wrote:
Hello All,

I am working on a translation of Le regime du corps and I came across a
rather complicated entry on rampion bellflower. There's an unusual amount
in this section warning about how bad this stuff can be. There is a bit at
the end saying how to prepare it which is also unusual in this work.Doing a
quick search online shows the leaves and roots are edible. In the Regime,
it looks like only the leaves are considered and are of course cooked. I
was wondering if anyone had any experience with this plant and what parts
were used, if so.

Here's the part of the entry concerning their preparation. It is a first
draft, so I apologize for the roughness of the work.

One must first cook them with calamint and with pepper, and then throw
water to it, and make cook together, and then one can eat them with pepper,
ginger, caraway, calamint, oregano, cinnamon and other similar spices, and
one must after drink some good lively strong wine, and that which are of
cold nature which are eaten used after of these electuaries, as with
ginger, acorus, quinces, *dyatrion pyperon*, because these things are good
when mending badness.

Dyatrion pyperon is medicine from three types of pepper: white pepper, long
pepper and black pepper.

Yours,

Guillaume
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