Section VII - Medieval Cooking - A Demo

   Medieval Cooking
   Ginger Bread

Meats
   A Forced Meat Pie
   Fruited Chicken with Turmeric Rice
   40 Cloves of Garlic Chicken

Vegetables

   Garlic Olives
   Mushroom Tart

Breakfast

   Fried Breakfast Porridge

Bread

   Brown Bread
   Dill Butter

Fruits and Flowers

   Rose Apple Pie
   Poached Pears

Subtleties

Drinks

   Hippocras
   Crimson Tea

This pamphlet started out as a flyer that I prepared for a Demo that the Shire of Dark River presented to the Davenport Public Library. I gave a half hour talk on Medieval Food and cooking practices and then presented a feast of A Forced Meat Pye, Fruited Chicken with Turmeric Rice, Pomegranate Carrots, Marzipan, Pepperkakors, Sekanjabin, and breads. I then decided to expand my pamphlet into a little booklet for demos and it sells well at a local Shakepearean Festival, too.

Medieval Cooking

We are a part of a medieval reenactment group, called the Society for Creative Anachronism, that selectively recreates the era between 500 AD and 1600 AD. We recreate the best that the Middle Ages had to offer such as the Chivalry. We leave out the worst that was happening, such as the plague.

One of the fun things that we do is present feast. I am a cook within the Society and these are some of my favorite recipes. I have updated the recipes and, in some cases, included a modern equivalent or have used modern conveyance, so that you might prepare them at home.

I thought we would start this pamphlet out with a real medieval Recipe. Below is a recipe for Gingerbread, dating from the 15th Century. Its not what you would expect from so familiar a cookie.

Ginger Bread

Source: Two Fifteenth Century Cookry Bokes, Harleian MS 279, 1430.

"Take a quart of hony, & sethe it, and skeme it cleene; take safroun, pouder Pepir, & throw ther-on; take gratyd brede & make it so chargeaunt that it wol be y-lechyd; then take pouder Cannelle, & strew ther-on y-now; then make yt square, like as thou wolt leche yt; take when thou lechyst hyt and caste Box leves a-bouyn, y-stykyd there on, on clowys. And if thou wold have it Red, cloure it with Saunderys y-now."

Just reading this recipe, you might not know how to prepare it, some of the words are familiar, others are not. That is because this is Middle English, essentially a foreign language. Below is my interpretation

A Working Version

8 cups of dried bread crumbs
1 1/4 cups of honey
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ginger
1/8 teaspoon ground pepper

Grind the bread to crumbs. Measure spices into a bowl with the crumbs. Bring honey to a boil and skim off any white scum that floats to the surface. Take from heat. Stir in crumbs. When well mixed press into a greased mold or 8 inch layer cake pan. Cover and let set for several hours before removing from the pan. You can make it red by adding food coloring, but I generally skip that step. Dry the Gingerbread well and it will last for several weeks.

Other recipes would have you "smite" your food or "Hack it to gobbets". One recipe that is actually telling us to stuff a rabbet with a partridge makes the process sound as if performing torture in the dungeons, with "breaking", "cramming," and "muddle" being part of the recipe instructions. Having tried the recipe it is rather tasty, but the wording is somewhat daunting.

Meats

Only during the fall season did the common or middle class people have fresh meats, when the animals that could not be fed over the winter were slaughtered. The Nobility relied on hunting for their supply of fresh meats, year round. In the winter and very early spring the cooks of the time had to work "cured" meats. Meat was preserved in many ways; salted, dried, smoked, made into sausage and then dried or smoked, potted and larded. When the cook was ready to use the meat, it would need to be soaked, pounded or disguised in some manner. Dried meats could be rather tasteless. Salted meats would taste mostly of salt. One of the things that they did was to soak the meat over night, changing the water at least twice to remove the salt and to reconstitute the dried meats. At this point it would be pretty bland and would not look very appetizing. SO, they would force it through a sieve, which would result in a ground meat and then they would bake it into pies using fruits and

A Forced Meat Pye

1 1/2 cups ground summer sausage
( NOTE: I put the sausage through a food processor on the grate setting)
1 medium apple peeled, cored, and diced
Rind of one medium orange grated
1/4 teaspoon mace
1/2 teaspoon of each of the following spices
Cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and ginger

Pie Crust - add 1/3 teaspoon of cinnamon, cloves, and ginger to flour as your prepare your favorite recipe or boxed mix. Combine all the ingredients. Make up your crust recipe. Place the filling into the crust and bake at 350 degrees for 25 to 35 minutes. Serve hot or cold. These types of pies keep very well and travel to picnics easily. You may also use leftover meats in place of the sausage.

Fruited Chicken with Turmeric Rice

2 cups Instant Brown Rice
2 cups water
1 teaspoon Turmeric
1/2 cup walnuts
1/3 cup raisins
4 chicken breast, deboned and skinned
1 package mixed dried fruit (16 to 24 ounces)
2 cups chicken broth
water

In a stock pot put one chicken breast for each serving that you intend to make. This recipe is set-up for 4 servings. Cook the chicken with the broth, add the mixed dried fruits. Simmer until the chicken is completely cooked and the fruits have become soft. Keep a close eye on the stewing meat and add water as needed to keep the pot from boiling dry. When you are done, the chicken should still have some liquid on it. Make the rice according to the recipe on the package adding the turmeric and raisins to the water before it boils. You will need to add about 1/4 cup more water as the raisins will soak up some of the liquid. Stir in the walnuts. To serve, spread the rice out onto a platter, arrange the chicken pieces over that, and then ladle the fruits and extra juice over the chicken. You may sprinkle with extra walnuts as a garnish. Serve it forth.

The original recipe for this dish was made from whole chickens, which were deboned and shredded over the rice. I also used a cup of white wine in the stewing process. I have made the recipe easier and healthier by using only the chicken breast. If you want you may cut the chicken into bite sized pieces or shred it over the rice.

40 Cloves of Garlic Chicken

1 cup olive oil
40 cloves of garlic
3/4 teaspoon each dried rosemary, thyme and sage
5 springs fresh parsley
4 lbs chicken breast, skinned and deboned
salt and pepper to taste

Place oil, garlic and herb's in a large casserole. Let marinate 1/2 hour. Wash and dry chicken and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Add chicken to the casserole dish making sure that the oil completely covers the chicken pieces. Cover with aluminum foil and a pan lid. Bake for 1 1/2 hours at 325 degrees. Before serving peel the garlic cloves and mash them, mix with 1 cup of the chicken juices and oil. Serve this as a sauce on the side. Unskinned chicken looks ghastly when used in this recipe, so always skin the bird before cooking.

Vegetables

The common person or peasant had to rely on farming and foraging for the bulk of their food. They generally owed 2/3's of what they grew to their Lord. The Lord in return gave them a place to live, and protected them in times of war. Some of the standard root vegetables were turnips, parsnips, and onions. Carrots were grown by the Dutch who fed them to their cows, as a result the area was famous for its rich butters and cheeses. When Queen Elisabeth was on the throne a Dutch suitor presented her with a tub of butter and a wreath of carrots that were studded with diamonds. The wreath was supposed to be worn on her head. Queen Elisabeth, being a practical woman, took the diamonds out of the carrots and sent the butter and carrots to the kitchen for her cooks to prepare. Much to the Dutch suitors delight the Queen loved the dish. Carrots caught on in a big way, as the Queen was a trend setter.

Garlic Olives

Drain liquid from green or black olives. Add 12 peeled cloves of garlic. Cover with olive oil and let stand 24 hours or more in refrigerator. Drain oil and serve forth.

Mushroom Tart

2 single crust pie shells
1 lb fresh mushrooms 1 pkg shredded cheese (cheddar, Swiss, or mozzarella)

Wash and slice the mushrooms. Bake crust till almost done. Put mushrooms in crust, top with cheese and return to the oven. Bake until the cheese is melted. Serve immediately.

Breakfast

Meals were not set out the way that we have them today. One source tells us that knights, on retainer and without lands of their own, were often poor. As such they often ate Poor Knights Toasts for their supper. This toast was basically what we know as French Toast, served with a sprinkle of wine rather then syrup.

The word Breakfast literally comes from the phrase "to break the fast."

Gruel is generally portrayed in modern cinema and literature as a thin sort of grain porridge, mostly oatmeal, for which poor little beggar boys get whipped if they ask for more. In my somewhat sporadic research of gruel I have discovered that "gruel" is a catch all term, sort of like today's term "casserole". What to do with all the leftovers? Mix it all together and serve warm as a porridge. Gruel in this fashion would hardly have tasted the same twice. One of the best descriptions that I came across was "yesterdays beef stew with today's oatmeal".

A Fried Breakfast Porridge

1 1/2 cups of cold set oatmeal (maybe left over from yesterday).
1 cup flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk

Mix together and fry on a hot griddle as you would pancakes. Serve with honey.

Variations on a theme.

1. Add a 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon and a small apple chopped fine.
2. Add crumbled sausage, bacon or leftover meats.
3. Add 1/2 cup raisins or other dried fruits
4. Add 1/2 cup nuts (walnuts or almonds)
5. Or add all of the above.

Bread

Bread in the Middle Ages was viewed a bit differently. It was sometimes the difference between life and death. It was not a dish at dinner. Dinner was what you ate with bread. Bread being the most important and sometimes largest part.

Commoners ate coarsely ground breads, if they were lucky there was a mill stone in the area, but peasants could only afford to have their grain ground once. The nobility could afford to have their grain ground two or three times. The finer the grain the better the bread. Grains most commonly used was rye and wheat.

Not everyone had the means to bake bread, as it required an oven and the time in which to bake it in. In the cities many living quarters were without even a fireplace, and in the country most of the peasantry spent the days working in the fields. So village and neighborhood bakers sprang up and everyone bought their bread, not unlike today. There were special laws passed to make sure that the bread was of good quality and size. The nobility had a staff of bakers so their bread was always fresh and made of good ingredients.

Brown Bread

3 cups rye flour
3 to 3 1/2 cups white flour
1 pkg dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water
1/2 cup dark honey
1 1/2 cup scalded milk
2 tablespoons oil or melted butter

Mix yeast and water, add honey. When milk has cooled to lukewarm add to yeast mixture. Add the oil. Mix in 2 cups white flour and 1 cup rye flour. Stir until smooth. Add the rest of the flour 1 cup at a time. Knead. Let rise. Shape into round loaves and place on greased cookie sheets. Let rise again until doubled. Bake at 350 degrees until loaf sounds hallow when tapped.

Interesting note on butter and cheese. These came from cows, goats, etc. and were a renewable source. Ergo they were inexpensive, meaning fit only for the peasants. Cheese and butter was known as the white meat for the poor. Royalty spread rendered goose lard on their bread. It was not a renewable source, was expensive to make and ergo was fit only for the gentry. So while the peasants had butter on their bread, the Royalty essentially ate margarine.

Dill Butter

Use 1 teaspoon of dill for each 1/4 pound of butter. Mix well. Set aside to chill until ready to use.

Fruits and Flowers

The cooks of this era relied a great deal on spices and herb's for flavoring. They also used flowers in their cooking. Rose and Violet were favorite flavors. If you do experiment with flower cooking remember to use only flowers that have been organically grown, bug spray can make you rather ill. Also, if you are using flower oils make sure that they are culinary extracts.

Rose Apple Pie

1 - 9inch two crust pie shell
Sift 3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
a dash of salt
Mix with
6 cups peeled and thinly sliced apples
1 cup chopped rose petals

Put mixture into the pie shell. Dot with 2 tablespoons of butter, put on top crust. Cover with foil to prevent excessive browning. bake 40 to 50 minutes at 425 degrees, remove foil last 15 minutes.

Fruits were dried and then simmered in wine to reconstitute. The recipe below starts with fresh fruits.

Poached Pears

6 pears, peeled, halved, and cored
1 1/2 cup red wine (or enough to cover pears)
1 1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons fresh rosemary

Make syrup with sugar, wine and rosemary. Pour over pears and simmer until tender. Leave in syrup to cool or serve warm.

Subtleties

People of the era liked to have illusion foods or to make foods that were to be presented to Royalty to be pretty. Some of the things that they did was to sculpt scenes of recent happenings in almond paste or marzipan. Queen Elisabeth had a baker on her staff whose entire job was to create a likeness of her many guest by sculpting gingerbread. The bust or faces where then present to them at evening meal.

They liked to create food that was made of one thing but looked like another. Such as making meat to look like fruit or fruit to look like meat. You could be slicing into what looked like a pear and suddenly find out that it is really spiced pork that has been shaped to look like a pear.

One of the favorites was to make pie shells and then fill them with live animals so that when the pie was opened the animals would pop out and surprise everyone, like the old rhyme said:

4 and 20 blackbirds baked in a pie
When the pie was opened the birds began to sing
Wasn't that a funny thing to set before the King.

In this case the word funny is meant literally, and does not (as I was taught in grade school) mean strange or odd.

Drinks

Everyone drank wine. Water was not good to drink as there was no way in which to purify it, some boiled it, but it still probably tasted bad, unless it came from a deep well. Wine not only made the water drinkable, it also help in the digestion of foods that were tainted. Wine was often served before it had a chance to age, or because of poor quality was more like vinegar then wine. To that end the populace would spice or mull their wines and served them warm. Sometimes spelled "Ypocras" this recipe has many variations.

Hippocras

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
4 cinnamon sticks, broken
4 grains cardamom, crushed
1/2 cup sugar or honey
1/8 teaspoon pepper
1 quart good red dry wine or grape juice
4 blue heliotrope blossoms (these are optional as they were used for coloring)
1 lemon cut into thin slices

Place spices in a large pot and pour in the wine or grape juice. Bring it to a boil and simmer covered for 7 to 10 minutes. Add heliotrope blossoms and simmer 3 to 5 minutes. Remove spices and flowers. Serve warm garnished with lemon slices.

Coffee although available in the Middle East was not a common drink in Europe until the late 1500's and then it was to expensive for common use. Tea from China was not introduced to Europe until the 1600's. "Teas" made of herb's was sometimes used, although more as remedies for sickness then refreshment.

Crimson Tea

5 cups rose petals, dried
1 cup rosemary leaves, dried
2 cups rose geranium leaves, dried

Mix thoroughly and store in tightly covered dark container. To use, steep 1 teaspoon herb mixture per 1 cup of boiling water for 5 minutes or to taste. Strain. Sweeten to taste.