EEEEC: Joana de Bairros’ “An Evening in Granada” Feast
Figs in the French manner
Entered under the category of degustation
“This was an event born out of my desire to cook Iberian food. I have been translating and redacting some recipes from the Portuguese Livro de Cozinha da Infanta D. Maria, and wanted to incorporate these into a feast…”
“…Normally I would look at the concept of an event and plan the feast based on that. This event was however entirely about the food and the dining experience and I had convinced my husband that he wanted to steward it so we could make the event as Iberian as we wanted to!…”
To read more about this sumptuous and delectable feast, visit this google doc.
Entered in Degustation, Astrid describes her entry:
“I have been interested in trying to make a lemon mead for a while as our household loves mead and limoncello. Unfortunately, I have been having trouble finding a proper period recipe. There are a few mentions in “Sima – a festive drink made with natures ingredients” by Seija Irmeli Kulmala about it being a favourite of King Gustav I of Sweden (early 1500’s) after he tasted it on a visit to Turku, a town that was then part of Sweden, but is now part of Finland. It was an imported drink from Riga and Lubeck (Latvia and Germany) and seems to have had a long history from there before it turned up in Finland of the future.
“The 16thC version of the drink was a honey-based mead and much higher alcohol content compared to the barely alcoholic sugar-based lemonade (like our homemade ginger beer) of modern Finnish Sima. So, more research to do, but I was excited to try my own version. I used a sack mead recipe of 2 parts water to one part honey with the juice and rind of 6 largish lemons making up a portion of the water allowance. It worked out that each cup of water was 8ml of lemon juice, and about 242ml of water. I used my usual mead making process, in that I heated the water, honey, lemon juice and rind, and let it get hot enough for the wax to scum (usually 65 to 70 degrees). Once any ickies are scooped off the top – I use my mums finest left over, crystalised, odd bits of honey from her last year’s hive takings, so there are usually fun particulates – I taste it, leave it to cool and then put it in a demijohn with some yeast. I was quite lucky in that the largest container of honey had a citrusy taste.
“The yeast is currently past its frat party phase and is now studiously munching its way through the sugar. I have a few weeks to go before I find out if it is going to be great, ok, or a complete disaster.”
EEEEC: Joana de Bairros’ Capon with Oranges and Lemons
An entry for collaboration and degustation, with just a hint of particpation
“This recipe is from Thomas Dawson’s The Gudwife’s Jewel from 1597 and was made by Isabel Maria and Joana for Monday night dinner at Canterbury Faire. It is a particular favourite as it is fairly straightforward, cooks well as a one pot dish when camping and is delicious.
“Redaction to serve 6 adults
“Ingredients
1.2kg boned chicken thighs
4 oranges
2 lemons
3 whole cloves
1 cube chicken stock
¼ c prunes
¼ c currants
¼ c dates
1 t pepper
1 t salt
1 c white wine
1 t rose water
1 t sugar
“Method
Dice the chicken and cut your oranges and lemons into wedges
Put chicken in a pot with 1t oil and brown
Add in oranges, lemons, dried fruit and cloves and start to cook with chicken
If using Massels stock make up 2 cups of stock using one cube and add to the pot.
Reduce down stock and cook the chicken and fruit down
When it starts to reduce in liquid add in the wine and remaining spices and salt with rose water and sugar and cook down further
“When it is ready, serve on top of slices of bread. We chose to serve it with a green salad with slices of orange. “
EDITED TO ADD: “To quote the old Amberherthe website: “We do not eat to live. As far as we are concerned, eating and food is an important part of the whole medieval experience. Therefore time and attention is given to eating and food preparation.” In this way, working together to prepare communal food for the household is to participate in an age old (and oft repeated) ritual that helps maintain the bonds of friendship and family.
Entered under degustation and personification: apple and raisin pies for Fiery Knights.
Snacks for events are always a good idea. I looked through my German cookbooks and settled first on making some cherry pies. And then I decided the cherry filling / garb stain potential was a little too high at an outdoor event, and I had some apples that were at the ready for pie-making stage.
To make them a little more interesting, I chose a recipe that included apples, raisins, and spices. I made these for a tourney that was then sadly rained out, so decided to experiment with freezing these for a later event. If they defrosted and remained whole, tasty and crispy without any further heating, I could stash away a supply of snack pies in the freezer for future events when I had time for baking, without adding extra stress to event preparation.
They were perfect in texture and were delicious.
I later realised I’d made the same pies for a previous challenge, which is not surprising given they are made using staple pantry items: PGC A&S Challenge
Entered under degustation (and possibly also collaboration), Ginevra describes her entries:
“I made lunch at Goldenflight (with others, but so maybe this is Collaboration as well- though I did the testing myself) We had – Norse handpies (Recipie from: http://www.godecookery.com/friends/frec129.html) bread rolls and butter, Castlevero’s green salad (-onions, because of allergies), carrot sticks, and oranges sprinkled with rosewater. Sadly, I did not take photos at the event, so this entry looks very boring.
“For Day of Dance I made 3 dishes 2 of which can be found in La Singolare dottrina di M. Domenico Romoli.(though I personally found the recipes in ‘A Spring Feast’ by Shannon Wanty). The dishes were Pollastri al Catelana (below) and Zuccarini (above). I had made neither of these before, and was mostly happy with how they turned out, but more practice was required to make the zuccarini regularly shaped.
Isabel Maria shares her entry for the categories of luxuriation, degustation, and exploration. As she says:
“There was an upcoming event called An Evening in Granada, and the promotional material read “It is 1526 and we invite you to join us in Granada, to celebrate the glad tidings of the nuptials of Carlos of Spain and Isabella of Portugal in an evening of fine food, fine company, and fine entertainment. Rumour has it that this is where the happy couple will be spending their honeymoon!”. As I had offered to make some sotelties to complement the feast and theme, it became obvious that I needed to learn some new skills in order to make the envisaged items; red sugarpaste carnations and a pomegranate decorated with gold leaf.
“Having never gilded anything, nor created anything so fine as carnation petals in the medium of sugarpaste before, I embarked on a journey of research, shopping, bodging equipment to approximate the ‘proper’ tools, and a testing amount of testing to see what worked for me. This was the exploration part of the project.
“Somewhere along this process, the pomegranate became a box to hold actual pomegranate arils and I decided to gild the carnation calyxes. (I’m not entirely sure how that happened.)
The pomegranate was made by forming the shapes over a suitable shape and allowing them to dry for several days before being removed and allowed to dry further. Once I was comfortable with their structural stability, I added the red ‘skin’ layer, and added the sculpted flower to the top. The gilding was added after further drying, and the application of a little sugar glue.
In contrast, the carnations were much more intensive in their construction and were completed over many evenings. Each layer of petals had to be cut out of the paste, then thinned and the edges thinned further until they ruffled. This delicate layer was then added to the wire and allowed to dry overnight before another layer was created and added. The calyx was cut from paste and moulded around the base of the petals when the petals looked sufficiently full and carnation like.
As these sotelties were edible they meet the definition of degustation even though they didn’t really feed anyone (Her Excellency excepted), and were created simply to add glamour and luxury to the event, it is clear they fall into the luxuriation category for this challenge. Which is not to say they didn’t generate a lot of enjoyment in their creation and display.”
Ailith presents this entry of an evolution of possets in the category of Degustation
“As some people are aware, I ran a tea tent some afternoons at Canterbury Faire 2023. This led me to put a bit more research into what people further to the west of Europe and in Britain drank to warm themselves of an evening. What I found was Possets. Used as a warm drink, a dessert, and the base for many other recipes, I kept running into the issue of recipe books that would simply say “start with a posset”. But how did I start with a posset when it was too well known for them to even write the recipe down? Limited to Google books and the Gutenburg Project (and similar websites) I eventually found The Closet of Sir Kenelm Digby Knight Opened by Kenelm Digby, published 1669. The book had been written in the 4 or so decades before, and had been published by the author’s son. I reasoned that as a philosopher and not a cook, Sir Digby had almost definitely written down older recipes rather than creating his own versions, and therefore it is extremely likely that his posset recipes are, in fact, period. So, under the sign of the Dizzy Bee, I used his “To Make a Sack Posset” (from page 111) as a base to start trialling possible recipes.
” And so we come to this. What actually is a posset? Well, a posset is a drink that sometimes had solid curds on top of it that could be eaten. It is make from milk or cream, eggs, a white wine or ale, sugar, and varied spices. There were as many different variations as their were cooks. The best description I have been able to come up with is that it is a drinkable custard mixed with a mulled white wine or ale. For those who can read scrawl, I have included my notes from the first few times I tried it, until I came to something simple that I felt was right for me. The notes were written specifically for myself and sometimes reference cooking utensils I have at home, so if something doesn’t make sense, that’s why…” I presented my final experiment with this particular posset recipe at the A&S showcase at Yule 2023. Many people tried it, and some even came back for seconds :)”
The original recipe:
TO MAKE A SACK POSSET Boil two wine-quarts of Sweet-cream in a Possnet; when it hath boiled a little, take it from the fire, and beat the yolks of nine or ten fresh Eggs, and the whites of four with it, beginning with two or three spoonfuls, and adding more till all be incorporated; then set it over the fire, to recover a good degree of heat, but not so much as to boil; and always stir it one way, least you break the consistence. In the mean time, let half a pint of Sack or White muscadin boil a very little in a bason, upon a Chafing-dish of Coals, with three quarters of a pound of Sugar, and three or four quartered Nutmegs, and as many pretty big pieces of sticks of Cinnamon. When this is well scummed, and still very hot, take it from the fire, and immediately pour into it the cream, beginning to pour neer it, but raising by degrees your hand so that it may fall down from a good height; and without anymore to be done, it will then be fit to eat. It is very good kept cold as well as eaten hot. It doth very well with it, to put into the Sack (immediately before you put in the cream) some Ambergreece, or Ambered-sugar, or Pastils. When it is made, you may put powder of Cinnamon and Sugar upon it, if you like it.
Digby, K. (1669). The Closet of Sir Kenelm Digby Knight Opened (p. 111).
Recipe I settled upon:
For 1 cup of cream, use:
half a cup of white(ish) wine
2 egg yolks
1 egg white
1/2 a stick of cinnamon crumbled
1/4 of a whole nutmeg roughly chopped
1 tablespoon honey or sugar
Mix wine, spices, and sugar into a small pot and put on to heat over a medium heat. In a medium pot simmer the cream for a few minutes, do not allow it to boil. remove the cream from the heat and beat in the egg yolks and white. Strain the hot spiced wine and mix into the cream, pouring from a height for aeration purposes.
“I am presenting this as a “completed” A&S project, but as any good cook will know, a project like this will never be entirely completed. Since testing this recipe I have since found actual period sources, plus I want to try it with different types of wine and especially mead. Possibilities are endless with a recipe as open as this.”
