bunnyjadwiga

From August09

I've been reading Hungry Monkey: A food loving father's quest to raise an adventurous eater by Matthew Amster-Burton (you should too, it's very funny as well as foodie). Mostly because I'm terrified of Beekman growing up to be a picky eater: we already have one serious picky eater, and because of the way I was raised, it makes me want to tear my hair out. Two of them will drive me right off the edge. (I know, picky eating usually peaks at age 4; I figure since Miss B. will be 14 and probably not speaking to any of us, the two of them will live on ramen noodles and salami sandwiches that year.)
( baby foodie stuff here )
So, yes, my baby had creamed weeds for his first successful vegetable.

(We'd tried mashed potato but that came RIGHT back out; I was appalled and considered having a maternity test; nobody in my family has ever turned down mashed potato-- it's the traditional first food!_

So, is the correct term for the head cook of a feast in fact "Chef de Cuisine"? Consider what Tigers & Strawberries has to say about the title:
http://www.tigersandstrawberries.com/2009/02/13/what-is-a-chef/

So what do I mean by “run” a professional kitchen? What is it that a chef does that home cooks, cooking instructors, food writers, food bloggers, line cooks and television personalities do not do?

They don’t create menus, cost out each menu item so that accurate prices can be assigned to them, set up pantries, understand and effectively run and repair arcane kitchen equipment, much of which is dangerous to life and limb, deal with multiple purveyors, keep track of inventory, order foodstuffs, hire and train staff, create plate presentation, devise and cook off-menu specials, expedite during service, deal with cranky dining room staff, cook and act as both den mother and field marshal at the same time.

*giggle*

From Eadric the Potter's class:
- Pack cooking gear in wool sacks, and wash them-- they make excellent hotpads, especially when they shrink.

Now I shall have to keep my eyes open for cheap wool. :)

I'm thinking of putting together a list of "easy to make medieval dishes" and I thought I'd start where I started, with Armored Turnips. For those who aren't familiar with them, they are a sort of turnip au gratin, or as some people have put it, turnips as cheese substrate.

Platina book 8
Cut up turnips that have been either boiled or cooked under the ashes.
Likewise do the same with rich cheese, not too ripe. These should be
smaller morsels than the turnips, though. In a pan greased with butter
or liquamen, make a layer of cheese first, then a layer of turnips,
and so on, all the while pouring in spice and some butter, from
time to time. This dish is quickly cooked and should be eaten quickly, too.

[Poll #1159629]

A couple of years back, I suddenly became wildly interested in cooking grains and dried beans. Ok, I seem to recollect that I became wildly interested in buying grains and dried beans and keeping them in pretty jars, but eventually one does have to eat them. Since then, I I've researched and cooked bulgur (cracked) wheat, barley and barley groats, buckwheat groats (kasha), millet, quinoa, oat groats and amaranth. Most of them are pretty yummy. Most of them make it into our food arrangements on a regular basis. We've also added couscous to our repetoire (who can't like a starch that cooks in five minutes if you dump it in boiling water, cover it, and take it off the heat?

But what I really need is a proportion chart, where the amount of grain and the amount of water are laid out for boiling and for slow cooking processes.

This is the best chart I've found so far:
http://www.rivercityfoodcoop.org/?section=products&page=cooking_grains
http://www.blueplanetco-op.com/wholegrains.html

There are some good grain cooking cookbooks, and I'll need to raid the Easton library for them (Madison PL, though good on many levels, has little on slow cooking and nothing on grains).

However, here's a few websites:
http://www.hgof.ns.ca/index2.php?function=cooking_tips
http://www.recipetips.com/kitchen-tips/t--1018/boilabsorbsteam-other-grains.asp

an interesting point that I've been thinking about lately, because I've been reading books with other people's interpretations of pre-1650 recipes in them again.

In the SCA-cooks world, we try to limit ourselves to recipes that are fully documented, specifically ones that start with a known, extant recipe written down before 1650, and which we 'redact' (i.e., recreate in modern measurements) as exactly as we can and with great care to ingredients.

But I find myself fussing in certain ways about what people do in their redactions and in their service, and in different ways about what I do, and what corner-cutting or accomodations to modern life I find acceptable for me to do.

I, for instance, tend to fuss about modern spicing and modern expectations of textures being accomodated in redacting and menu choices. But then I smack myself about serving modern crudites in my dayboards, and my tendency to serve certain sauces to be eaten with bread. (I haven't found good sauce on bread documentation, though many of the veggies I serve in sauce are meant to be served OVER bread, such as buttered worts...)

And then there's the drinks. Infusions of herbs and jalabs of sugar syrup are very popular in my kingdom, and I've helped to make them so. But I wonder if anyone routinely drank cold mint tea or cold lavender tea rather than small beer or small mead? What about my lemon-ginger syrup jalab? I serve that at events, and people think I'm being very
period-- but I made that recipe up, using the proportions in a modern sekanjabin recipe, and I have to keep admitting it. That recipe has escaped out into the SCA cooking world and has a separate existence. People think it is period because they've had it at feasts that were full of redactions from period recipes.

I've served Vanilla pizelles in place of period wafers with something, because that's what I had time and people would eat, and comforted myself with the idea that Vanilla is the modern equivalent of rosewater. But my pizelles weren't from a period recipe, and they had vanilla in them!

And yet, I'm still cranky at Constance Hieatt because in Pleyn Delit she recommends allspice in a recipe, though the allspice can't be documented as a regularly used spice in our period, and because her cameline sauce is based on a completely obscure version, which, if tweaked by unsuspecting cooks, comes out as a raisin-nut stuffing...

Do I hold a double standard? Am I really judging my work by similar, if not the same, standards I judge others? I've served bananas at a dayboard, and will do it again. Is it right for me to complain so bitterly when someone serves Bigos/Hunter Stew with tomatoes in it at a feast?

Digby Cakes with Splenda created by Master Tirloch of Tallaght
http://oak.atlantia.sca.org/21/digbysplenda.htm

STARTERS:
Olives *
Lombardy sops (layered casserole of bread & cheese with broth) (bread, dairy, meat; vegetarian version available on request)
Sallat *

FIRST COURSE:
Fish with Orange Juice
Fried Millet Polenta (contains dairy; plain dairy free millet available) *
Cooked dish of Lentils *
Garlic Chicken
Limonada (raisin-lemon-almond pudding) (nuts) *
Parsley Dish (contains nuts, bread)*

SECOND COURSE:
Casserole of Pork
Rice cooked in the Oven (may contain eggs)*
Modern Pottage of Chard, served with parmesan on the side *
Moorish Eggplant (contains eggs, dairy) *
Fried figs *
Carrot-Cheese Pie (contains dairy) *

Buffet:
Food for Angels (Sweetened cheese with rosewater or orange flower water) *
Anise Biscotti (contains wheat) *
Peach Dish (contains meat broth)
Quince Paste *
Fruit *
Jordan Almonds *

* indicates vegetarian options. An additional meat dish may be added at the cook's discretion.

Slowly, ah, slowly...

But the feast for Conviviencia (Labor Day weekend in Peach Bottom PA) is coming together.

starters:
- Lombardy sops (cheese and bread casserole)
- something sharp-tasting?

First course
Fried Millet polenta
Armored Capon?
Sauce(s) of some kind?
Greens dish?
Moorish Eggplant (eggplant, meet de Nola)
Lentil or chickpea dish (vaguely favoring chickpeas)?

Second course
Casserole of meat, made with pork
Mirrauste of apples?
Rice in the oven
Fish with bitter orange juice?
parsley dish?
Limonada?
Carrot-cheese pie

Desserts:
Candied stuff
Peach pie?
Quince paste
Anise Biscotti
Food for Angels (venetian version)
Fruit

from De Nola again:

178. Pottage called jota
POTAJE LLAMADO JOTA

You will take chard, and parsley, and mint, and borage, and put everything to cook so that it comes to a boil; and then put it on a chopping-block, and chop it small with spices; and when it is well-chopped, strain it through a woolen cloth, and put it in a pot; and you must give it a boil in such a manner that it does not lose its greenness. And do not cover it until the hour of dinner, and if you wish to cook it the night before, make it in the same manner, but you must put in some bacon from fresh pork and fry it to extract the juice; and with that juice, gently fry the above-mentioned things; and with pot-broth in the manner of spinach, and then prepare dishes, and upon each dish put a piece of that bacon which you have gently fried.

Ok, this one is a bit odder. I'm going to work on it this way:
- chard, mint, parsley (borage ommitted), cleaned and chopped roughly
-blanch greens
- chop up fine and add spices
- drain?
- cook on low just until done (make sure color does not change)

I'm worried about that 'strain through a woolen cloth but I'll try it.