An electronic version of the notebook in my haversack
So, this weekend was March Crown, a West Kingdom (SCA) event wherein the next Queen and King are chosen via combat, and of course, inspiration. More to the point, we also have a cooking competition. By the way, you can skip this part if you …
So, yeah. Last year, I fell into a rabbit hole involving a medieval method of chemically cooking using calcium carbonate. Here’s an article I wrote about it…I need to revisit it one day, and expand on the article. Medieval Fireless Cooking
Spring Coronet Feast 2015 Documentation
Oh, yeah, this feast. A couple friends of mine, Bjorn and Hilarie, were at the time Prince and Princess of Cynagua in the West Kingdom (if you don’t know where that is, don’t worry, it’s not crucial). In any case, they wanted to show off to some of the other Royalty at this particular camping event. Yes, we were camping, about 10 people were to eat, and Bjorn loaned me some of his Guard to be servers.
It was a challenge.
Oh, and the picture is from the West/An Tir War, not the above event. I’ll talk about the war and the Play Dates some other time.
Kitchen Chemistry Class 1 This might be the very first class handouts I wrote…a basic look at making cheese. May have to update it someday…
No, not leaving. It’s just that, many years ago, I took a class in pewter casting at the Estrella War. And, as one does, I came home, wrote my own class handout, and taught the local group how to do it. It’s basically, how to do Terminator 2 on a low budget. Assuming you can get Schwarzenegger to work cheap.
So, this is one of the oldest classes I taught where I wrote a handout. Basic definitions on meadmaking terms, and the basics on how to make it yourself. Mead
So, after the boost to my cooking mojo from last week’s Culinary Symposium, I thought I needed to capitalize on that and play with the Transylvanian cookbook this weekend. The two recipes for “vetrece” caught my eye just now. Tenth. BEEF VETRECE WITH BREAD Salt …
I did say I’d post other classes I’ve taught. This is from last year’s Symposium, and was about the evolution of kitchens in the SCA’s period.
So, supposing you have gone to the trouble of making a batch of túró (not that it’s hard or all that troublesome). What to do with it? Túró cake Crush the túró, whip some eggs, then add some dill, sour cream and butter. and Dish …
The only cheese actually specified in The Science of Cooking is “túró”. After hunting around for a description, I finally was able to get one from one of my translation checkers, who describes it as a very mild, unaged cheese with no real curd formation, …
So, if you know the story of how the Transylvanian Cookbook came to be in English, you’ll know the recipe title “Grim Reaper Cow Beef Juice” figured prominently in my decision to make it happen. I mean, I WANTED to know what that was. (Proper, non-Google translation of the title is “Beef with Garlic Harvest Sauce”). And that garlic harvest sauce shows up in a great many of the recipes in that cookbook. Good reason, it’s delicious! And so, here’s my interpretation of it:
Twelfth. Pork with harvest sauce.
Prepare the pig like I told you to. After the meat is tender, slice some onion and parsley leaves. When serving it, make harvest sauce. Don’t forget to add spices.
Which would help more if you knew the rest of the cookbook. This is more effective:
Veal with harvest sauce.
Do the same like I told you. Boil the meat, add some onion, parsley roots and when it’s done, slice some parsley leaves too, when it’s done and you’re about to serve it whip some eggs in vinegar, pass the broth through a strainer into a bowl, whip it so that the eggs won’t shrink the hot broth; put this vinegar egg sauce on the meat, serve at least three or four slices.
The instructions for the beef version( which is first in the cookbook) also talk about adding black pepper.
So, I roasted the shoulder of a pig in a Dutch oven, nothing special but some onions, salt and pepper with it. Left the lid on, because I wanted it to make broth. After about four hours at 325, it came out, and I simmered some chopped parsley roots and a celery root in the broth, puréed them there ,and then it was allowed to cool, and was refrigerated. The broth was cooled too, so that the next day I could easily peel off the fat and discard it.
When came time to serve at the Symposium Friday potluck, I sliced and reheated the roast, and made the sauce. First, I beat 6 large eggs with about a cup of white wine vinegar and a tablespoon or so of black pepper. Then I tempered it into the slowly reheating pork broth which was about 4 cups in volume. As a note, this would be much easier in a ceramic pipkin with its temperature control.
Once the broth and eggs were together, I continued heating, not allowing it to boil, and kept stirring until the sauce was creamy and thick. Then I poured it over the pork and served it. I admit, I forgot to add the chopped fresh parsley over top.
Wait, why the celery root? The roots add body and a small amount of flavor to the broth, the way a non-medieval russet potato might. But parsley roots are hard to come by, and the flavor after cooking isn’t all that strong, so I went with a similar effect with only a few parsley roots and a celery root. Parsnips would have worked too.
