Midlands Regional Preparation

13th Century Cooking Pot

Bean Pot














So, I'm entering my first A&S Competition. Three entries into Division 5, Single Dish.

Kaliis
Sour Curds of Almond Milk
Sauce for Lords

All of the entries are recipes from northern European manuscripts from the 13th century. My main source book is Libellus De Arte Coquinaria


Kaliis is basically wheat bread crusts, cooked with milk and thickened with egg. I will make it as is. But then I will also make it with the addition of cinnamon and possibly other spices, also thinking about butter. There is no mention of any fruit in the cookbook. Honey is only used in sauces. Sugar is only mentioned once in a dish for the sick. I would speculate that the dish was eaten with bits of meat, probably as a breakfast dish. Definitely not safe for Lenten times. I haven't decided how I will cook this yet. It's possible I will use a clay pot or I may actually use a more shallow pan since it instructs to simmer it. I imagine it to be very similar to 'white mush' with the consistency of a gruel or cream of wheat. The recipe before it for white mush recommends flavoring it with butter and cinnamon and saffron. I'll try it both ways. I'm wondering if it will be possible to have it for sampling at the competition. I could always have it in a crockpot and then put it into the serving dish when it was time. But have in the documentation actual photos of me doing it over a flame in an earthenware vessel. That reminds me, that I should ask if I can have power.

Edited to add: Have researched milk and bread. Have decided to bake a bread of wheat flour, using a starter developed with fermented dough, as the recipe specifically mentions wheat bread. I have decided it is to keep the cook from using the more common rye bread. For the milk, I will use oberwise brand whole milk as technically the cream content is the same as raw milk and it's not legal to purchase raw milk where I reside. Eggs I will use large size vegetarian fed chicken eggs, unless research indicates otherwise. The flour I will use Bob's Red Mill Brand as a personal preference of their level of quality.

Sour Curds of Almond Milk is a Lenten version of Skyr. A spoon-curd cheese that has been eaten since the Viking Age at least and still to this day in Iceland and Scandinavia. This was not a common food as it requires wine and almonds. The recipe says wine or vinegar. I am choosing to use wine. I've narrowed it down to a Chenin Blanc. Since during this time period France and Spain were the leading exporters of wine to the Northern lands and Britain. Also Denmark had a tight trade relationship with England since they were England's gateway to the Baltic trade routes. England was favoring French wines because of the marriage of Henry and Elinore (sp?) Check later. I chose white to keep the curd white as I speculate that the Lenten substitute would want to seem as close to the actual product as possible. The food of the time also seemed to favor white foods. Plus, honestly the idea of pink-ish fruity curd cheese sounds revolting to me. I will serve it with bread. Possibly honey as a drizzle as Skyr has been known to be enjoyed with honey since the Viking Age. For this recipe, I will also be making my own almond milk, cooking over an open flame, in a clay cooking pot very similar to the 13th century cooking pots shown in the Museum of London collection shown above. The 13th century pot in actually approximately 10 inches in height and 12 inches in circumference. The modern lead-free clay bean pot in approximately 8 inches in height and 10 inches in circumference. This will be kept cool until serving. Since it would be most likely made for Lent that is a cool season and it wouldn't have been a problem.

Edited to add: Still going with a wine, as almonds indicate a recipe for a wealthy house. While researching vinegars for the Sauce for Lords, I decided that the most logical choice of vinegar would be malt, as it comes from malted barley, brewed into an ale and soured. In Denmark, at the time, ale was the most common drink and barley the most cultivated crop, specifically to make ale. So while I could use malt vinegar for this recipe I am still choosing to use wine, to keep with the theme of affluence my recipe choices indicate.

A Sauce for Lords is an interesting spiced vinegar sauce, thickened with bread crumbs. Luckily I will have bread from the Kaliis recipe and will use the same kind for both. A wholewheat bread made from a sour starter. I haven't decided or researched enough to decide whether to use a red or white vinegar...though a malt vinegar may be acceptable too. One solution could be to try it three times with all three as they all may have been used. The other creative license I was considering was the addition of raisins to balance the sour, as suggested in the notes of the book, on that particular recipe. If I did it would be in addition to making the sauce as stated, without. Since it mirrors a very popular sauce of the time period that in other sources adds various dried fruits, I feel comfortable that it's within the scope of the project.  This will be room temperature and I need to find a cask for it. I'm also going to roast some duck, cover it in sauce and salt it, for tasting, as the recipe directly after suggests for its purpose.

Edited to add: Going to use malt vinegar. Wine would have been imported and possibly too expensive to allow to sour or too scarce to allow souring. Malt vinegar would have been more readily available more cost effective for preservation.

More to come....