A report by Rudd Rayfield on the thirteenth-annual Hatherleigh Fire Festival Medieval Dinner held at his home in Minneapolis.

NOTE: See also the files: Hatherleigh-art, sotelties-msg, cak-soteltes-msg, Warners-art, illusion-fds-msg.

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Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2000 09:53:25 EST

From: RuddR@aol.com

Subject: SC - Hatherleigh 2000

On Saturday, 18 November, I hosted the thirteenth-annual Hatherleigh Fire Festival Medieval Dinner at my home in Minneapolis. There were twenty-four at table, including three children. We were honored to have as a guest Lady

Margaret Fitzwilliam of Kent (MKA Jennifer "Pixel" Getty), from Nordskogen, who introduced us to Armored Turnips, elegantly presented with yellow and white stripes. Another imaginative dish was sixteen fist-sized Yrchouns, bristling with slivered almond spines and sporting cute little currant eyes and noses. Also impressive, the Tourte Parmerienne was rectangular, ten inches by fifteen inches, with pastry battlements defended by chicken leg turrets flying bacon flags.

My own contribution was a brace of Cockentrice. I found a small, family butcher shop in South St. Paul (just up the hill from the slaughterhouses), that found me a twelve-pound suckling pig. I special-ordered a roasting chicken with its head and feet still on from Lund's, a local up-scale supermarket. I cut them both in half and sewed them back together with carpet thread, having first to poke holes through the pig's skin with a metal skewer. I lined up the spines of the halves I was joining, and sewed them together down one side at a time. I sewed down through the pig's skin and up through the chicken's, pulling its thinner skin over the top of the seam. I held the chicken's neck in a graceful curve with a skewer supported in a wad of aluminum foil, which was disguised on the serving platter with a purple cabbage leaf. I roasted them according to directions for suckling pig in "Joie de Cuisine" (MS Rombauer-Becker 1975). The hardest part (apart from scooping out the pig's eyes) was trying to use a needle with wet, greasy fingers. I replaced the pig's eyes with green grapes and cloves, and put a small red onion in its mouth. I know the original receipts say "stuff it as a pig", or stuff it with bread, eggs and suet, and some purists may criticize me for deviating from the primary source, but I decided to acknowledge their bird half, and stuffed them with garlic, grapes and parsley (Sauce for a Gos, Ashmole MS 1439, redaction below). Some of the guests were a bit intimidated to look at a second course that looked back at them (including the Yrchouns), but once the beasts got cut up, they were completely devoured.

A picture of the roasted Cockentrice ready to be served can be seen below:

Rudd Rayfield

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Menu

First Course

Mortreus (Harleian MS 4016)

Puree of Peson (Forme of Cury)

Beef with Pevorade (Ashmole MS 1439)

Chicken with Lumbard Mustard (Forme of Cury)

Mushroom Tart (Menagier de Paris)

Sambocade (Forme of Cury)

Second Course

Peeres in Confyt (Forme of Cury)

Cockentrice (Harleian MS 279)

Yrchouns (Harleian MS 279)

Armored Turnips (Platina)

Salat

Tourte Parmerienne (Viandier de Taillevent)

Bake Mete (Pear Custard Pie) (Harleien MS 279)

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SAUCE FOR A GOS

(Garlic and Grape Sauce for Fowl)

Take percelye, grapis, clowes of garleke, and salt, and put it in (th)e goos, and lete roste. And whanne (th)e goos is y-now, schake out (th)at is wi(th)-in, and put al in a mortre, and do (th)er-to iij harde (y)olkes of egges; and grind al to-gedre, and tempre it vp wi(th) verious, and cast it upon the goos in a faire chargeour. & so serue it for(th).

Ashmole MS 1439

(Garlic and grapes was a popular combination with various fowl, as stuffing and as sauce.

The amount of garlic I used is based on personal preference. I have substituted wine vinegar for verjuice.)

1 ten- to fifteen-pound goose, or 2 four-pound ducks or chickens

2 C chopped parsley

2 C seedless grapes

12 whole cloves of garlic, or to taste

Salt to taste

3 hard-boiled egg yolks

1/2 C wine vinegar

1. Preheat the oven to 450=BA.

2. In a bowl, combine grapes, garlic, parsley, and salt. Stuff the goose, ducks or chickens with this mixture.

3. Put the bird on a rack in a roasting pan, and put it in the oven. Reduce heat to 350=BA, and roast for 20 minutes per pound for the goose, or 25 minutes per pound for the ducks or chickens, or until the fowl is cooked through. Draw grease out of the pan frequently.

4. Remove from oven and allow to cool for about fifteen minutes. Remove the stuffing, and put it in a blender or food processor. Add the egg yolks and vinegar and pur=E9e the mixture.

5. Put the roast goose on a serving platter and pour the sauce over it.

Yields two cups of sauce.

Serves six to eight.

A BAKE METE

(Pear Custard Pie)

Take an make fayre lytel cofyns; (th)an take Perys, & (y)if `ey ben lytelle, put .iij in a cofynne, & pare clene, & be-twyn euery pere, ley a gobet of Marow; & yf (th)ou haue no lytel Perys, take grete, & gobet hem, & so put hem in (th)e ovyn a whyle; (th)an take (th)in commade lyke as (th)ou takyst to Dowcetys, & pore (th)er-on; but lat (th)e Marow & `e Perys ben sene; & whan it is y-now, serue forth.

Harleian MS 279

(The original recipe calls for little pie crusts, but I have made this as one large pie. In Harleian MS 279 Dowcetys (doucettes) are plain custard pies.)

Pastry dough for one nine-inch pie crust

3 large pears

3 T bone marrow, in large chunks

3 raw egg yolks

1/4 C sugar

Dash salt

1 C heavy cream

1/8 tsp saffron

1. Preheat oven to 450=BA.

2.Peel, halve, and core the pears. Slice one of them into strips and layer the strips evenly in the bottom of the pie crust. Sprinkle two tablespoons of crumbled bone marrow over the pear slices.

3. Neatly arrange the remaining pear halves on top of the sliced pears, rounded side up. Place the remaining chunks of marrow at the center of the pie.

4. Put pie crust, filled with pears and marrow, into the oven for ten minutes to harden it.

5. In a bowl, lightly beat the egg yolks. Stir in remaining ingredients.

6. Reduce oven heat to 325=BA. Pull oven rack part way out and quickly and carefully pour custard mixture into the pie crust. The round tops of the pears should remain above the surface.

7. Bake pie for thirty minutes, or until firm. Allow to cool before serving.

Serves six to twelve.

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