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fd-Germany-msg – 1/19/08

 

Medieval and Period German food. Cookbook sources. Recipes. References.

 

NOTE: See also the files: Germany-msg, pickled-foods-msg, turnips-msg, vinegar-msg, vegetables-msg, beer-msg, root-veg-msg.

 

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NOTICE -

 

This file is a collection of various messages having a common theme that I have collected from my reading of the various computer networks. Some messages date back to 1989, some may be as recent as yesterday.

 

This file is part of a collection of files called Stefan's Florilegium. These files are available on the Internet at: http://www.florilegium.org

 

I have done a limited amount of editing. Messages having to do with separate topics were sometimes split into different files and sometimes extraneous information was removed. For instance, the message IDs were removed to save space and remove clutter.

 

The comments made in these messages are not necessarily my viewpoints. I make no claims as to the accuracy of the information given by the individual authors.

 

Please respect the time and efforts of those who have written these messages. The copyright status of these messages is unclear at this time. If information is published from these messages, please give credit to the originator(s).

 

Thank you,

    Mark S. Harris                  AKA:  THLord Stefan li Rous

                                          Stefan at florilegium.org

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From: Tom Brady <tabrady at mindspring.com>

Date: Fri, 02 May 1997 08:48:24 -0400

Subject: Re: SC - Questions

 

>One reference he made in the first chapter caught my eye. He says that

>the first cookbook printed on a printing press was Kuchenmeisterey

>(Cooking Mastery) printed in Nuremberg in 1485 and that 56 editions of

>this book were printed. Has anyone heard of it? Is it available in

>English Translation?

 

Here's what I was able to find in the Library of Congress records:

 

Title:         Kuchenmeysterey / in Abbildung herausgegeben von

                  Rolf Ehnert.

Published:     G=E8oppingen : K=E8ummerle, 1981.

Description:   65, x p. ; 21 cm.

Series:        Litterae ; Nr. 71

LC Call No.:   TX721 .K934 1981

Dewey No.:     641.5943 19

ISBN:          3874524760

Notes:         Photoreproduction of original published: Passau :

                  Printed by Johann Petri, 1486? Now owned by Bayerische

                  Staatsbibliothek M=E8unchen (4o Inc. s.a. 161a/3)

               Bibliography: p. x.

Subjects:      Cookery, German -- Early works to 1800.

Other authors: Ehnert, Rolf.

               Petri, Johannes, 1441-1511.

Other titles:  K=E8uchenmeisterei.

Series Entry:  Litterae (K=E8ummerle Verlag) ; Nr. 71.

Control No.:   81188708=20

 

Nothing about a translation there, but that doesn't mean that one doesn't

exist.

 

Hope this helps a little,

Duncan

- -------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tom Brady    tabrady at mindspring.com   SCA: Duncan MacKinnon of Tobermory

 

 

Date: Tue, 16 Sep 1997 06:23:43 -0400

From: Philip & Susan Troy <troy at asan.com>

Subject: SC - Ein/Das Buoch Von Guter Spise

 

I've been advised by Mistress Caterina Sichlingen Von Nurnberg that her

translation of Ein Buoch Von Guter Spise is available on the Web at the

following URL:

http://cs-www.bu.edu/students/grads/akatlas/workroom.html

 

German 14th-century cookbooks, get 'em while they're 'ot, they're

lovely...fox nipple chips, otter's noses...

 

Seriously, though, there is also some additional stuff that will be of

interest, like various works in progress.

 

Have fun!

Adamantius

 

 

Date: Fri, 16 Jan 1998 13:47:38 -0600

From: "Decker, Terry D." <TerryD at Health.State.OK.US>

Subject: RE: SC - SC-German food in period

 

What constitutes Medieval German cooking is difficult to say.  There

would be differences depending on what foodstuffs were generally

available in a region.  The northern region would use more fish, while

the southern region would use more meat, etc.  Were I really pushed, I

might also say:  "Cherries, apples, hazelnuts, cinnamon, nutmeg, sweet

dishes, sour dishes."

 

Charlemange incorporated the German states into the Carolingian Empire

around 800 C.E.  and they became part of the Holy Roman Empire when it

was officially recognized in 962.  The HRE officially died in 1806, but

it was effectively dead by the mid-16th Century.  So German cooking

would probably have been heavily influenced by early French cooking.  I

posted a couple of translations here a short while back which would give

you an idea of the foods available around 800-900.

 

For later recipes, you might try Das Buch von Guter Speise, a

translation of which is available on the Web and in paper, This dates

from about 1354.

 

Other possible sources (which I do not have copies of dang it):

 

1400    Manuscript DII30 at the University of Basel (there is a

published thesis of about 40 copies)

1485    Kuchenmeisterei (The Mastery of the Kitchen)

1553    Das Kochbuch der Sabrina Welserin

1581    Das Neu Kockbuch (I think this is part of Cariadoc's translation

project) (Rumpolt)

1603    Speisebuchlein:  Darrinnen Kurtzer Vnterricht von allerley

Speise vnd Trank so zur Menchlichen Nahrung dienlich... (Hubner)

1609    Ein Schon kunstlich Kochbuchlein von Vielen vnd manchen Richten

(original currently in the Passau Glasmuseum)

1719    Neues Saltzburgisches Koch-buch

 

It's not much help, but it's what I've got.

 

Bear

 

 

Subject: German cookbook

Date: Sat, 18 Apr 1998 21:50:28 -0500

From: vjarmstrong at aristotle.net (Valoise Armstrong)

To: stefan at texas.net

 

>Is this just translations or redactions, too? How much for the book?

>How is it bound? How many pages? Is it the complete Das Kochbuch der

>Sabina Welserin? How can people reach you to order it? Just some of the

>questions that I imagine people are going to ask.

 

Translations only, no redactions, of 205 recipes in Das Kochbuch der Sabina

Welserin. It is the complete cookbook. It's forty pages spiral bound for

$16. I can be reached at:

Valoise Armstrong

P.O. Box 2492

Little Rock, Arkansas 72203

vjarmstrong at aristotle.net

 

I am on the sca-cooks list and sca-arts list, but I wasn't sure if it would

be polite to post there about commercial projects (even on a tiny scale

like this).

 

Valoise

 

 

Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 18:41:17 EDT

From: LrdRas at aol.com

Subject: Re: SC - German anyone?

 

Here is another site you might find useful.

 

http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/kobu.htm

 

Ras

 

 

Date: Tue, 22 Sep 1998 06:53:26 -0500

From: vjarmstrong at aristotle.net (Valoise Armstrong)

Subject: Re: SC - German anyone?

 

Bear wrote:

>>Das Kochbuch der Sabina Welserin is available in translation, but I don't

>>have the information.

 

The English translation is mine and I have a couple of copies left, e-mail

me if you're interested.  I am planning on offering it to Cariadoc for his

published cookbook collection after that as the pace of my mundane life is

rapidly increasing.  As far as I know, Sabina Welser and Ein Buch von Guter

Speise are the only two German texts that have been translated into

English.

 

If you have access to a university library for interlibrary loan you might

down Thomas Gloning's bibliography at

http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/cookbib.htm

 

This is the most comprehensive list of material that I've found on German

cooking and drink and although Gloning's rannge of dates extends outside

SCA time it's still useful. Unfortunately most of these sources are in

German and many are unavailable in the US or are pretty rare.

 

Several people have mentioned Gloning's home page:

http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/kobu.htm

This has the complete text of Ein alemannisches Buechlein vonn guter Spise

and a portion of a Rheinfrankisches Kochbuch (neither one in English) as

well as a few redactions that I think are in English (I think - it's been a

while since I looked).

 

Valoise

 

 

Date: Tue, 22 Sep 1998 18:29:31 +0200 (CET)

From: Thomas Gloning <Thomas.Gloning at germanistik.uni-giessen.de>

Subject: Re: SC - German Anyone? "Rheinfraenkisches Kochbuch (1445)"

 

I have just been editing the German cookery book from the Ms. germ. fol.

244 (now in Berlin) from about 1445, the "Rheinfraenkisches Kochbuch". It

has been published, together with

a facsimile, a transcription, translation (to new High German), notes,

glossary and an article by Trude Ehlert (from "Das Kochbuch des

Mittelalters"). It can be obtained by Ludwig Auer in Donauwoerth.

 

For further information see my homepage:

  http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/rfk.htm

 

There is also a bibliography, which contains many studies and sources:

  http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/cookbib.htm (but it is long)

 

Thomas

 

 

Date: Tue, 22 Sep 1998 16:41:46 -0500

From: allilyn at juno.com (LYN M PARKINSON)

Subject: Re: SC - German anyone?

 

Armstrong, Valoise. Sabina Welser¹s Cookbook.  Translated from Das

Kochbuch der Sabina     Welserin (c. 1553). Privately published,

Little Rock, AR, 1998.  English translations    only, no originals,

no redactions.  Frau Welserin¹s own collection of recipies.

 

Valoise should be on this list.  Her book is available for sale.  If she

doesn't post you, let me know and I'll find her address. She hasn't

redacted the recipies, and as I recently bought it, I haven't

either--yet!

 

Fahrenkamp, H. Jurgen.  Wie man eyn teutsches Mannsbild bey Krafften

halt.  (in      German).  Prisma Verlag. Munchen or Gutersloh,  1986.

ISBN 3 570 09730 7      Sources and originals not given, occasionally

mentioned.  Modern German redactions.

 

Eleonora Maria Rosalia.  Freiwillig aufgesprungner Granat-Apffel.

Hausmettel and kochrezepte von 1709.  (taken from a hand-written recipe

book of the 16th C.)

        (in Gerrman).  Working on translation.

 

I've got the above two books.  Love to cook German food, glad to help if

I can.  I also have some modern German cookbooks in English, and some in

German, to which we can refer if something absolutely stumps us.

Sometimes, 'reverse engineering' helps a little.

 

Allison

 

 

Date: Wed, 23 Sep 1998 20:42:37 -0500

From: vjarmstrong at aristotle.net (Valoise Armstrong)

Subject: Re: SC - Sauerkraut

 

Ras wrote:

>Cool! Could you write down and send the SPECIFIC reference (pub., pg. etc.).

>I've just added sauerkraut to the Oct. menu. :-) Period-like, of course, but

>it WILL be there.

 

Roeck,  Bernd.  Baecker, Brot und Getreide in Augsburg. Sigmaringen: Jan

Thorbecke Verlag, 1987.

 

It's probably out of print, but I got it fairly easily through interlibrary

loan. I didn't save the ISBN, just photocopied what I needed. It's not as

interesting as it sounds at first - the subtitle translates to something

like - The history of the baking trade and the politics of supply in the

Imperial city at the time of the Thirty Year's War_. But mixed in with the

out of period and political stuff are some nice tidbits, like the food

budget for an orphange in 1572 and speculation from period sources on what

the working class ate and spent on food. There's also an appendix that

giving the Augsburg municipal baking laws from 1606.

 

It's cultural history, academic and in German, but there are some SCA

applicable parts.

 

Valoise

 

 

Date: Sun, 27 Sep 1998 15:46:39 -0500

From: allilyn at juno.com (LYN M PARKINSON)

Subject: Re: SC -  carp and lebkuchen

 

I was looking up some info on the lebkuchen in some of my German

referances, and noticed the statement that carp is traditionally cooked

in Germany on Christmas Eve, as it goes back to the monks' ponds.

Evidently, they kept carp as a staple.  The fattening of the Christmas

carp might begin as early as August.  So, as soon as we're home from

Pennsic, we rush out and feed the fish!!!  They didn't say what was used

to fatten the carp, or what monks used in place of cardboard boxes of

fish flakes.

 

My German family has a herring salad, with beets, for Christmas eve and

other special family events, but I think that comes from the

great-grandfather who was a trader based in Riga, Russia. Which brings

us back to lebkuchen.

 

These spice cakes/cookies were developed from a happy mixture of the

Franconian honey trade and the Pfeffersa"cke, the 'peppersacks' as

Nure"mberg's prosperous medieval merchant adventurers were called.

"Commercial gingerbread was baked by the members of an exclusive guild,

known as Lebku"chler."  Scharfenberg, Horst. _The Cuisines of Germany_,

Simon & Schuster, Inc., 1989.  Definately prepared for the modern USA

market, but good food and sometimes interesting info. (The quotation

marks in German words are attempting to be umlauts)

 

Allison, who is not a spoon tease, I don't have the herring salad recipe.

It's SECRET and I don't remember because I only helped with it once, 13

years ago.  There's green stuff, and chopped pickled beets, and chopped,

cooked herring, and chopped, pickled gherkins and more stuff.

 

 

Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1998 18:29:02 -0500

From: vjarmstrong at aristotle.net (Valoise Armstrong)

Subject: Re: SC - Sabina Welser's Cookbook

 

>At Pennsic, I picked up a cookbook titled Sabina Welser's Cookbook

>translated from Das Kochbuch der Sabina Welserin (c. 1553) by Valoise

>Armstrong.   Does anyone know anything about the german source for this

>cookbook?  Are the recipes truly all from the mid-1500s?

>Unfortunately, this is only the English translation and does not include

>the original german.

 

According to Hugo Stopp who edited the hand-written manuscript for

publication the majority of the book appears to be written in one

handwriting style, that of Sabina Welserin. Unfortunately there were

several women in the Welser family with that name in the 16th C. but the

likeliest suspects died in either 1576 or 1599. Stopp also says that

additions were made by a second person, but he describes the second

handwriting as being a distinctly 16th C. style. So, yes, the recipes date

from the 16th C.

 

>The reason I ask is this cookbook is unsual in several regards. A number

>of the recipes give amounts. There are several pastry recipes (standing

>pies, dumplings and tarts). Since these are unusual offerings in the

>English, French and Italian books I have studied I wondered if this

>cookbook was entirely from the mid-1500's or maybe contained later

>recipes as well.

 

The recipes are sometimes more detailed than earlier cookbooks, but this

might have more to do with the time period than the location. Most of the

English and Frennch medieval cookbooks that are readily available are

definitely earlier than this. But look at Knelme Digby and Hugh Plat's

Delightes for Ladies - their instructions are much more detailed than

earlier English recipes.

 

If anyone's interested Hugo Stopp's transcription along with a translation

into modern German shouldn't be too hard to get through interlibrary loan.

 

Das Kochbuch der Sabina Welserin. Heidelberg: Carl Winter

Univeritaetsverlag, 1980.

        ISBN 3-533-02905-0

 

Valoise

 

 

Date: Fri, 30 Oct 1998 11:19:50 -0800

From: david friedman <ddfr at best.com>

Subject: SC - Sabrina Welserin Webbed

 

I have just added Valoise Armstrong's translation of Sabrina Welserin to my

web page; you can find it at:

 

http://www.best.com/~ddfr/Medieval/Cookbooks/Sabrina_Welserin.html

 

David Friedman

 

 

Date: Tue, 3 Nov 1998 21:12:58 +0100 (CET)

From: Thomas Gloning <Thomas.Gloning at germanistik.uni-giessen.de>

Subject: SC - bibliographies

 

I have put a _slightly_ enlarged version of cookbib.htm on my website.

In addition, I extracted from this file all the German sources and put

them in a chronological order, beginning with the many editions and

facsimiles of the "Buoch von guoter spise".

You can find these lists at:

 

  http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/cookbib.htm

 

and

 

  http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/germcook.htm

 

As always: additions and suggestions are extremely wellcome.

 

Thomas

***

Dr. Thomas Gloning

Germanistik, Universitaet Giessen

http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909

New edition of 15th century cookery book:

http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/rfk.htm

 

 

Subject: Re: ANST - Medieval Food, clothing, tents and German armor

Date: Fri, 06 Nov 98 06:52:59 MST

From: RAISYA at aol.com

To: ansteorra at Ansteorra.ORG

 

Two of the lists are 14th century.

None of the lists are specifically 12th century, but the 9th century

Charlemagne list would almost certainly have been available to a 12th century

German, and certainly had a major influence on what was grown.  I'd also

recommend this site, with the earliest known German language cookbook:

 

Ein Buch von guter spise (c. 1345 to 1354)

http://www.cs.bu.edu/students/grads/akatlas/Buch/buch.html

 

The earliest German garden book (or health manual, unclear which) I have

tracked down is HORTUS SANITATIS (or possibly called GART DER GESUNDHEIT),

Peter Schoeffer, Mainz, 1485.  However, the title and a few of the woodcuts

are all I've found so far.

 

Raisya

 

 

Date: Fri, 19 Feb 1999 02:33:48 +0100

From: Thomas Gloning <Thomas.Gloning at germanistik.uni-giessen.de>

Subject: SC - Altbayrische Kochrezepte ( XV./XVI. cent.)

 

For those interested in German cookery recipes: you can find the

text of "Alte Kochrezepte aus dem bayrischen Inntal" (15th/16th century;

ed. Danner) on my website:

 

http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/kb-dann.htm

 

or via:

 

http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909

then chose ETEXTE or ALTE KOCHBUECHER in the left frame, then search for

the DANNER-entry in the right frame.

 

Remember that around 1500 most German texts are written in some sort of

dialect...

 

Thomas

************

Dr. Thomas Gloning, JLU Giessen

http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909

Rheinfraenkisches Kochbuch (15. Jh.):

http://www.uni-giessen.de/~g909/rfk.htm