pickled-meats-msg - 3/20/08
Period pickled meats. recipes.
NOTE: See also the files: campfood-msg, food-storage-msg, canning-msg, drying-foods-msg, meat-smoked-msg, stockfish-msg, vinegar-msg, eggs-msg, pickled-foods-msg, compost-msg.
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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
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Mark S. Harris AKA: THLord Stefan li Rous
Stefan at florilegium.org
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From: ddfr at best.com (David Friedman)
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Re: Doing Pennsic without ice
Date: 1 Sep 1995 16:34:20 GMT
"The lords salt" (in the Miscellany) is a period recipe for pickling meat;
we have used it repeatedly at Pennsic. The only problem is that the meat
is sour and spiced, which one deals with, if one wants to, partly by
washing it before use and partly by using it in dishes that are supposed
to have vinegar in them and leaving out the vinegar.
<snip>
David/Cariadoc
Date: Tue, 1 Oct 1996 08:49:04 -0400 (EDT)
To: markh at risc.sps.mot.com (Mark S. Harris)
From: "L. HERR-GELATT" <liontamr at postoffice.ptd.net>
Subject: Re: Preserving meat
Aoife <liontamr at postoffice.ptd.net> wrote:
>> >Book I, Recipe 11
>> >To keep cooked sides of pork or beef or tenderloins
>> >{Callum porcinum vel bubulum et unguellae coct ae diu durent}
>>
>> >Place them in a pickle of mustard, vinegar, salt and honey, covering the
>> >meat entirely, and when ready to use, you'll be surprised.
>
>This sounds interesting. I don't like pickles but I might like this.
>Do you have a redaction that you have worked out? How much of each of
>these did you use? What kind of vinegar? And I'm not much of a cook
>even in a modern kitchen, what exactly is braised beef? Do you mean
>meat that is already cooked? Or a particular cut of meat?
>
> Stefan li Rous
> markh at risc.sps.mot.com
Basically, I eye-balled the recipe (well, I tasted it, too). The approximate
proportions were thus:
One three-pound chuck-roast, browned in 1 tbsp olive oil, then braised in
about 1 cup of water for 1 hour. Pour off the juices and let the roast cool.
Place in a container that will just fit, and has an air-tight cover. Pour
over about 2 cups vinegar (I used my own italian herb-white, but cider
vinegar would also do, and plain white, and even wine-vinegar). Add 1 tbsp
salt (Kosher is best--or preserving salt but table salt will also do),
three tbsp prepared grainy brown (spicy) mustard or about 3 tbsp cracked
mustard seeds, and approx 1/2 cup honey or to taste. You're going for the
sweet-tart ratio here. This can sit on the counter, if the counter is in a
reasonably cool place, that is. Our ancestors would have kept the vat n the
cellar away from fireplaces and lights. Due to the pickle and the cooked
meat it should keep for quite a while, but you must check it often, and
re-boil the pickle whenever necessary, adding extra vinegar after the boil.
Refrigeration is also a good way to keep it. Either way, the longer you keep
it, the better it gets. This would make an excellent marinade for raw meat, too.
Aoife
Date: Fri, 26 Jun 1998 21:38:27 EDT
From: LrdRas at aol.com
Subject: SC - Meat and Lord's Salt
In a message dated 6/26/98 8:02:44 PM Eastern Daylight Time, ddfr at best.com
writes:
<< Meat pickled with the Lord's Salt is good, but it lends a strong and
distinctive taste to whatever you make with it. By the end of the week,
unless you and yours are very fond of vinegar, you are going to be sick and
tired of that taste. >>
I was thinking about the pickled meat as described above.
Could not a plausible period use of this "preserved" meat entail rinsing the
meat or perhaps even parboil it? :-) You would then cover the meat with water
(or broth), add an onion or so, some pepper, a pinch of cloves and cinnamon,
maybe a little galingal and crushed cubebs and then simmer this until the meat
is ltterally falling apart and the broth is considerably reduced. Perhaps a
dish of fruimenty (or rice) on the side? Or spoon it over some sops?
This method of preparation would almost negate the vinegar taste. Any residual
flavor would nicely blend in with the rest of the sauce by becoming a
flavoring "ingredient" which would fine tune the dish. Serve it with the
slightest hint of freshly ground "true cinnamon" and the tiniest sprinkle of
sugar. The last of this years apples slowly roasted on the hearth and boiled
carrots. Top it off with a nice goblet of sweet spiced wine diluted with some
cold spring water or a draft of cool ale brought directly from the cellars?
Such are the things of feasts!
Ras (Who just finished one feast! <sigh> I'll never learn. :-)
Date: Fri, 3 Jul 1998 13:00:37 -0700
From: david friedman <ddfr at best.com>
Subject: Re: SC - Meat and Lord's Salt
I wrote:
><< Meat pickled with the Lord's Salt is good, but it lends a strong and
> distinctive taste to whatever you make with it. By the end of the week,
> unless you and yours are very fond of vinegar, you are going to be sick and
> tired of that taste. >>
and Ras writes:
>Could not a plausible period use of this "preserved" meat entail rinsing the
>meat or perhaps even parboil it? :-) You would then cover the meat with water
>(or broth), add an onion or so, some pepper, a pinch of cloves and cinnamon,
>maybe a little galingal and crushed cubebs and then simmer this until the meat
>is ltterally falling apart and the broth is considerably reduced. Perhaps a
>dish of fruimenty (or rice) on the side? Or spoon it over some sops?
>
>This method of preparation would almost negate the vinegar taste. Any residual
>flavor would nicely blend in with the rest of the sauce by becoming a
>flavoring "ingredient" which would fine tune the dish. Serve it with the
>slightest hint of freshly ground "true cinnamon" and the tiniest sprinkle of
>sugar. The last of this years apples slowly roasted on the hearth and boiled
>carrots. Top it off with a nice goblet of sweet spiced wine diluted with some
>cold spring water or a draft of cool ale brought directly from the cellars?
Consider the following recipe from Two Fifteenth Century Cookery Books:
Conyng, Hen, or Mallard. Take conyng, hen or mallard, and roast him almost
enough; or else chop him, and fry him in fresh grease; and fry onions
minced, and cast altogether into a pot, and cast thereto fresh broth and
half wine; cast thereto cloves, maces, powder of pepper, canel; then stepe
fair bread with the same broth and draw it through a strainer with vinegre.
And when it hath well boiled, cast the liquor thereto, and powder ginger,
and vinegre, and season it up, and then thou shall serve it forth.
(spelling modernized)
We have done this at Pennsic with pickled meat, rinsing and soaking the
meat, leaving the vinegar out and reducing the spicing from what we would
use with fresh meat. It works fine. But you do still have the
vinegar-and-spices flavor; and the original poster was proposing to eat
dishes made with pickled meat something like 6 nights out of 10. I still
think he would get tired of it.
Elizabeth/Betty Cook
Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 10:31:56 -0500
From: Melanie Wilson <MelanieWilson at compuserve.com>
To: LIST SCA arts <sca-arts at raven.cc.ukans.edu>
Subject: Pickled fish
This variation is similar to Gravlaks ie buried or grave salmon. there is a
record of its use in a ms of 1348, and is probably older still.
Fish sandwiched between 2 layers of birch bark and fir branches is weighed
down with stones and buried in the soft sandy shoreline. eat after 4-6 days
or leave to ferment for 6-12 weeks.
Here is a modern pickeling recipe for 6-7 lbs fish
1tbsp brandy, 3/4 oz sugar. 1.5oz crystilized(not dehydrated)salt, pepper,
dill
Gut, sprinkle with brandy, mix salt, sugar & pepper, scatter over, chop
dill, spread over first fillet and sandwich the two together, cover with
foil,weigh the top leave in cool place 37 F (3-4 c for civilized folk :)),
turn twice a day, pour the pressed out liquid back between the fillets,
remove weights after 2 days. Ready to eat in 3-4 days.
Tip: freeze fish first to kill any fishy parasites
Mel
Date: Sat, 30 Jan 1999 12:32:27 -0800
From: david friedman <ddfr at best.com>
Subject: Re: SC - Lord's Salt--no salt?
At 9:39 PM -0500 1/29/99, Bonne wrote:
>All the talk of preserving beef by "corning" it got me to thinking that's what
>the recipe for Lord's Salt was, wasn't it? But no, that's cooked meat placed
>in spiced vinegar to preserve it. There's not a bit of salt in it. Cariadoc,
> why then is it called Lord's SALT?
One shall take cloves and mace, cardamom, pepper, cinnamon, ginger an equal
weight of each except cinnamon, of which there shall be just as much as of
all the others, and as much baked bread as all that has been said above.
And he shall cut it all together and grind it in strong vinegar; and put it
in a cask. That is their salt and it is good for half a year.
The obvious explanation is either that it is called a "salt" because, like
salt, it is being used to preserve meat, or that there is a mistranslation
from the latin. I have a vague memory of an etymological link between sauce
and salt, with salsa as evidence.
David/Cariadoc
Date: Thu, 25 Feb 1999 17:43:07 -0800
From: david friedman <ddfr at best.com>
Subject: Re: SC - Pickles, Pickles, Pickles (or: Bounced message from Vika)
Vika posted our recipe for pickled meat from the Miscellany, which is at:
http://www.best.com/~ddfr/Medieval/Articles/Camping%20without%20a%20cooler.html
and, after the recipe, commented:
>My notes:
...
>Strong (i.e. above 5% acidity) vinegar cost an arm and a leg for a small
> bottle, so I used half reg. red-wine vinegar and half cider vinegar.
>As the recipe says, this is supposed to keep meat for up to three weeks
> unrefrigerated. I made it on, I think, Sunday, tried a bit Tuesday,
> and served it Saturday. The flavors were a bit better blended on Sat.,
> I think, but it was perfectly acceptable on Tues.
The original recipe says strong vinegar. When I was researching this one, I
was worried about botulism, so I read up on the hazards of preserving food.
What I came up with was that vinegar of 5% or better will prevent the
botulism germs from getting a foothold in your stuff, and that 15 minutes
boiling will destroy the botulin toxin if it has developed. Given that some
meat juice is probably going to dilute your vinegar a bit, and that
standard wine or cider vinegar is sold at 5%, I would seriously recommend
paying that arm and a leg and mixing at least some of the strong vinegar
with your ordinary vinegar, as a safety measure.
We have in fact kept meat this way in a plastic tub on the kitchen counter,
covered but not specially sealed, for three or four weeks with no problems.
But that was with the stronger vinegar.
Elizabeth of Dendermonde/Betty Cook
Date: Sun, 4 Jul 1999 14:41:03 EDT
From: Weaver8002 at aol.com
Subject: Re: SC - salmon recipe?
>>I can suggest the most common recipe to prepare "gravad lax", a Swedish
speciality. Cut the salmon in thin pieces and leave overnight in a
marinade composed of sugar, dill, blackpepper and salt. Easy, wonderful
tasty and not salty at all!
Ana L. Valds>>
The recipe I've been using for the last 2 years takes a little longer. I've
had great success with it, even took it to Pennsic last year, where it went
over very well. It freezes very nicely although it never gets very hard.
Margherita the Weaver
GRAVLAX
2 salmon filets about 1 lb. each
bunch fresh dill
1/4 cup kosher salt
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 T cracked peppercorns
Place one filet skin-side down in a deep glass, enamel or stainless steel
baking dish or loaf pan. Spread the dill over the filet. Combine sugar,
salt & pepper and spread over the dill. Place the second filet skin side up
on top. Cover with plastic wrap & aluminum foil. Cover with weights (Canned
goods work well.) Refrigerate for 3 days, turning and basting with
accumulated juices every 12 hours. Scrape off the dill mixture. Slice each
half, skin-side down, very thin. Serve with black bread, spring onions and
honey mustard.
Date: Tue, 20 Jul 1999 09:52:52 -0400
From: "Gaylin Walli" <gwalli at infoengine.com>
Subject: SC - the Lord's Salt and the test of time
Cariadoc wrote:
>The Lord's Salt is something we have been making for years; it really works
>quite well for preserving meat. I don't guarantee six months, but we tested
>for several weeks.
I have tested this recipe with 5 different half quart jars of venison
steaks cut up and in large pieces. All 5 jars survived for at least 12 months,
mostly due to the fact that I forgot about them. They sat on the bottom shelf
of a kitchen cupboard for the vast majority of that time and did not fester.
The little residual fat from the meat floated to the top and went mildly
rancid (I say mildly because it was such a small amount of fat that
you could barely tell). This was easily skimmed. The meat itself was
completely lacking in texture. It reminded me a great deal of baby food:
edible but extremely boring.
jasmine
Iasmin de Cordoba
gwalli at infoengine.com
Date: Mon, 8 Nov 1999 09:29:58 -0600 (CST)
From: Jeff Heilveil <heilveil at uiuc.edu>
Subject: SC - Lord's Salt experiment.
Salut!
It has been a while since I last posted. Recently, I was moving out of my
house and heading out to a new one, and my housemate and I found a
left-over jar of Lord's Salt in a cabinet. We had made it for Lillies
(Mid-June) and it was still around. Having taken the precautions that my
pathology background provided, I sampled some of the meat. It was
wonderful. It had even mellowed a little bit. Now, we do things a little
differently than the recipe in the Miscellany. Using a bottle of "Essig"
(25% acidity vinegar), we made a solution of 7% acidity vinegar (As
opposed to mixing 5% and 7% as suggested. IT results in a strongly
flavored meat that works well for Roast of Meat, and for snacking on with
bread. Well, it turns out that it also works well for meat that is still
safe to eat 4 and a half months later.
Bogdan
_______________________________________________________________________________
Jeffrey Heilveil M.S. Ld. Bogdan de la Brasov, C.W.
Department of Entomology MoAS, Barony of Wurm Wald
University of Illinois Bucatar-sef, Wurm Wald
heilveil at uiuc.edu Middle Kingdom
Date: Mon, 08 Nov 1999 08:57:44 -0800
From: Maggie MacDonald <maggie5 at home.com>
Subject: Re: SC - Lord's Salt experiment.
At 09:29 AM 11/8/99 -0600,Jeff Heilveil said something like:
>It has been a while since I last posted. Recently, I was moving out of my
>house and heading out to a new one, and my housemate and I found a
>left-over jar of Lord's Salt in a cabinet. We had made it for Lillies
>(Mid-June) and it was still around.
>Well, it turns out that it also works well for meat that is still
>safe to eat 4 and a half months later.
>
>Bogdan
The Calafian Cook's Guild did a redaction involving Lord's Salt many years
ago, and kept some of it in the back of the cabinet "just to see what would
happen". It was pulled out last year (after sitting for a couple of
years?). The meat in it was still perfectly good, tasted wonderful, and was
VERY usable. I do not recall what vinegar they used with it, but I remember
that I really enjoyed the strong spicy/savory flavor that went clear
through the meat. The last time it came out it had to be "rinsed" a little
at first, to leech out some of the salt, but it was still very good.
Maggie MacD.
Date: Tue, 9 Nov 1999 08:43:03 -0000
From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Nanna_R=F6gnvaldard=F3ttir?=" <nannar at isholf.is>
Subject: Re: SC - Lord's Salt experiment. (long)
O.K., as several people have asked for it, here are the recipes and
translations. The Codex K version should be more correct than the Icelandic
version which derives from it.
Recipe no. 6:
Icelandic manuscript:
Quomodo temperetur salsum dominorum et quam diu durabit. Geroforsnagla skal
taka. ok muskat cardemomium pipar. canel. ingifer. sitt jmn vge af hveriu.
utan canel. skal vera jafn ?ycktt vid alltt hitt annath ok svo micit steiktt
braud sem alltt ?at er fyr er sagtt. ok skera ?at alltt saman. ok mala me
stercku ediki. ok lata j legil. ?at er ?eirra sals ok um eitt misseri.*
*The scribe has erased "mi" from misseri and written "ar" (year) instead.
How to make a sauce for lords and how many days it keeps. Take cloves and
nutmeg, cardamom, pepper, cinnamon, ginger, an equal weight of each, except
the cinnamon, which should be as much as all the others, and as much fried
bread as all the above, and cut it all together and crush it with strong
vinegar, and put in a cask. This is their sauce and is good for half a
year/one year.
Danish manuscript, Codex K:
Quomodo temperetur salsum dominorum et quam diu durat. Man skal tak grfrs
naghl. oc muscat. cardemomum. pipr. cinamomum tht r kanil. oc ingifr.
all ifn wghn. tho swa at kanil r m mykt sum all hin andr. oc slyk
tu stekt brth sum all hin andr. oc stt thm all samn. oc mal mth
strk dyk oc lat .i. en leghl. Tht r hrr sals. oc r goth et halft
aar.
How to make a sauce for lords and how many days it keeps. Take cloves, and
nutmeg, cardamom, pepper, cinnamon, that is canel, and ginger, an equal
weight of each, but the cinnamon should be as much as all the other spices,
and also fried bread twice as much as all the rest. Crush it all together,
and grind with strong vinegar and put into a cask. This is lords sauce and
is good for six months.
Danish manuscript, Codex Q:
Mn scul tak grofrs naghl, muscat pipr. oc ingifr. af hwr ther m
mykt af cinamomum. ss the r all samn. oc tys mmykt af hwith
brth. stkt ss tht r alt oc stth tht samn mth ddik. thenn sals
hald mn goth i eth halft aar i en lghl.
Take cloves, nutmeg, pepper and ginger, an equal amount of each, and as much
cinnamon as all the others, and twice as much white bread, fried as it is
whole, and pound this together with vinegar. This keeps well for six months
in a cask.
Recipe no. 7