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
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.
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Thank you,
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. Valdés>>
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 jæmn væge 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 takæ gørfærs
naghlæ. oc muscat. cardemomum. pipær. cinamomum thæt ær kaniæl. oc ingifær.
allæ iæfn wæghnæ. tho swa at kaniæl ær æm mykæt sum allæ hinæ andræ. oc slyk
tu stekt brøth sum allæ hinæ andræ. oc støt thæm allæ samæn. oc malæ mæth
stærk ædykæ oc latæ .i. en leghæl. Thæt ær hærræ salsæ. oc ær 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 lordīs sauce and
is good for six months.
Danish manuscript, Codex Q:
Mæn sculæ takæ gærofærs naghlæ, muscat pipær. oc ingifær. af hwær theræ æm
mykæt af cinamomum. æssæ the æræ allæ samæn. oc tysæ æmmykæt af hwith
brøthæ. stækt æssæ thæt ær alt oc støthæ thæt samæn mæth æddik. thennæ salsæ
haldæ mæn goth i eth halft aar i en læghlæ.
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
Icelandic manuscript:
Quomodo condiantur assature in salso supra dicto. ?at sem madur vill af
?essu salse hafa ?a skal hann vella j ponnu vel a glodum branda lausum.
Sidan skal madur taka villi brad af hirti æda ra. ok specka vel. ok
steikina. ok skerra ?at vel brentt ok j ?ann tima sem salset er kalltt. ?a
skal ?etta ?ar slæggiaz med. littlu salltti. ?a ma liggia um ?riar vikur.
Sva ma madur leinge verd veita. gæs endur. ok adrar villibradir. ef hann
sker ?ær ?unnar. ?etta er betzta sals er herra menn hafa.
How to use the above sauce. Take what you want to use of this sauce and boil
it in a pan on hot embers without flame. Then take some game, hart or roe,
and lard it well, and roast it, and cut it well burned*, and when the sauce
is cold, then place the meat in it with a little salt. Then it can be kept
for three weeks. In this way geese, ducks and other game can be kept for a
long time, if cut thin. This is the best sauce that the lords have.
The original says "brentt", burned, but that is probably an error - the
Danish text has "brethæ", broad, thick.
Danish, Codex K:
Quomodo condiantur assature in salso supradicto.
Thavær man wil af hænnæ hauæ. tha skal man wællæ hænnæ wæl .i. en pannæ ofnæ
hetæ gløthær utæn brandæ. oc skal man takæ brathæ af hiort ællær ra. wæl
spækkæth oc stekæ them wæl. oc skæræ them wæl brethæ. oc thæn timæ thæn
salsæ ær kald tha skal wildbrath .i. læggæs mæth litælt salt oc thæt ma
lygge thre ukæ. Swa mughæ man haldæ goth hiortæ brath. giæs oc ændær. of man
skæR them thiokkæ. thættæ ær the bæstæ salsæ thær herræmæn hauæ.
How to make use of the above sauce. When you want to use some of it, then
boil it well in a pan on hot embers without flame. And take a steak of hart
or deer, well larded, and cut into thick slices. And when the sauce is cold,
then place the game in it with a little salt and it can be kept there for
three weeks. In this way one can preserve steaks of hart, geese and ducks,
if cut thick. This is the best sauce that the lords have.
Danish, Codex Q:
Wilæ mæn syltæ thær nokæt i. tha latæ thæt wællæ. oc sithæn thæt ær full
kalt tha skulæ mæn stækt wild brath kalt hiort ra. gaas. æth annæn wild
bradh. skoræth i stykki læggæ thæræ i mæth lit salt. thæn sylt mughæ mæn
gømæ thre vkæ.
If you want to pickle something in it, then let it boil, and when it is
quite cold, then place in it fried game, cold hart, roe, geese or other
game, cut into pieces and placed in the sauce with a little salt. This can
be kept for three weeks.
Nanna
Date: Wed, 10 Nov 1999 08:53:55 -0000
From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Nanna_R=F6gnvaldard=F3ttir?=" <nannar at isholf.is>
Subject: Re: SC - steaks
Stefan wrote:
>When I think of steak I think of slices of meat. I don't think of a steak as
>being other than sliced. In this paragraph "steak" seems to be more used as
>synonymous with "chunk of meat" or perhaps "roast" as it then specifies to
>cut it into thick slices. Also the second time "steak" is used as "steaks of
>hart, geese and ducks" seems to imply a more generic cut than I was thinking
>of. Perhaps it is my knowledge of meat cuts which is the problem. Comments,
>anyone?
Or just that Iīm being too influenced by the original text and by my native
language. You see, "steik" in Icelandic and Old Norse (English borrowed the
word from ON) can mean either roast or slice of meat; the original meaning
of the verb "steikja" is "to roast on a spit". So Iīm probably just using
the wrong English word here.
But - your question made me realize that Iīve skipped a few word of the
recipe - "oc stekæ them wæl", which translates as "and roast them well"
(note stekæ = roast). And now I remember I had originally translated the
text something like this "take a roast of hart or deer ... and roast them
well" and when I read the text again I thought "hey, that doesnīt sound too
good" - and in trying to correct the mistake I bungled the text. Sorry!
Nanna
Date: Tue, 09 Nov 1999 07:34:05 -0500
From: grizly at mindspring.com
Subject: Re: Re: SC - Lord's Salt experiment. (long)
> 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, <<<SNIP>>>
The use of copious amounts of Cinnamon in all of these recipes strikes a curious chord for me. I read, this summer, an abstract of an article based on research done at Harvard, IIRC. they determined that cinnamon had an effect on bacteria on food. . . I believe it was bacteriostatic. The food with cinnamon basically retarded growth of bacteria, and the researchers suggested that cinnamon had the effect of protecting foods in the middle ages where it was used in the brines or marinades.
These recipes may be good support for that basic research.
niccolo difrancesco
Date: Wed, 10 Nov 1999 13:10:52 EST
From: ChannonM at aol.com
Subject: Re: SC - Lord's Salt experiment. (long)
grizly at mindspring.com writes:
<< I believe it was bacteriostatic. >>
According to The Complete New Herbal, by Richard Mabey, Penguin Books;
...cinnamon bark oil is antibacterial, inhibiting E.coli, Staphylococcus
aureus and thrush (Candida albicans)
Date: Thu, 11 Nov 1999 10:06:33 -0500
From: Lurking Girl <tori at panix.com>
Subject: Re: SC - Lord's Salt experiment. upcoming trial with venison
ChannonM at aol.com wrote:
> I am going to try out this recipe this weekend. I have some basic questions
> before I start out.
>
> 1.Strong vinegar- someone posted that you need to use 7% versus the ordinary
> 5% acid level, where could I obtain such a vinegar, or is there a name for it
> that would be universal
After getting a mild scolding about using 5% :), rather than trying a
specialty food market, where they had such things but they were deadly
expensive, I just went to the supermarket, and sure enough they had
some vinegars which were about the same price but more acidic. They
didn't seem to have a separate name.
> Is there something that I can obtain to scientifically
> demonstrate that it is safe before I condemn my fellow cooks to a day of
> vomiting and other nasties, if that is the least of the problems to result
> from bad food. I just want to be very careful in what I serve to others, so
> please forgive the anal retentiveness on this.
If it's of any help as a statistical point, my 5% stuff was fed to a whole
bunch of people (including myself) at a vigil in February, and there were
no ill effects as far as I know. So if you're using the stronger vinegar,
logically you should be fine.
Vika
Date: Thu, 18 Nov 1999 13:10:33 EST
From: ChannonM at aol.com
Subject: SC - Write up on Lord's Salt experiment
Hello everyone,
Well, I managed to come through on this write up and here it is except the
original recipes (I would think everyone could pull up their old posts on it,
it is alot of space). Hope this is as interesting to you as it was in
performing.
Hauviette
My Recipe Recreation
In approaching this recipe I wanted to make a large enough quantity that I
could use it as a shelf item and have the combined ingredients to keep on
hand for future use. As such I began with a fair quantity of Cinnamon
Zeylanicum (the recipe specifies canel) and using a metric scale for
accuracy, I weighed out the Cinnamon first to obtain the total weight that
all of the other spices should be combined. The recipes asks
for an equal amount of each, but the cinnamon should be as much as all the
rest. In this my dilemma was should my measurements be mass or volume. I
chose mass and my reasoning is that most recipes are a prescription in their
origin (see the definition of recipe) and as such the ingredients would
have been obtained in weighted amounts. The volume of say ground nutmeg Vs
cloves is substantially different and as such only weight would give me equal
amounts of each. My justification for using grams in my experiment was that
the scale I have is electronic and can convert to either metric or imperial,
however when using ounces the scale can be out by as much a .2 of an ounce,
but would only be out by 1gm at the most. I have converted the quantities for
those who do not have access to a metric measurement, but would suggest that
when buying the ingredients that you simply buy in said quantities instead of
trying to determine the quantities in dry measure. This will ensure fresh
spices are used which may be instrumental in the preservative aspect of this
recipe although there is argument that the spices used in the middle ages
would have had a diminished strength due to the time spent in travel and the
adulteration by middle men. Finally, I have rounded off the measurement to
imperial since 1 ounce is equal to 28.35 grams and my quantities of the
spices were only 31g (greater than an ounce by 2.65 grams).
Base ingredients: combine the following dry ingredients and use 1 cup to 3.5
cups vinegar per recipe
Cloves 31g or 1 ounce Ginger 31g or 1 ounce
Nutmeg 31g or 1 ounce Pepper 31g or 1 ounce
Cardamom 31g or 1 ounce Cinnamon 186g or 5 ounces
Pepper 31g or 1 ounce
Bread crumbs 372g or 1.37 lb. (22 ounces)
Red Wine Vinegar 3.5 cups
1.5 LB of venison steak (preferred a roast, but steak was all that was
available)
2 TB lard
1 tsp. salt
Method;
Grind the spices and combine with the bread crumbs. Using a pestle, grind the
dry ingredients together to ensure the crumbs are well inundated with the
spices. Add the vinegar and further mash the contents of the bowl.
Pour the spice/bread crumb/vinegar combination into a sauce pan and place
over low heat. Stirring regularly, bring to a full boil for 1.5 to 2 minutes.
Remove from heat and let cool thoroughly.
Meanwhile, remove any fat from the venison and spread lard over the surface.
Place in an oven proof dish, into the oven at 350 degrees for 35 minutes.
Remove from the oven and let cool.
Using a shallow covered dish, pour half of the cooled spice mixture into it.
Place the meat on top of this and then pour the remaining sauce over the
meat, making sure that it is well covered. Put the dish in a cool, dry place
(this dish is meant to be a preserved meat )and keep for up to three weeks
(although there are a few people who have kept it for months and attest that
it is perfectly safe I have yet to determine that).
A Discussion;
The Codex K and Codex Q state that the amount of bread crumbs fried bread
should be twice as much as all the rest as opposed to the Icelandic
Manuscript requiring as much fried bread as all the others. I chose to
follow the earlier manuscripts and totaled the weight of all spices and
doubled it for the amount of bread crumbs.
The issue of strong vinegar was discussed on the SCA Cooks list and I was
advised to purchase a 7% vinegar that would be particularly strong and seemed
to fit the recipes requirement (it calls for strong vinegar). However, I
had been part of other discussions regarding making your own vinegars as
opposed to using commercially produced varieties and an unscientific
conclusion was reached that since vinegars would have been used fairly soon
after inception and having been made using a suspected weaker mother of
vinegar then the acidity level would have been lower than what we have
available as the average vinegar today. As such, and considering I was unable
to locate any vinegars with an acidity level higher that 5%, I used a common
red wine vinegar with a 5% acidity level. Red Wine vinegar was chosen as the
best accompaniment to game. The quantity of dry ingredients to vinegar was 1
cup dry to 3.5 cups vinegar. Anything less than 3 cups of liquid produced a
gel like mass that was almost impossible to bring to a boil. The added .5 cup
was to ensure coverage of the meat in the dish and to account for the
thickening of the product during cooking.
I combined the dry ingredients in a medium sized metal bowl and ground the
ingredients together as much as was possible using a pestle . Taking 1 cup of
the dry ingredients and pouring in 3.5 cups of vinegar I mashed the contents
further. This sauce was then slowly brought to boil on low heat stirring
regularly to prevent scorching . The recipe directs you to take what you
want of this sauce and boil it in a pan on hot embers without flame hence,
the temperature was kept at 3 on the dial of an electric stove.
I was lucky to have venison available to me although not in a roast but
steaks. The lady who translated the recipes, states that the word stekae
actually means roast, not steak and is probably the root for the English word
for steak. Since the roast is then further cut into thick slices, I felt it
sufficient to follow the spirit of the recipe using pre-sliced roasts. Not
using a roast may have an effect on the texture of the meat in the end, since
the centre and edges of the meat would cook simultaneously as opposed to
varying times. In order to compensate to some degree I folded the steaks into
a larger piece of meat and roasted them as such. Upon initial tasting, we
found the venison to be on the dry side, as the sauce had yet to penetrate
the meat. The next trial will be 5 days post the construction of the dish.
A modern analysis of the spices used in this dish
According to The Complete New Herbal, by Richard Mabey, Penguin Books;
Cinnamon bark oil is antibacterial, inhibiting E.coli, Staphylococcus aureus
and thrush (Candida albicans)
Cloves are strongly antiseptic due to the high percent of phenols.
Black Pepper stimulates the taste buds and helps promote gastric secretions,
in addition, I believe there is some research out there that says it is also
a preservative of foods.
The Complete Medicinal Herbal, Penelope Ody tells us that;
Nutmeg is carminative (relieves flatulence, digestive colic and gastric
discomfort), is a digestive stimulant and antispasmodic, prevents vomiting,
appetite stimulant, anti inflammatory and is used as digestive remedy
especially for food poisoning. Used in large doses (7.5g or more in a single
dose) is dangerous producing convulsions and palpitations.
Cardamom is antispasmodic, carminative and a digestive stimulant.
Ginger is a circulatory stimulant, relaxes peripheral blood vessel, promotes
sweating, expectorant, prevents vomiting, antispasmodic, carminative,
antiseptic.
Date: Wed, 1 Dec 1999 11:38:59 -0600
From: david friedman <ddfr at best.com>
Subject: Re: SC - Lord's Salt experiment. upcoming trial with venison
At 5:39 PM -0500 11/10/99, Hauviette wrote:
>I am going to try out this recipe this weekend. I have some basic questions
>before I start out.
>
>1.Strong vinegar- someone posted that you need to use 7% versus the ordinary
>5% acid level, where could I obtain such a vinegar, or is there a name for it
>that would be universal
When we first did this recipe, I read up on botulism. From what my
sources said, vinegar that is 5% or better will prevent the botulism
bugs from growing in your stuff, and boiling for 15 minutes will
destroy the botulin toxin if it has developed. We figured that the
vinegar is getting somewhat diluted by the meat juices and that it
would therefore be safer to start with stronger vinegar.
>5. Is there a test that I can perform to determine the level of bacteria
>before eating it? Is there something that I can obtain to scientifically
>demonstrate that it is safe before I condemn my fellow cooks to a day of
>vomiting and other nasties, if that is the least of the problems to result
>from bad food. I just want to be very careful in what I serve to others, so
>please forgive the anal retentiveness on this.
I don't know about a test. We have usually served this to others in
dishes cooked at least 15 minutes, but have often eaten it ourselves
out of the jar. The original batch we made sat on the kitchen counter
for three or four weeks, being opened every couple of days so we
could take out another piece and eat it. We haven't poisoned
ourselves then or since, and we have been doing the recipe for years.
Our version is in the Miscellany.
Elizabet6h/Betty Cook
Date: Thu, 14 Sep 2000 23:48:10 -0700
From: "James F. Johnson" <seumas at mind.net>
Subject: Re: SC - jerky documentation?
Apicius gives a recipe for preserving cooked sides of pork and beef in a
pickle of vinegar, honey, salt, and mustard. That's basically it. No
mention of amounts, and definitely no mention of _drying_, but the
ingredients would make tasty marinade for dried meat.
Seumas
Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2000 18:00:08 -0700
From: "James F. Johnson" <seumas at mind.net>
Subject: SC - Adaptation from Apicius for jerking meat
Seumas commented:
> I tried a preservative solution from Apicius with vinegar, salt,
> mustard, and honey, but proportions are not included, so I have been
> experimenting.
Stefan li Rous replied
> Interesting. Apicius recipe please? Would this be dried/ground mustard
> seed since you already have liquid with the vinegar and the honey? Or
> would this be a mustard sauce?
>From the 1936 Vehling translation of Apicius, Book I, Chapter VII
[Vehling 11]:
"To keep cooked sides of pork or beef or tenderloins place them in a
pickle of mustard, vinegar, salt and honey, covering meat entirely. And
when ready to use, you'll be surprised."
If I recall correctly (Mmm...notes have disappeared) I started with
750ml of red wine vinegar, 250ml of honey, 4 Tablespoons each of ground
mustard and sea salt. This itself tasted mostly of vinegar naturally, so
I doubled the amount of mustard and honey. I might have added more sea
salt, but this used up the last in the kitchen at that time. The sliced
meat marinated in the fridge for a full day, then 24+ hours in a 150 F
oven. Came out very dry (brittle) and slightly tangy of the vinegar. I
would prefer it more spicy/savoury, so later attempts will increase the
mustard and salt again. I might go so far as to make a very thin paste
of mustard and salt using the vinegar and honey. I'm also considering
grinding up the salt with the mustard for an additional dredge of the
meat before packing and marinating. Personally, I would like to try some
with black pepper, perhaps ginger. I like more pungent flavours.
Seumas
Date: Wed, 15 Mar 2000 11:30:34 +1100
From: Lorix <lorix at trump.net.au>
Subject: Re: SC - Brining of meats in period
Liam Fisher wrote:
> has onyone seen any evidence of brining meats (not pickling or marinating)
> before cooking in period? It's just a technique I've been experimenting with
> as of late that works well with old tom turkeys and tougher cuts of meat
> where you soak the meat in a decently strong salt/sugar solution overnight
> (not a technique that I recommend if you are salt/sugar sensitive) and then
> roast the meat the next day. I also brine turkeys sometimes when they won't
> entirely thawed by the time I want to cook them.
>
> Cadoc
Ahh, you have stumbled across my current pet project! However, I am looking for
the pickling of fish rather than meat, but my current info appears to apply. I
note, that I have been looking for pickling recipes, in the following sources I
suggest I have seen a number of recipes where the meat appears to have been
brined for preservation & then cooked in a manner later to extract the salt.
Since my research has been directed at the exact opposite of what you want, I
can only give you the references rather than the recipes.
Might I suggest that you refer to this webpage:
http://www.best.com/~ddfr/Medieval/Cookbooks/Menagier/Menagier.html
This gives several references to the salting of both fish & meats eg:
"Item, at Besiers, from St. Andrew's day [November 30] which is before
Christmas, sheep are salted in quarters, by rubbing well with salt, and rubbing
again, and so on and so on, and then piling the quarters on top of each other
for eight days and then putting in the fireplace.
If you want to salt beef or sheep in winter, have coarse salt and dry it well in
the pan, then grind it well, and salt.
And note that in June and July mutton should be soaked, then salted.
To Salt Beef Tongues. In the right season for salting, take a quantity of beef
tongues and parboil them a little, then take them out and skin them, then salt
them one after another, and lay them in salt for eight days or ten, then hang
them in the fireplace, leaving them there for the winter: then hang them in a
dry place, for one year or two or three or four.
Goose must be salted naturally for three days.
Coot salted for two days are good with cabbage.
Wood Duck also; note that they come every three years.
If a hare is taken two or three weeks before Easter, or at some other time when
you want to save it, gut it and take out the entrails, then cut the skin on its
head and break it, and make an opening in the head and remove the brain and fill
the hole with salt and sew up the skin: it will keep for a month if hung by the
ears."
These are only a few references from this source, but I have found this the best
source thus far for info on preservation.
Alternatively, online, you may wish to check out:
Sabina Welserin's cookbook has some recipes (eg no 29). It also has a recipe
for 'marinated' fish (168) which involves cooking the fish (which I don't want
to do, but more to what you are looking at).
http://www.best.com/~ddfr/Medieval/Cookbooks/Sabrina_Welserin.html
Du fait de cuisine (Chiquart) - This has references to serving "salted grey
mullet' and 'salted filleted pike' and serving same with mustard on a side
dish. I believe that it also has references to salted meat (again no recipes)
http://www.best.com/~ddfr/Medieval/Cookbooks/Du_Fait_de_Cuisine/Du_fait_de_Cuisine.html#ProvisionofFish.
Now, my research has mainly been directed at the curing/preserving of fish, but
it may be that this can be applied to meats to! I know salted fish existed in a
form to preserve for many years (per Chiquart, Taillevent & Menagier). I have
found recipes that use salted fish BUT must be cooked prior to serving (to
extract salt). However, there appears to be another way that fish were
preserved. I have found elusive references to fish that was served salted (and
apparently uncooked with sauces), further in Terence Scully's book on early
French Cookery there is a reference from a 13th Century Doctor who advocates
that fish should be eaten within a few days of salting. So this appears to
suggest that some fish were salted for long-term preservation, whilst others
were salted as a manner of food preparation (like gravelax).
Lorix
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 11:54:45 -0500
From: Elaine Koogler <ekoogler at chesapeake.net>
Subject: Re: SC - Competition entry
> I still need suggestions for a period savory cold dish, something thinly
> sliced or perhaps a pate of bull's balls. My other idea was calf's tongue
> thinly sliced. What do you think Ras, anything in your collection regards
> giving tongue at Art/Sci?
>
> Daniel Raoul
Check out several of the late period cookery books. There is a Pork Brawn that
is pickled and served cold with a vinegar-mustard sauce. I served it a couple
of years ago at an Elizabethan feast, and it was very well received! There is a
redaction, if you're interested, in Dining with William Shakespeare, but you can
find originals in Digby, May and others.
Kiri
From: "Jane M & Bj Tremaine" <vikinglord at worldnet.att.net>
To: <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Date: Tue, 17 Jul 2001 14:05:07 -0700
Subject: [Sca-cooks] RE: [Sca-cooks]feast
This is the recipe for the pickled chicken that was served at a recent
banquett I went to. I loved this chicken.
PICKLED PULLETS
The French Cook
After they are will dressed. cleave them in two, if they are small. break
their bone and set them a pickling with vinegar, salt, peper, chibol and
lemon peels: let them steep therein, till you have occasion to use them, and
then set them a draining, flowre them, and frie them in fresh seame or lard;
after they are fryed, stove them a very little with their pickle them serve
them with a short sauce.
Redaction by THL Gillian of Lynnhaven and Magnus Gra'hetta
3lbs chicken breasts (6 half breasts)
Lemon peel form two lemon (1 lemon for overnight pickling, 2 lemons for 1/2
hour pickling)
3/4 cups white wine vinegar
2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. pepper
4 green onions (chibol) approx. 1/2 cup
2 cups of flour
1/4 cup sesame oil
additional green onion and sesame seeds for garnish
Cut chicken into strips. (each breast in 1/2 then in 1/3 strips) Marinade
in first 5 ingredients 3 hours maximum.
Drain off the pickling juice and reserve. Roll the chicken pieces in flour
and fry in Indian sesame oil. Remove the chicken from the pan and add the
juice. Simmer the juice to reduce by 1/2. Garnish the chicken with chopped
green onions and sesame seeds. Serve with the sauce on the side. 12
servings, 3 strips per person.
Jana
Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2001 15:30:12 -0700
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
From: Maggie MacDonald <maggie5 at home.com>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] period fried chicken?
At 05:13 PM 7/18/01 -0500,Mark.S Harris said something like:
>Jana gave a recipe:
>
>PICKLED PULLETS
>The French Cook
>
>Jana, or anyone else, can you give us more details on the original
>recipe? It does sound interesting. I wonder how the taste changes if
>the meat is kept in the pickling juice for a week or two instead of
>only a few hours. If this is meant to preserve the meat, why the
>"3 hours maximum" in the redacted recipe? If this does keep the
>meat, I wonder if this would work for keeping meat without refrigeration
>for things like Pennsic.
>
>Stefan li Rous
From what I observed, while cooking the pickled chicken (at that
particular feast), if you left the chicken in that marinade much longer, it
would be completely cooked, and do what cooked chicken does, fall apart.
I'd definitely play with this at home before attempting to use it 'out in
the field', such as at Pennsic. We marinated a bit less than three hours,
and the outsides of the chicken was thoroughly cooked, with the centers
were still slightly pink. It was a very lovely dish though.
Maggie MacD.
Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2001 22:12:16 -0400
From: Philip & Susan Troy <troy at asan.com>
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] period fried chicken?
"Mark.S Harris" wrote:
> Jana gave a recipe:
>
> PICKLED PULLETS
> The French Cook
>
> After they are will dressed. cleave them in two, if they are small. break
> their bone and set them a pickling with vinegar, salt, peper, chibol and
> lemon peels: let them steep therein, till you have occasion to use them, and
> then set them a draining, flowre them, and frie them in fresh seame or lard;
> after they are fryed, stove them a very little with their pickle them
> serve them with a short sauce.
>
> Redaction by THL Gillian of Lynnhaven and Magnus Gra'hetta
>
> <snip>
>
> Cut chicken into strips. (each breast in 1/2 then in 1/3 strips)
> Marinade in first 5 ingredients 3 hours maximum.
> Drain off the pickling juice and reserve. Roll the chicken pieces in
> flour and fry in Indian sesame oil.
> <snip>
>
> We've discussed chicken recipes many times before, including some that
> were fried. This is the first that I can remember that calls for the
> chicken to be floured and then fried. Sounds pretty close to modern
> fried chicken to me.
Except that this is more like braised chicken, because the cooking is
finished in the marinade. The recipe than talks of serving them with a
"short", or rich, sauce. It seems to me thickening the marinade with
some egg yolks would be the way to go for a fricassee sort of effect. I
have a couple of questions, though...
> But I don't recognise the book and there is not time frame for the
> recipe given. So this might not actually be a period recipe.
Well, depending on your version of period, this is pretty darned late.
Le Cuisinier Francoise, written by La Varenne in approximately 1650, was
translated into English some short time later, maybe 1655 or so. That
appears to be the source for this.
> Jana, or anyone else, can you give us more details on the original
> recipe? It does sound interesting. I wonder how the taste changes if
> the meat is kept in the pickling juice for a week or two instead of
> only a few hours. If this is meant to preserve the meat, why the
> "3 hours maximum" in the redacted recipe? If this does keep the
> meat, I wonder if this would work for keeping meat without refrigeration
> for things like Pennsic.
That would depend on the strength of the vinegar, I suspect, but then I
also suspect that the palatability might be compromised by really strong
vinegar. Part of the issue of marinating time may have a lot to do with
the portion/service control, which involves the chicken pieces being
smaller than 1/3 of the size the recipe seems to stipulate [halves].
Presumably larger pieces would require a longer time for the acid to
penetrate into the flesh, and to denature ("cook") the protein. It
should be noted that the safe cooking temp for potentially
salmonella-ridden American battery chickens is 157 degrees F. and up;
after steeping it in acid, that is one cooked bird, but I have no
records on whether vinegar has any effect at all on salmonella or its
produced toxins.
I'm in the midst of some kind of brain bubble as to the acidity of
natural vinegars; I know commercial vinegars are normally brought either
up or down to 5% acidity, but I forget whether real vinegar would be
more or less potent than this. It's been a long day. If the vinegar is
less strong than we;re used to, and the pieces of bird are larger than
the adapted recipe calls for, it's conceivable that the recipe would
work without rendering the chicken already cooked before... um...
cooking it. And then, of course, it's possible that if the vinegar were
"weak", it wouldn't keep very well at Pennsic.
I agree that some experimentation might be in order.
So. Why Indian sesame oil? Is this just a matter of personal aesthetics
on the part of the adaptors of the original recipe?
Adamantius
From: "Peters, Rise J." <rise.peters at spiegelmcd.com>
To: "'sca-cooks at ansteorra.org'" <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Subject: RE: [Sca-cooks] Re: Period Fried Chicken
Date: Thu, 19 Jul 2001 11:35:11 -0400
The pickling juice is boiled down as a sauce, so the raw chicken germs get
cooked.
From: Elise Fleming [mailto:alysk at ix.netcom.com]
> Greetings. The "Pickled Pullets" sounded tasty so I copied off the
> recipe. Just read it this morning and now I have a question. It
> says to set the chicken in a pickling of vinegar, salt, pepper,
> chibol and lemon peels and to let them steep. Then the chicken is
> fried, and they are served with some of the pickle in which they (as
> raw chickens) sat for a number of hours. My question is... Is this
> safe? Does that pickling really kill all the nasty raw chicken
> germs that we are warned about? How come modern marinades, to which
> you add vinegar and water, tell you to throw out the marinade and
> not re-use it?
>
> Alys Katharine
From: "Jane M & Bj Tremaine" <vikinglord at worldnet.att.net>
To: <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Subject: RE: [Sca-cooks] Re: Period Fried Chicken
Date: Thu, 19 Jul 2001 10:04:06 -0700
> The pickling juice is boiled down as a sauce, so the raw chicken germs get
> cooked.
According to a modern BBQ book I have if you put a Marinade on the stove a
boil it for 5 minutes after the meat has been removed it is safe to use as a
sauce or to brush on the meat when it is cooking.
Jana
Date: Thu, 19 Jul 2001 13:25:53 -0400
From: Philip & Susan Troy <troy at asan.com>
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] period fried chicken?
Jane M & Bj Tremaine wrote:
> The receipe states fry them in fresh sesame or lard? I think the sesame oil
> is an interpretation of this.
>
> But I'll ask Gill and find out for sure.
Ah. Okay, I think I get it now. I think it calls for fresh seyme (or
maybe it is spelled seame in this one), which is usually acknowledged to
refer to fat skimmed off the broth from boiling meat. Essentially,
clarified beef drippings, etc.
I guess it could easily look like a typo for sesame if you're not
familiar with the term...
Adamantius
Date: Thu, 19 Jul 2001 11:02:24 -0700
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
From: Maggie MacDonald <maggie5 at home.com>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Re: Period Fried Chicken
At 11:01 AM 7/19/01 -0500,Elise Fleming said something like:
> How come modern marinades, to which
>you add vinegar and water, tell you to throw out the marinade and
>not re-use it?
>
>Alys Katharine
This marinade is added to the pan after the chicken has been cooked and
removed, and it deglazes the pan (as well as making a very tasty
gravy). Any of the nasty germs/microbes that COULD be in the marinade are
then very well cooked, just like the chicken. You don't just toss the
marinade in the pan then toss it on the plate, it gets cooked for several
minutes. (Or at least, that's the way we did it at the feast).
Maggie MacD.
Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 09:21:08 -0400
From: Philip & Susan Troy <troy at asan.com>
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Re: Period Fried Chicken
Elise Fleming wrote:
> Except that's what the original recipe says to do. I didn't post
> back into this thread after I read that the modern interpretation
> said to boil up the marinade. But there is no evidence in the
> original recipe that one was to do that. With subsequent posts in
> later digests (I'm sort of behind!) it seems that it still might not
> be a safe thing to do. I suppose one could make up more marinade,
> or reserve some of it prior to putting the chicken in.
Yes, the original recipe (which has perversely vanished from where i
thought I would find it) says something about stoving it for a short
time (or some such) in the marinade, and then says to serve it with a
short sauce. So, you are presumably finishing it fairly quickly in the
pickle, which you might presumably use as the basis for your sauce, but
that appears to be optional, so long as the sauce is "short", which a
marinade isn't. "Short" generally means fatty, rich, or tender, as in
short paste, so maybe some butter beaten in for a drawn/beaten butter or
beurre blanc kind of effect might be recognizable to the original cook,
or maybe an egg yolk liaison might be nice. But I suspect the shortness
of the sauce is to counteract the sourness of the marinade, and it
doesn't really specify whether the pickle is intended as a sauce
component at all. Maybe claret, orange juice and butter? The options are
pretty broad.
As for the safety issues of using the marinade as a sauce, well, what
tends to be pathogenic and/or toxic about undercooked chicken is killed
at a temperature that is pretty low by simmering standards. Assuming the
marinade gets hotter than even poaching temperatures of around 160
degrees Fahrenheit, it should be pretty safe.
Adamantius
Date: Thu, 26 Jul 2001 16:32:43 -0400
From: Tom Bilodeau <tirloch at cox.rr.com>
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] pickled beef
Here is one recipe for pickled beef:
-----
SPICED BEEF (OR SPYCED BEEF)
by Winifred Corbet de Wynterwood
For many of the feasts I have prepared, I have prepared a dish of cold spiced
beef. Frequently, I have been asked for the recipe. Well, for those of you
whom I gave the recipe to and unfortunately misplaced it (I usually end up
misplacing recipes I get from others) or have never gotten a copy but want it
here it is.
Recipe
beef roast
whole bay leaves
whole mustard seeds
onions, sliced
vinegar
sugar
Roast the beef, let cool. Slice the beef reasonably thin after it has cooled.
Layer the beef in a pot or some kind of sealable container. Between beef layers
layer sliced onions (enough to make a layer), two bay leaves and a bunch of
mustard seed. Mix together the vinegar and sugar. Use just enough sugar to
take away the acidic bite of the vinegar. Pour the vinegar/sugar mixture over
the layers until they are covered. Place the lid on the container and set in
the refrigerator for at least two days. When ready to serve, remove the beef
from the other things in the pot and serve cold.
Comments
This is the way I prepare this dish. I have not included any amounts for bay
leaves, mustard seed, onion, vinegar or sugar. Frankly, I never know how much I
used each time I have prepared this dish. Just use whatever works.
When slicing the beef, this works best if the roast is icebox cold. I usually
cut the beef slices into about 2 inch pieces, this way it is easier to layer
them in the pot. I don't think the recipe specifies which type of vinegar to
use, but I prefer to use a mixture of apple cider vinegar and red wine vinegar
rather than white vinegar. This provides a better flavor to the beef.
When preparing to serve the beef, I have sometimes rinsed the beef pieces in
cold water when I thought they were a little too strong. Use your own judgment.
Credits
I got this recipe from Dame Winifred Corbet de Wynterwood who got it from
Mistress Meghan Pengwyn of Wynterwood who got it from Duchess Melisande de
Belvoir who I believe got it from Grafin Judith von Gruenwald.
~Tirloch of Tallaght
From: BaronessaIlaria at aol.com
Date: Thu, 26 Jul 2001 17:04:27 EDT
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] pickled beef
To: sca-cooks at ansteorra.org
tirloch at cox.rr.com writes:
> Credits
> I got this recipe from Dame Winifred Corbet de Wynterwood who got it from
> Mistress Meghan Pengwyn of Wynterwood who got it from Duchess Melisande de
> Belvoir who I believe got it from Grafin Judith von Gruenwald.
> ~Tirloch of Tallaght
Bingo! That is exactly the path it took. We usually roasted the beef to about
medium doneness, some cooks prefering to go a little more toward well done.
The beef has a faint sweetness to it when its ready and a nice tang from the
vinegar, onions and mustard. I've never liked pickles and resisted eating
this for a couple of years after I started making it for events but I finally
gave in and tried it. Yum! It keeps beautifully, though it rarely results in
leftovers to keep.
We usually used cider or red vinegar, and one thing I note it does not
mention in the text is to shake the tub every so often while you're poking in
the fridge during the two days. That keeps the flavors melded nicely. It
should also be in something non-metallic so the vinegar doesn't react with
the container.
Meghan/Ilaria
Date: Sat, 09 Jul 2005 01:39:32 -0400
From: Robin <rcmann4 at earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] The Lords Salt; danish text
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
UlfR wrote:
> I need to get hold of the Danish text for the Lords Salt (from Grewe). I
> know I have the book, but it must be hiding in a small, dark corner of
> the house, probably in the same corner as Stefanssons Arctic Manual.
>
> One should never move.
>
> /UlfR
Thomas Gloning has a transcription of Codex K on his website:
http://staff-www.uni-marburg.de/%7Egloning/harp-kkr.htm
and Henry Notaker has Codex Q:
http://www.notaker.com/onlitxts/molbech.htm
--
Brighid ni Chiarain
Barony of Settmour Swamp, East Kingdom
Robin Carroll-Mann *** rcmann4 at earthlink.net
Date: Sat, 9 Jul 2005 10:39:49 +0200
From: Volker Bach <carlton_bach at yahoo.de>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] The Lords Salt; danish text
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Am Samstag, 9. Juli 2005 09:22 schrieb UlfR:
> Robin <rcmann4 at earthlink.net> [2005.07.09] wrote:
>> Thomas Gloning has a transcription of Codex K on his website:
>> http://staff-www.uni-marburg.de/%7Egloning/harp-kkr.htm
>> and Henry Notaker has Codex Q:
>> http://www.notaker.com/onlitxts/molbech.htm
>
> The transcription is of no muse to me (it is the Danish original I
> want).
This is from the Gloining text - I think it is what you are looking for
K6. Quomodo temperetur salsum dominorum
et quam diu durat. (Q5)
Man skal takū gŋrfūrs naghlū. oc muscat. cardemomum.
pipūr. cinamomum thūt ūr kaniūl. oc ingifūr. allū
iūfn wūghnū. tho swa at kaniūl ūr ūm mykūt sum allū
hinū andrū. oc slyk tu stekt brŋth sum allū hinū andrū.
oc stŋtū them allū samūn. oc malū mūth stūrk ūdykū oc
latū .i. en lūghūl. Thūt ūr hūrrū salsū. oc ūr goth et
halft aar.
> And the Notaker section does not appear to have that recipie in it.
Yes, but under #5
5. Mūn sculū takū gūrofūrs naghlū. muskat pipūr oc ingūfūr. af hwūr therū ūm
mykūt. oc ūm mykūtaf cinamomum ūsse the ūrū allū samūn. oc tysū ūmmykūt af
hwith brthū stūkt, ūsse thūt ūr alt, oc stthū thūt samūn mūth ūdik, thūnnū
salsū haldū mūn goth i eth halft aar i en lūghlū. Wilū mūn syltū thūr nokūt
i, tha latū thūt wūllū, oc sithūn thūt ūr full kalt tha sculū mūn stūkt wild
brath kalt, hiort, ra, gaas ūth annūn wild brath, skorūth i stykki, lūggū
thūrū i mūth lit salt, thūn sylt mughū mūn gmū thre vkū.
BTB, the use os 'garofaers/gorfaers' for cloves indicates a Scandinavian
connection even for the parts of the Wolfenbttel MS not part of the
Haprestreng tradition. Thanks for getting me to notice that.
Giano
<the end>