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cheese-msg – 9/23/07

 

Medieval cheese. Recipes. Cheeses which date from medieval times.

 

NOTE: See also the files: dairy-prod-msg, Cheese-Making-art, cheesemaking-msg, Charles-Chees-art, cheesecake-msg, cheese-goo-msg, clotted-cream-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: winifred at trillium.soe.umich.EDU (Lee Katman)

Newsgroups: rec.org.sca

Subject: forwarding recipe

Date: 18 Apr 1993 19:18:58 -0400

 

here is the recipe I was trying to forward a few days ago.

Lets hope this different editor does the trick for me....

 

Winifred                                 Lee Katman

Winifred at trillium.soe.umich.edu           Cynnabar, Midrealm

-------

Greetings from one who is new to the net and the SCA, but not to medieval

cooking:

 

I have a very good book of recipes called "Fabulous Feasts" by Madeleine

Pelner Cosman which covers what was eaten, how it was presented and what

what was available.  Definitely two thumbs up!  This book has a whole

section on Appetizers.

 

One that is very easy and fits your requirements is Brie Cheese with honey

and mustard, which consists pretty much that.  Cut the cheese into small

pieces and dolup a little mustard (I prefer mustards with the seeds uncrushed)

and a little bit of honey on top.  Even if this dish gets a little warm it

just softens the cheese.

 

Victoria Williams Cauldwell

vaw at lclark.sun.edu          

 

 

From: jtn at nutter.cs.vt.edu (Terry Nutter)

Newsgroups: rec.org.sca

Subject: Re: feast formats

Date: 9 Nov 1993 18:39:19 GMT

 

Greetings, all, from Angharad ver' Rhuawn.

 

Avwye writes,

 

>      FYI Jeff Smith's _The Frugal Gourmet Cooks Three Ancient Cuisines_ is

>not a bad source for modern Greek and Roman foods.  I've made a few Greek

>students less homesick....I've also used it to compare medieval recipes

>against, for things like amounts and cooking times. AND, he recommends Apicus

>in his bibliography. (I believe there are some modern adaptations --not weird,

>just using modern measures, etc.--in the collection, too.)

 

This is all true.  You should, however, be aware that he's a dreadful source

on period or ancient cookery. It is one thing to have Apicius in your

bibliography; it's another thing to write a book that reflects serious

scholarship either in its text or in its recipes.  Smith's book does the

first, but not the second.  -- But it is all good eating.

 

>      Earlier this thread was exploring the use of cheese in "period" feasts

>served at events.  My plea to cooks: please do not use cheese as a filler in

>every single dish you serve. Some of us can't digest it, and even with the

>lactose supplements our ability to digest dairy products is limited. Nothing

 

_Nothing_ should be used in every single dish!  Apart from the objection

above, that there are probably people who can't eat it, anything you care

to name (except maybe salt) is going to get seriously old with that much

repetition.

 

And it isn't period ;^). Despite complaints to the contrary, the figures

I've been putting together show that even salt isn't that common.

 

>      And when you do use cheese, please do not use

>American cheddar!  Cheese may be period, but the cheddar variety is not!

 

Most currently existing named varieties of cheese are post period; the

name generally derives from issues including the specific species of

critters that help make the stuff cheese, which are usually modern.

There are a few exceptions, brie being one of the better known.  Another,

as I recall (but I don't have the information at home), is double gloucester.

You can get it, but at least here, it's killingly expensive.  Cheddar is

actually not a bad substitute -- probably as similar to their hard cheese

are our chickens are to their chickens, or our eggs to their eggs.

 

Then again, they ate cheeses; that's a plural.  If you're going to push

a lot of cheese at people, it's only sensible to include some variety.

 

Cheers,

-- Angharad/Terry

 

 

From: jtn at nutter.cs.vt.edu (Terry Nutter)

Newsgroups: rec.org.sca

Subject: Re: Cheese questions

Date: 25 Nov 1993 04:59:30 GMT

 

Greetings, all, from Angharad ver' Rhuawn.

 

Fiammetta Adalieta writes,

>Mistress Angharad, thank you and again thank you for your postings,

 

You are most welcome; though I'm not a mistress (wife, yes ;^).

 

>In the article on Ember day tarts, Angharad mentioned that cheddar and

>munster cheeses (if I remember correctly) are not period.  I was wondering

>what sort of cheeses are, and how we know.

 

I looked this stuff up several years back, and came to the conclusion that

there are several lines believed to go back to period, but that I couldn't

readily find out why they believed them unchanged.  The period or very close

cheeses that I recall offhand still in use today are cream cheese, cottage

cheese (but fresh, not aged), brie, and double gloucester.

 

Cheers,

-- Angharad/Terry

 

 

From: kellogg at rohan.sdsu.edu (kellogg)

Newsgroups: rec.org.sca

Subject: Period soft cheeses (was: Re: Is cheesecake period?)

Date: 22 Oct 1996 17:12:26 GMT

Organization: San Diego State University Computing Services

 

Monica Cellio (mjc at telerama.lm.com) wrote:

(attribution lost) wrote:

 

: >Is cheesecake period? If so, when and where?

 

: Cheese pies of various sorts are period, but not as sweets.  The closest

: thing I know of to dessert-grade cheese pies is from Digby (1669).  The

: closest approximation for the cheese is probably ricotta or farmer's cheese.

: Cream cheese is modern.

 

        This thread aroused my curiousity, so I did some fairly extensive

web searches.  Cream cheese does seem to be an American original.

 

        Most cheese websites claim a great antiquity for cottage cheese,

unfortunately without any references.  The one soft cheese that I seem to

have found a solid period reference to is ricotta.

The Sugarplums...All About Cheese site at <URL: http://www.sugarplums.com/

fieryfeature/c.html> shows a print of a painting entitled "The Ricotta

Eaters" by one Vincenzo Campi, who is listed as having lived between

1525 and 1591.

 

        Anyone know anything else about this painting or artist?

 

                Avenel Kellough

 

 

From: L Herr-Gelatt and J R Gelatt <liontamr at postoffice.ptd.net>

Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 07:11:23 -0500 (CDT)

Subject: SC - Re: sca-cooks V1 #78

 

About farmers cheese:  What I can buy commercially that is called

Farmer's Cheese is nothing more than what is called "Green Cheese" or

unripened, pressed curds in our historical time frame. If you break it apart

in your fingers you can clearly see that a large curd was allowed to form.

It was salted, pressed (whey removed to make it more solid) and then sliced

into a brick, wrapped, and sold as farmer's cheese. These cheeses are

probably the closest to what we can buy that is similar to what most period

recipes for "cheese tarts" are made of, if somewhat drier. The cheese tartes

or pies in my experience were supposed to be lumpy, although you can see

that this cheese breaks apart very easily. I make my own curds with milk

from Jersey cows. It is far, far superior.

 

        Now, what I grew up calling Farmer's cheese is something different.

We also called it Cup Cheese, and was in essence a strong smelling liquid

cheese sold in cups or tubs (no rind visible), and roughly had the

consistency of that children's play thing, Slime, although it was clear- to

faint yellow. (PLEASE, no jokes about bodily excreta). It's a Pennsylvania

Dutch (Or Amish) delicacy, and deservedly so if you like stinky cheese.

Anyone from Lancaster, PA out there who could get me a recipe would be

rewarded with my undying thanks!

 

      I would appreciate a private e-mail or post of the cheese goo recipe.

I have been waivering for months now over fresh cheese with fine herbs or

"savory toasted cheese" (not my recipe--the brie version, but I havn't

gotten my hands on the recipe yet) for a feast. I much prefer my own

cheeses, because they're richer and have far more character and flavor than

bought cheese. Must be the unpasteurized, fresh Jersey Cow milk, cream and all.

 

Aoife

 

 

From: Stephen Bloch <sbloch at adl15.adelphi.edu>

Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 14:20:21 -0400 (EDT)

Subject: Re: SC - Re: sca-cooks: viking's pies

 

Allison wrote:

> Norse Pies, from the James Prescott translation

>

> Take  cooked meat chopped very small, pine nut paste, currants, harvest

> cheese crumbled very small, a bit of sugar and a little salt.

>

> That's the entire recipe. Is it Norse, you Vikings out there?

>

> I usually use farmer's cheese when harvest cheese is called for, but I'm

> now wondering if that's the wrong assumption.  Cheeses were made in late

> Spring, after the calves/kids/lambs/??? were weaned, and you had some

> rennet from a calf stomach handy.  By Autumn, how much would such a

> cheese ripen?  Enough to crumble? ...

 

I'm not a cheese expert -- I'm sure Gideanus will have something to say

on this -- but the last time we made Norse Pies, we used Roquefort, a

more-or-less wild guess based on the words "crumbled" and "rich" (which

apparently doesn't appear in the Prescott translation).  I'm not fond of

blue cheeses, but it worked pretty well.

 

                                      mar-Joshua ibn-Eleazar ha-Shalib

                                                Stephen Bloch

                                          sbloch at panther.adelphi.edu

                                      http://www.adelphi.edu/~sbloch/

                                       Math/CS Dept, Adelphi University

 

 

From: Uduido at aol.com

Date: Thu, 1 May 1997 10:47:13 -0400 (EDT)

Subject: Re: SC - Yolks vs whites

 

<< the

cheesecake called sambucade in the Forme of Cury uses egg whites and a

curd cheese, which could easily be of the low-fat variety. >>

 

If you do "substitute" low or non-fat cheeses in a recipe, please experiment

ahead of time. The melting/cooking consistencies of several of these products

are granular rather than meted and creamy after heating.

 

Lord Ras

 

 

From: Mark Schuldenfrei <schuldy at abel.MATH.HARVARD.EDU>

Date: Fri, 2 May 1997 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT)

Subject: Re: SC - Yolks vs whites

 

  If you do "substitute" low or non-fat cheesesw in a recipe, please experiment

  ahead of time. The melting/cooking consistencies of several of these products

  are granular rather than meted and creamy after heating.

 

Indeed. In fact, I have found that very few of them work.

 

Consider, for example, that fat free cream cheeses tend to "air harden" when

left out.  They dry into a rather unattractive plastic flake.  Still just as

tasty, but really yucky looking.  (For a fast example, pour some honey on a

piece of bread that was covered in fat free cream cheese... and it will

obligingly dessicate in front of your eyes.)

 

        Tibor

 

 

From: JTRbear at aol.com

Date: Fri, 2 May 1997 21:10:33 -0400 (EDT)

Subject: Re: SC - Yolks vs whites

 

Tillamook makes a reduced fat cheddar that works fine in chees sauces and

melts pretty well straight.

 

Jean-Philipe Lours

 

 

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

Date: Tue, 03 Jun 1997 21:48:15 -0400

Subject: Re: SC - Cheese recipes

 

Kerridwen wrote:

> I am looking for a starting place for recipes for period cheeses.  I am

> willing to do the research but would appreciate a nudge in the right

> direction.

 

Unless I'm mistaken, I don't think you'll find very many recipes for

making cheeses in sources considered classically period, unless they're

non-English sources I haven't seen translated yet, which is possible.

There are a few recipes for things like chinches, junket, and lait larde

which are for various curd foods or "whitmeats" in the 14th-15th-century

English repertoire (ex. The Forme of Cury, etc.). One of the problems

you'll encounter is that cheeses either tended to be made on small farms

by presumably illiterate farmers, or at monasteries whose records became

sparse after their dissolution in the 15th century or so. Detailed

descriptions of the cheesemaking process just don't seem to proliferate.

 

What you WILL find are a few Roman recipes, both, I believe, in Cato the

Elder's book on Agriculture, which would be approximately 3rd century

B.C., and Columella's De Re Rustica, which is a similar book from around

the second century C.E.. You might also try Pliny the Elder's Historia

Naturalis, wherein are descriptions of the process for making things

like Vestine Cheese, if I remember correctly. The dates I mention are a

bit iffy, since I'm working from memory here.

 

Also, you'll find some late and post-period sources in English. They

include Bartholomew Dowe's "Dairy Book for Good Housewives" (1588)

Elinor Fettiplace's Receipt Book (~1604),  Sir Hugh Plat's "Delightes

for Ladies" (1609), Gervase Markham's "The English Housewife" (~1615),

and "The Closet of the Eminently Learned Sir Kenelm Digby, Knight,

Opened" (~1669). Fettiplace only gives recipes for fresh soft cheeses,

while the others go further into the process of making aged cheeses.

 

People researching this topic seem to have an innate desire to discover

that their favorite modern cheese is found in period. Almost without

exception, this doesn't appear to be the case. There are quite a few

cases where period cheeses from, and named for, a given region, bear

little resemblance to modern cheeses from the same area, with the same

name.

 

Good sources for information on ancient-vs.-modern cheese are C. Anne

Wilson's "Food and Drink in Britain", and, Heaven help me for saying so,

the Larousse Gastronomique, which, as I have frequently said, is pretty

much reliable only where French foods are concerned.      

G. Tacitus Adamantius

 

 

From: L Herr-Gelatt and J R Gelatt <liontamr at postoffice.ptd.net>

Date: Wed, 4 Jun 1997 07:16:35 -0500 (CDT)

Subject: SC - Re: sca-cooks V1 #135

 

That Cheesy Guy, Adamantius wrote :^D

>What you WILL find are a few Roman recipes, both, I believe, in Cato the

>Elder's book on Agriculture, which would be approximately 3rd century

>B.C., and Columella's De Re Rustica, which is a similar book from around

>the second century C.E.. You might also try Pliny the Elder's Historia

>Naturalis, wherein are descriptions of the process for making things

>like Vestine Cheese, if I remember correctly. The dates I mention are a

>bit iffy, since I'm working from memory here.

>

>Also, you'll find some late and post-period sources in English. They

>include Bartholomew Dowe's "Dairy Book for Good Housewives" (1588)

>Elinor Fettiplace's Receipt Book (~1604),  Sir Hugh Plat's "Delightes

>for Ladies" (1609), Gervase Markham's "The English Housewife" (~1615),

>and "The Closet of the Eminently Learned Sir Kenelm Digby, Knight,

>Opened" (~1669). Fettiplace only gives recipes for fresh soft cheeses,

>while the others go further into the process of making aged cheeses.

>

>People researching this topic seem to have an innate desire to discover

>that their favorite modern cheese is found in period. Almost without

>exception, this doesn't appear to be the case. There are quite a few

>cases where period cheeses from, and named for, a given region, bear

>little resemblance to modern cheeses from the same area, with the same

>name.

 

What we do know, however, is that similar cheeses do appear in period (sorry

to confuse). Anecdotal evidence suggests that strong cheese, mild cheese,

gooey cheese, dry cheese, poor quality cheese, high quality cheese, curds,

and Whig houses (where they sold the whey much like a coffee bar of today.

There's no accounting for tastes!) all were common. You probably will not

find colored cheeses, but you can find fancy-shaped cheeses and "similated"

cheese from almond milk.

 

And here is another post-period but probably accurate place to look (it's my

hobby, too): Lady Castlehill's Receipt Book: 1976, Molendinar Press, Glasgow

copyright Haymish Whyte. This is really a cook-book manuscript disguised as

a coffee table book. Some punctuation has been changed to make sense to a

modern non-sca reader. Otherwise, it's faithful. It is probably current with

the OOP Martha Washington, but gives a great recipe for slip-coat cheese.

 

Also try: Mrs. McClintock's Receipt book for cookery and Pastry work: Ed.

Isabail MacCloud, Scotland's first published cook book from the late 16th

early 17th century, and the stats are,going from memory: Edinburough

University Press, sometime in the 80's.

 

I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to teach a cheese-making

class about three years ago in a kitchen that was a Jr. High teaching

kitchen....had the mirrors over the stove, etc. I was delighted to see the

reaction to the process of hardening the curds. The class actually gasped

when the curd seperated from the whey and I stuck my spoon into a pot of

what looked like milk and was actually a huge solid lump floating in a clear

liquid! It still makes me chuckle, thinking about it. That's Alchemy at it's

finest!

 

Aoife  

 

 

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

Date: Wed, 04 Jun 1997 10:20:07 -0400

Subject: Re: SC - Re: sca-cooks V1 #135

 

Aoife wrote back at me, who'd previously pontificated:

 

> What we do know, however, is that similar cheeses do appear in period (sorry

> to confuse). Anecdotal evidence suggests that strong cheese, mild cheese,

> gooey cheese, dry cheese, poor quality cheese, high quality cheese, curds,

> and Whig houses (where they sold the whey much like a coffee bar of today.

> There's no accounting for tastes!) all were common. You probably will not

> find colored cheeses, but you can find fancy-shaped cheeses and "similated"

> cheese from almond milk.

 

Yuppo! Cheese is cheese, and each has some variant on the qualities

other cheeses have, so this isn't surprising. True that anecdotal

evidence indicates that there were cheeses coated with mold or a dry

rind, etc. My point was only that just because a recipe calls for Brie,

it doesn't necessarily follow that modern runny Brie with a white rind

is what is being referred to. I remember reading that Roquefort, for

example, is perfectly well-known in period France. The catch is that  it

had no blue veins, but, if I remember the statement correctly, had a

moldy white rind like the modern Brie or Camembert. It may be that some

local dairy person picked an opportune (or inopportune, depending on

your POV) moment to scald the wooden equipment, killing the "official"

Roquefort mold, leaving room for the little penicillium buggers we know

and love today to proliferate and become the new "official" mold.

 

Adamantius

 

 

From: nweders at mail.utexas.edu (ND Wederstrandt)

Date: Wed, 4 Jun 1997 08:06:26 -0500 (CDT)

Subject: SC - Soap

 

Just taking the Good Huswife's Jewel back to the library so I have it with me:

 

To make good sope.

<snip>

 

Also is the tidbit to make cheese yellow you must add Saffron.

 

Clare R. St. John

 

 

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

Date: Wed, 04 Jun 1997 11:19:58 -0400

Subject: Re: SC - coloring cheese?

 

ND Wederstrandt wrote:

> I didn't think so either... I mean I knew they colored cheese but didn't

> know everything they used... when I pulled the sope recipe this morning

> from Good Huswife's Jewel(1596) I saw the note on a different page stuck in

> the middle of how to preserve apples and what makes a good pig.  It makes

> sense since vast quantities of saffron were grown around Saffron-on-Waldon

> (hence the name)  I make soft cheese so next time I make some I'm going to

> try it.  I haven't tried marigolds either but will try a batch with that as

> coloring. Does anyone else know what coloring agents were used?

>

> Clare St. John

 

Well, various green leaves, primarily sage and parsley, are known to

have added both flavor and color to soft cheeses eaten fairly fresh.

This may have arisen as a side effect of using herbs to curdle the milk

(sage and nettle tops seem to be the standard).  Markham (Again! Oy!

[Slaps forehead]) calls for saffron to be added to the peculiar mixture

he says should be used to "run" your milk into curds. Another thing to

consider is that for aged cheeses, they tend to become fairly

yellowish-brown as they become drier, with the ratio of fat to total

mass becoming higher.

 

Adamantius

 

 

From: Gretchen M Beck <grm+ at andrew.cmu.edu>

Date: Wed,  4 Jun 1997 12:50:32 -0400 (EDT)

Subject: Re: SC - Cheese recipes

 

There is a very early period cheese recipe in Lucius Junius Modratus

Columella, On Agriculture, book VII, section VIII. My impression is that

this was written sometime after the Caesars but sometime before the fall

of Rome--I may be wrong on this, and it may be earlier.  According to

the Pittcat (University of Pittsburgh Library), ol' Lucius had an

Italian translator in the 15th C, as well as a German one.

 

toodles, margaret

 

 

From: jodi_smith at juno.com (Jodi N Smith)

Date: Wed, 11 Jun 1997 17:50:35 EDT

Subject: Re: Fwd: SC - Goat Cheese

 

I have entered goat-milk cheese in Arts & Sciences competitions, with

good results.  My documentation for the use of goats in making cheese

comes from:

 

Larousse Gastronomique, by Prosper Montagne (translated by Nina Froud and

a bunch of other people), Crown Publishers, New York 1961

 

Food in History, by Reay Tannahill, Stein & Day, New York 1973

 

It also seems like several of the books about all the various kinds of

cheeses have chapters on the history of cheeses, and sometimes the

history of particular varieties of cheese.

 

Good Luck!

Mistress Drahomira, Unser Hafen, Outlands

 

 

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

Date: Wed, 11 Jun 1997 07:38:29 -0400

Subject: Re: SC - Goat Cheese

 

Sharon L. Harrett wrote:

> Does anyone have documentation for goats' milk cheese in period? I have some

> secondary for Classical Greece and Rome, but that's not enough. I seem to

> remember seeing an article on the history of cheeses in a magazine (possibly

> Food &Wine) but can't find it. I have a friens who raises goats and makes

> wonderful cheese, and she would like to enter it in Art-Sci, but can't find

> anything reliable for dates and places. Help please?

 

There are pretty detailed instructions for making sheep's and

goat's-milk cheeses in Columella's book on husbandry (De Rustica?) which

is 1st-2nd century C.E., and they are referred to in the various

Tacuinum Sanitatis manuscripts, which are 14th century. The process is

not described in the medieval manuscripts, but Columella's process is

still more or less what is used today, and it is reasonable to assume

the same thing was done in the middle ages.

 

Adamantius

 

 

Date: Thu, 17 Jul 1997 11:08:42 -0400

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

Subject: Re: SC - Culinary A&S Entries

 

Mark Harris wrote:

> I'd be interested in hearing more about the dry, smoked sausage and the

> cheese. Did you make these from the raw materials? recipes?

 

The sausage was as close as I could get to the Polonian Sawsedge in Sir

Hugh Plat's "Delighted for Ladies" (c. 1609), made following the recipe

pretty closely. It is, in fact, a kielbasa. As for the cheese, it was an

English Slipcote, so called because it is a pretty soft cheese inside a

rind of the dried outermost layer, rather than a mold coating. You can

give it a squeeze, and the coat slips off. Recipes for this are found in

numerous sources, ranging from the Penn Family receipt book to Kenelm

Digby to Martha Washington's Cookery Book.

 

I neither slaughtered the hog nor milked the cow, but otherwise did my

best ;  ).

 

> I don't remember the article, but I will be trying to find it in my not

> very well organised TIs, so you can tell me just to go there. But I would

> like to hear any elaborations or corrections.

 

Apart from the omission of a good chunk of the notes and bibliography

(the article was pretty long, are you surprised ;  ) ?  ), there isn't

too much I would add if I were to write it over again. You can find it

on the Web, now that I think of it, on the Ostgardrian Web pages at:

 

http://www.adelphi.edu/~sbloch/sca/cooking/ppb.html

 

Adamantius

 

 

From: marilyn traber <margali at 99main.com>

Newsgroups: rec.org.sca

Subject: Re: butter in period?

Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 12:48:41 -0400

 

XSimmons wrote:

> Know what you can make from all that skimmed milk, after you've

> separated off the cream? Cottage cheese!  ("Yum, yum," cried all the

> dieters.)

>

> Just for grins, cottage cheese is also period.  Curds [14c] and whey

> [before 12c] (solids and liquid) form in the cheese-making process,

> which generally involves enzymes from a calf's stomach.  (Still like

> rennet custard, regardless of the origin of the rennet!)

>

> Curds are rich in casein, a protein that also helped make milk-paint

> work (and is now used in making plastics.) Whey is high in lactose,

> vitamins, and minerals, and contains some fat.  Perhaps that is why

> curds and whey are mentioned as food for children.  (Imagine having

> cottage cheese for breakfast, instead of "frosty choco-nut sugar

> crunch

> bomb" cereals!)

>

> Ly Meara al-Isfahani (who likes her curds and whey with cinnamon and

> honey)

 

   I got into cheesemaking not because I recreate stuff, but I grew up

near a cheese factory and grew up eating chese curds-not in the form of

cottge cheese, but in the form of pre cheese. In the cheddaraing

process[and other forms of solid cheese] the curds forming the cheese

are drained and compressed. You can actually do this with cottage cheese

of you know what you are doing. Curds like this are essentially

unripened uncompressed "green" cheddar. A "green" cheese isnt

necessarily a green colored cheese, but the compressed cake of cheese

that the "grain" pattern of the curds is still visible. The medievals

would also batter and fry these curds sort of like our mozzarella

sticks. Well, I have the taste for curds, and make them just for the

"precheese" With the whey left over after the curds precipitate out, you

make a condenses whey spread by gently heating the whey til almost all

of the water is gone, and you have a rich velvety lightly carmel colored

goo that is high in vitamins.

 

margali

 

 

Date: Sun, 14 Sep 1997 11:46:11 -0400

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

Subject: Re: SC - Re: sca-cooks V1 #262

 

ND Wederstrandt wrote:

> I was at the wonderful Central Market and found some cheese with Nettles in

> it.  I was tempted to get it to try but didn't have enough cash.  I also

> read that nettles can be used for cheesemaking as well as being a fiber and

> dye plant.  The Vikings were very adept at using it.

>

> Clare St. John

 

Yep. Especially after they invaded Scotland and Ireland...

 

Actually, though, there are recipes for nettle cheese in Columella,

Markham, and Digby (howzzat for a law firm?), I believe.

 

Adamantius

 

 

Date: Wed, 17 Sep 1997 12:43:11 -0400 (EDT)

From: Mark Schuldenfrei <schuldy at abel.MATH.HARVARD.EDU>

Subject: Re: Re- SC - Hierarchy-Cathe

 

I love a coincidence! This is from the "barely-1-day-old" letter from Laurel

Queen of Arms.

 

        Tibor

 

From the section on accepted arms:

 

Michael Houlihan. Badge. Vert, a wedge of Emmental cheese reversed Or.

 

<Snip>

    Emmental is the correct name for what

    is sold as Swiss cheese in the United States.  It is a period

    cheese, which was sold in wheels and blocks.  

 

 

Date: Fri, 19 Sep 1997 15:05:04 -0500

From: L Herr-Gelatt and J R Gelatt <liontamr at ptd.net>

Subject: SC - oat recipe

 

<snip>

 

While these are not documented recipes, Cheese and other food was potted in

late period, and oatcakes are so simple to make that I am unaware of an

historical example of their recipe, although I have read accounts of their

existence.

 

Oatcakes, Potted Stilton   adapted from Farmhouse Cookery...Recipes from the

Country kitchen, Reader's Digest, London 1980.