Food of medieval monks and nuns.
NOTE: See also the files: monks-msg, nuns-msg, religion-msg, popes-msg, vegetarian-msg, fasts-msg.
************************************************************************
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
************************************************************************
Date: Wed, 23 Feb 2000 09:07:57 -0500
From: Kay Loidolt <mmkl at indy.net>
Subject: SC - Deutsche Koch buchen
Johann von Metten, poultrier, writes:
Many years ago while I was studing in Bavaria I was going through the
monastic library at Metten Abbey. Metten is the Great-Grandmother house
of my own community here in Indpls. so that is how I came to be there.
While there I came across a tome called " Gottes lieb fur Mann"
'God's Love for Man' which turned out to be a cookbook of monastic
cuisine dating from the mid 14thc. through to the (temporary)
dissoulution of the house in 1840 by King Ludwig I. I asked for more
info and was told that it had (of course) been compiled by various
cellarers and that copies had been exchanged between Metten, Einsedeln,
Salzburg, and Munster communities.
I currently have a few rather dog-eared copied leaves of this treasure
left to me, and having recently heard that Einsendeln Abbey in
Switzerland was going to publish their monastic cookbook entitled '1,000
years of monastic cooking'. I was curious if anyone else here had heard
of such a book or had any other leads on monastic cooking practices.
It seems to me that with a growing interest in vegetarian cooking this
would be an ideal source as the Rule of Benedict discourages the meat of
4 legged animals and restricts the use of fowl to Sundays and other
feastdays when the customary fast is prohibited.
Any thoughts or ideas about this would be appreciated, I have quoted
these copies in past A&S projects, but now feel that I should have a
more servicable copy, not being able to access Metten library again
without going there, I ask if anyone else has seen or heard of such.
Johann von Metten
Date: Thu, 24 Feb 2000 18:21:41 +0100
From: Thomas Gloning <gloning at Mailer.Uni-Marburg.DE>
Subject: SC - Deutsche Kochb¸cher
Johann said:
<<... which turned out to be a cookbook of monastic
cuisine dating from the mid 14thc. through to the (temporary)
dissoulution of the house in 1840 ...>>
I spoke to the pater librarian of Metten Abbey. He will look for the
book and tell me more about it. But it might take two weeks.
<<... having recently heard that Einsendeln Abbey in
Switzerland was going to publish their monatic cookbook entitled '1,000
years of monastic cooking'.>>
I spoke to the pater librarian of Einsiedeln Abbey. He said that they
only have one 17th/18th manuscript from Austria. He knew nothing about
plans of publishing such a work. However, he said that a few weeks ago,
a lady from Zuerich was there to take photos from this manuscript. Could
be that _she_ is working on a project '1000 years of monastic cooking'.
<<... or had any other leads on monastic cooking practices.>>
- -- there are books, e.g.: Norman Foster, Schlemmen hinter Klostermauern.
Die unbekannten Quellen europ‰ischer Kochkunst, Hamburg 1980 (translated
from the American; no title mentioned). -- Erna Horn: Kˆstliches und
Curieuses aus alten Kloster- und Pfarrk¸chen. M¸nchen 1979. (She used
also non-monastic material!)
- -- Several early manuscripts were monastic cookbooks, at least they were
written or found in a monastery; in addition there are food calendars,
giving the menu for the different parts of the year, e.g. the "Kalender
und Kochb¸chlein aus Tegernsee", published by Birlinger.
Thomas
Date: Sat, 25 Mar 2000 00:53:14 +0100
From: Thomas Gloning <gloning at Mailer.Uni-Marburg.DE>
Subject: SC - German Sp‰tzle
<< Fahrenkamp gives his source as the 14th C. Tegernsee Cloister, but
does not give the original, and I don't have a copy of this, although I
would love to. >>
An important source for food habits of the Tegernsee Cloister is
Birlinger's (not always reliable) edition "Kalender und Kochb¸chlein aus
Tegernsee" (published in: Germania 9, 1864, 192-207; based on a 15th or
rather 16th century manuscript; around 1534 or so, IIRC). However, I did
not find something there, that could serve as a basis for Fahrenkamp's
recipe for "Smalzic nudelin" (p.82). According to some dictionaries, the
word "Nudel" is not attested in Middle High German, but appears only
since the mid 16th century. I may be wrong, but I must assume, that this
one is a modern recipe with a fake "medieval" title.
Thomas
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2000 02:15:23 +0100
From: TG <gloning at Mailer.Uni-Marburg.DE>
Subject: SC - Humbert of Romans on monastic food and eating
In a biography about Jordan the Saxon, the second Master General of the
Dominicans (13th c.), the author excerpts some interesting passages on
monastic food and eating from a text written by Humbert of Romans
(Humbertus de Romanis), the fifth Master General of the Dominican order.
Among many other things, he says about the cook, a lay brother:
"In der K¸che darf er nie aufgeregt sein" (< germ. excerpt)
In the kitchen, he should never be hectic/excited/upset/in panic
(Will see if I can get the original source.)
T.
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2004 22:51:53 -0400
From: "Shaon Gordon" <gordonse at one.net>
Subject: [Sca-cooks] The Chubby Monk
To: <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Philippa Patrick, of the Institute o Archaeology, at University College,
London, has been studying skeletal data from 300 sets of bones from Tower
Hill, Bermondsey, and Merton abbeys. Her results were presented to the
International Medieval Congress, meeting in Leeds. At the end of the article she gives two suggested menus for what the monks were eating based
on a current and other research.
She also make note of a medical condition known now as Dish (diffuse
idiopathic skeletal hyperostosis) triggered by overeating and a rich diet.
"The marks of Dish keep appearing on their skeletons. It forms a coating on
the spine like candlewax dripping down the side," said Ms Patrick.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1261533,00.html
If anyone comes across a more detailed paper on this research, I'd love to
know more. The Westminster Abbey records sound like they could be
helpful, too.
Sharon
Date: Fri, 16 Jul 2004 09:52:16 -0500
From: Robert Downie <rdownie at mb.sympatico.ca>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] The Chubby Monk
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Sharon Gordon wrote:
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1261533,00.html
Neat article. I remember seeing the The "doorway" at Alcobaca monastery's
dining room in Portugal. I though it was something they just made up for the
tourists, but I guess there was more truth to it than I thought :-)
"Portuguese Cistercians had a test: monks unable to squeeze through a certain
doorway at Alcobaca monastery's dining room had to fast while slimmer
colleagues tucked into "pastry in vast abundance".
Faerisa
Date: Fri, 16 Jul 2004 12:13:55 -0500
From: "Betsy Marshall" <betsy at softwareinnovation.com>
Subject: RE: [Sca-cooks] The Chubby Monk
To: "'Cooks within the SCA'" <sca-cooks at ansteorra.org>
Christ's toes!!! That would do for me for a week! (Mind you I tend to be
sedentary...)
Article Snippet...
"Friar's tucker
A 13th century Cluniac friar's possible daily intake based on Ms
Patrick's studies:
11am-1pm Three eggs, boiled or fried in lard. Vegetable porridge with
beans, leeks, carrots and other produce of monastery garden. Pork chops,
bacon, and mutton. Capon, duck and goose with oranges. Half pound of
bread, to use as sop. Peaches, strawberries and bilberries with egg
flan. Four pints of small (watery) beer.
4-6pm Mutton gruel with garlic and onions. Posset of egg, milk and figs.
Venison with rowanberries, figs, sloes, hazelnuts and apple. Stewed
eels, herring, pike, dolphin, lampreys, salmon, cod and trout. Half
pound of bread as sop, sometimes soaked in dripping or lard. Syllabubs
of fruit. Four pints of ale. Flagon of sack or other French, Spanish or
Portuguese wine."
Date: Tue, 22 Feb 2005 16:41:36 -0600
From: Robert Downie <rdownie at mb.sympatico.ca>
Subject: [Sca-cooks] I Got My Portuguese Convent Sweets Books -
Who-hoo!
To: SCA_Subtleties at yahoogroups.com, SCA-Cooks at ansteorra.org,
SCAFoodandFeasts at yahoogroups.com
And only 20 Euros for shipping...grumble, grumble...
Mesa, Doces e Amores no Sec XVII (the table, sweets and passions in the 17th C)
Docaria Conventual do Alentejo as Receitas e o Seu Enquadramento
Historico (convent sweets of Alentejo, the recipes and their history)
Docaria Conventual do Norte Historia e Alquimia da Farinha (convent
sweets of the north, history and alchemy of flour)
Of course, now it's going to take me a while to go through them.
Unfortunately, in quickly skimming the contents, the recipes are not
dated, so there could be modern ones along with the originals. One of
the introductory chapters mentioned the rise of convent sweets starting
in the second half of the 16th C, and truly blossoming by the 17th C.
and that many of the sweets were created specifically for the nobility,
as these religious orders were also responsible for entertaining Kings.
I'll keep notes as I go along, and eventually I hope to have some
useful information to share. There's a fair amount of info on monastic
life in General there too, by the looks of it.
Faerisa
Date: Sun, 17 Sep 2006 16:22:31 -0700 (PDT)
From: Marcus Loidolt <mjloidolt at yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Sca-cooks Digest, Vol 5, Issue 67/ Himmel und
Erde
To: sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org
Benedicte alles,
Himmel und Erde as I know it....from a pre publication manuscript
of a friend of mine from monastery days...'Gottes Lieb fur Mann' God'
s love for man, a thousand years of monastic cooking, from Einsedeln.
Einsedeln is a Swiss Benedictine monastery founded in the year 935.
www.kloster-einsiedeln.sh/
Himmel und Erde is Cabbage, Apples and Onions fried/sauteed' in
butter with salt and pepper. Often served with goose or pork, but
also with other meats and on fast days without butter and just using
olive oil.
I remember it being served even over here in American monasteries
who trace their descent from Eisiedeln and Bavarian/Austrian
communities.
Johann von Metten
10. Re: Himmel und Erde (was Re: Bourbelier of Wild Pig) (Saint Phlip)
Date: Sun, 17 Sep 2006 22:49:36 -0400
From: ranvaig at columbus.rr.com
Subject: [Sca-cooks] Himmel und Erde
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
> Benedicte alles,
> Himmel und Erde as I know it....from a pre
> publication manuscript of a friend of mine from
> monastery days...'Gottes Lieb fur Mann' God' s
> love for man, a thousand years of monastic
> cooking, from Einsedeln. Einsedeln is a Swiss
> Benedictine monastery founded in the year 935.
> www.kloster-einsiedeln.sh/
http://www.kloster-einsiedeln.ch/ but I didn't see any recipes
> Himmel und Erde is Cabbage, Apples and Onions
> fried/sauteed' in butter with salt and pepper.
> Often served with goose or pork, but also with
> other meats and on fast days without butter and
> just using olive oil.
>
> I remember it being served even over here in
> American monasteries who trace their descent
> from Eisiedeln and Bavarian/Austrian communities.
I checked a bit before I posted. Cabbage and
Apples is a classic German dish, but I'd never
heard it called Heaven and Earth. All the modern
recipe could find, including ones in German, are
for potatoes and apples, sometimes mashed,
sometimes with onions. I didn't see any with
cabbage.
Perhaps the use has changed. I've heard that
Erd?pfel originally meant another vegetable
(perhaps gourd, perhaps some other root) before
the tag settled on potatoes. I wonder if the
dish was originally made with that? I haven't run
across either combination in period cookbooks,
but that doesn't mean they didn't make it. Does
your cookbook say how old the recipe is?
Ranvaig
Date: Fri, 15 Apr 2011 20:04:34 +0000 (GMT)
From: galefridus at optimum.net
To: sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Looking for a text on Monastic Cooking?
<<< I have been looking for information on a book called "A Thousand
Years of Monastic Cooking", or translated sources for any
Monastic Cookery. I am mostly interested in France, Germany (or
that area), or Italy any help would be wonderful.
Waldetrudis von Metten
Kimetha Steele
ksteele at hisadaamerica.com >>>
There does not appear to be such a book, at least not with that title. ?I searched the WorldCat database for the title as given, then as many variations as I could think of. ?What materials I found were all in languages other than English. ?I found items in German -- some doctoral dissertations and some books -- focusing on monastic cookery in specific centuries. ?I found one French title that looked pretty close:
Title: La cuisine des monast?res /
Author(s): Meneau, Marc; Caen, Annie; Czap, Daniel.
Publication: Paris : Martini?re,
Year: 1999
Description: 192 p. : col. ill. ; 30 cm.
Language: French
Standard No: ISBN: 2732425516; 9782732425511
Descriptor:
Cooking, Medieval.
Monastic and religious life -- History -- Middle Ages, 600-1500.
Monastery gardens.
Kloosters.
Kookkunst.
This one is available at only a few institutions in the North America: NY Public Library, Boston Public Library, University of Chicago, and University of Toronto
One of the German dissertations also looked interesting:
Das Refektorium im Jahreskreis Norm und Praxis des Essens in Kl?stern des 14. Jahrhunderts, by Suzanne Fritsch.
It only covers the 14th Century, but it looks like it might do so comprehensively, and it's available at more than a dozen institutions in North America.
-- Galefridus, who mundanely is an academic librarian and locates obscure stuff for folks all the time
Date: Sat, 16 Apr 2011 00:18:19 +0100 (BST)
From: emilio szabo <emilio_szabo at yahoo.it>
To: sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org
Subject: [Sca-cooks] monastic cooking
-- Norman Foster: Schlemmen hinter Klostermauern
("aus dem Amerikanischen")
-- Dreihundertj?hriges deutsches Klosterkochbuch (publ. 1856 from a lost
manuscript; preview at books.google.com)
-- Johnna mentioned the cookery book from the Dorotheenkloster recently (here or
elsewere)
-- if I remember well there is also a culinary calendar from Tegernsee monastery
-- "Gola e Predighiera"
E.
Date: Sat, 16 Apr 2011 09:50:17 +0200
From: "Susanne Mayer" <susanne.mayer5 at chello.at>
To: <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
Subject: [Sca-cooks] Monastic Cooking
All three texts in the Doris Aichholzer book: Wildu machen ayn guet essen...
are books given and or where written in Monasteries in Austria: The Dorothea
Monastery in Vienna, The Mondseeer cookbook was given to the Monastery
Mondsee 1453, The Innsbrucker text was found in monastery and owned by
Maximilian I, but it is not clear if he bought it or if it was a heriloom
book.
And no one knows if these books were only kept in a library or actually used in
the kitchen of the cloisters.
Katharina
Date: Sat, 16 Apr 2011 10:50:33 +0100 (BST)
From: Volker Bach <carlton_bach at yahoo.de>
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Monastic Cooking
The Mittelniederdeutsches Kochbuch/Woldfenb?ttel MS and the Inntallkochbuch are also from monastic contexts AFAIR. The K?nigsberg MS comes from the library of the Teutonic Order, probably not exactly what you're looking for, but monastics of a kind. All three are on Thomas Gloning's website. There are translations of the Inntal and Konigsberg in the Florilegium, but they're not all that good.
Giano
{Please note, Giano is the author of the above two mentioned translations, so his opinion that "they're not all that good." may be a bit biased. - Stefan]
Date: Sun, 17 Apr 2011 14:11:45 -0700 (PDT)
From: Meisterin Katarina Helene <meisterin02 at yahoo.com>
To: "sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org" <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Looking for a text on Monastic Cooking?
(Kimetha Steele)
<<< I have been looking for information on a book called "A Thousand Years of Monastic Cooking", or translated sources for any Monastic Cookery. I am mostly interested in France, Germany (or that area), or Italy any help would be wonderful.
Waldetrudis von Metten >>>
I don't have the book you mentioned, but I do have one called "From a Monastery Kitchen," by Brother Victor-Antoine d'Avila-Latourrette.? The introduction says that most of its recipes are based on 17th century monestary cooking. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Meisterin Katarina Helene von Sch?nborn, OL
Shire of Narrental (Peru, Indiana) http://narrental.home.comcast.net
Middle Kingdom
http://meisterin.katarina.home.comcast.net
Date: Sun, 17 Apr 2011 22:27:09 -0400
From: Anne Murphy <afmmurphy at gmail.com>
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Sca-cooks Digest, Vol 60, Issue 34
<<< I have been looking for information on a book called "A Thousand Years of
Monastic Cooking", or translated sources for any Monastic Cookery. ?I am
mostly interested in France, Germany (or that area), or Italy any help would
be wonderful.
Waldetrudis von Metten >>>
That's not period at all - or particularly interesting to a cook.
Pretty simple, everyday, modern meatless cooking. I got it - mailorder
- when I was in college and interested in meatless cooking. I didn't
find it all that inspiring even then.
AEllin
Date: Sun, 24 Apr 2011 17:00:50 -0400
From: Johnna Holloway <johnnae at mac.com>
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] Looking for a text on Monastic Cooking?
On Apr 15, 2011, at 6:21 AM, Kimetha Steele wrote:
<<< I have been looking for information on a book called "A Thousand
Years of Monastic Cooking", or translated sources for any Monastic
Cookery. I am mostly interested in France, Germany (or that area),
or Italy any help would be wonderful.
Waldetrudis von Metten >>>
As Galefridus has already noted this title doesn't appear as such.
I have found a couple of other possible books that carry some of the
words you mention. These include: A Taste of Heaven: A Guide to Food and Drink Made by Monks and Nuns which is described as "and honor the
ingredients and traditions of monastic food making over a thousand
years...". It describes modern products made today however.
Forthcoming is the new volume by Andrew Jotischky. Hermit's Cookbook:
Monks, Food and Fasting in the Middle Ages. I saw a review in a London
paper. It will be out in May in the UK and in July in the states.
The description from the publisher appears here:
http://www.continuumbooks.com/books/detail.aspx?BookId=157981&;SearchType=Basic
It proceeds to explore how the ideals of the desert fathers were
revived in both the Byzantine and western traditions, looking at the
cultivation of food in monasteries, eating and cooking, and why
hunting animals was rejected by any self-respecting hermit. Full of
rich anecdotes, and including recipes for basic monk's stew and bread
soup - and many others - this is a fascinating story of hermits,
monks, food and fasting in the Middle Ages.
The author is:
Andrew Jotischky is Professor of Medieval History at Lancaster
University, UK. He has published widely on aspects of medieval
religious history; his principal publications include Crusading and
the Crusader States (2004), and The Penguin Historical Atlas of the
Bible Lands, with Caroline Hull (2009).
Johnnae, playing librarian again
Date: Mon, 16 May 2011 21:19:25 -0400
From: Johnna Holloway <johnnae at mac.com>
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] monastic cooking
In April someone was looking for texts on monastic cookery; tonight I
came across this German title:
Dreihundertj?hriges deutsches Kloster-Kochbuch ( ISBN: 3826215001 )
Enthaltend: eine bedeutende Anzahl l?ngst vergessener, jedoch ?u?erst
schmackhafter Gerichte. Nach einem in den ?berresten des ehemaligen
Dominikaner-Klosters zu Leipzig aufgefundenen Manuscript.
Bearbeitet und herausgegeben von Bernhard Otto.
Reprint der Ausgabe von 1856.
Eine einmalige Sammlung l?ngst vergessener, jedoch ?u?erst
schmackhafter Gerichte nach Aufzeichnungen aus dem Dominikanerkloster
zu Leipzig. Ausgesprochene Fastengerichte wie Fisch, Eierspeisen oder
Gem?se werden genauso geheimnisvoll beschrieben wie Wildbraten,
Gefl?gelgerichte oder Geb?ck.
1994, 135 S. ISBN: 3826215001
They list 60 works under Recipes from Bible, Monastery, Church & Parsonage
Johnnae
Date: Tue, 17 May 2011 06:12:30 +0100 (BST)
From: Volker Bach <carlton_bach at yahoo.de>
To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
Subject: Re: [Sca-cooks] monastic cooking
--- Johnna Holloway <johnnae at mac.com> schrieb am Di, 17.5.2011:
<<< In April someone was looking for texts on monastic cookery; tonight I came across this German title:
Dreihundertj?hriges deutsches Kloster-Kochbuch ( ISBN:
3826215001 )
They list 60 works under Recipes from Bible, Monastery, Church & Parsonage >>>
A word of warning on this one: it is a genuine manuscript, as far as I can tell, and i would date it to the sixteenth century from context. however, the editor has relentlessly modernised the spelling and syntax and in the process introduced some misreadings. Still interesting, if not very ascetic (the monastic context is established only through its provenance).
Giano
<the end>