Elizabethan Dinner: The menu and original recipes
This past week was a week where I was not feeling it as far as blogging goes. The week before that took a lot out of me and I fell behind on basic house maintenance and self-care. Last week was more about making my environment comfortable than about food and food blogging, which is sometimes what it needs to be.
This past Saturday I invited a group of people over for Elizabethan Dinner and a reading of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”. I’m very excited about this as it’s the beginning of something I’ve been wanting to do for a while now - hosting regular play readings.
The recipes are from Gode Cookery. The translations and redactions were done by me.
The Menu:
A Hare Hashed
Chickens and white broath
Herb Pye
Furmentie
The Recipes:
A Hare Hashed
DESCRIPTION: Rabbit stewed in wine and flavoured with nutmeg & lemon.
A Hare Hashed.
Cut it out in quarters, chine it, and lay it in Clarret, mixed with three parts of water, and parboyl it, then slice the flesh in thin pieces, and lay it on your stew pan, let this be off the Body, but the legs wings, and head whole, almost cover it with some of the liquor it was boyled in, add some Butter, sliced Nutmeg, the juce of Lemon, and a little beaten Ginger, serve it upon sippets, Garnish it with Lemon, and sliced Onion.
Translation:
Cut it out in quarters, chine [chine is the whole or part of the backbone of an animal, with the adjoining flesh, I'm taking this to mean that you remove the backbone] it, and lay it in Clarret mixed with three parts of water, and parboil it. Then, slice the flesh in thin pieces, and put it in your stew pan. The flesh from the body should be what is cut in pieces, the legs, arms, and head should be whole. Pour enough of the parboiling liquid over the rabbit in the pan until it is almost covered. Add some butter, sliced nutmeg, the juice of one lemon, and a little crushed ginger. Serve it upon pieces of crustless toast. Garnish with lemon and sliced onion.
Redaction:
9 cups water
3 1/3 c claret (one bottle)
Four rabbits
The juice of two lemons
3 T nutmeg
1″ fresh ginger, mashed
I could not find rabbits with the heads on, so this redaction is done with headless rabbits.
Cut the rabbits in quarters and remove the backbone.
Bring the water and wine mixture to a boil.
Parboil the rabbits.
Whole the rabbit is parboiling, mix together the ginger, nutmeg, and lemon juice in a bowl.
The legs and arms should be preserved as whole and the rest of the body should be sliced.
Put the parboiled rabbit in a crock pot.
Pour about a ladle-full of the liquid that the rabbit was parboiled in into the bowl with the ginger, nutmeg, and lemon juice and mix.
Pour this into the crock pot and then ladle in the parboiling liquid until it’s nearly to the top of the crock.
Cook on “low” for approximately 4-5 hours.
You could also do the same thing in a dutch oven for about an hour rather than using the slow cooker.
Chickens and white broath
DESCRIPTION: Chicken stewed in white wine with herbs and eggs
Original:
Put three points of Strong Broath, to a quart of good white-wine, then put it into a Pipkin or some other Earthen Vessel, as many Chickens as it will Conveniently boyl, and when it begins to simmer slice some Dates, and put into it, with three or four blades of Mace, and half a pound of Beef Marrow, shred some white Endive small, and strew in a few sweet herbs; let them stew over a moderate fire, and the Broath being a little strong, strain in the yolk of two or three Eggs, stir them about till enough, then take them up, Dish it with Marrow, Dates, large Mace, the Broth, and Sippets; Garnish with pickled Grapes, and Barbaries, or for want of them, Parsly, and red Beats.
Translation:
Put three parts of strong broth to a quart of good white-wine, then put it into a pipkin or some other earthen vessel as it will conveniently hold [Ed. Note: The chickens and the liquid.]. When it begins to simmer, slice some dates with three or four blades of Mace and half a pound of beef marrow, shred some white endive small, and strew in a few sweet herbs. Let them stew over a moderate fire and the broth being a little strong, strain in the yolk of two or three eggs, stir them about until enough, then take them up. Serve it with marrow, dates, large Mace, the broth and pieces of crustless toast. Garnish with pickled grapes, or if you don’t have those, with parsley and red beets.
Redaction:
Notes:
- The beef marrow was not included as I couldn’t find it when shopping. I have since identified a source and would definitely include it next time.
- I also did not add the white wine as I forgot to get some from the state store and did not have time to fix the mistake.
- I did this in an electric roaster as I only have one oven and it was a dinner party. You can do this in a conventional oven by following the same instructions. Just use a roasting pan in the oven and set the temperature the same as I set it on the electric roaster).
2 qts broth
2 whole roasting chickens
1 1/3 c whole dates
2 T mace
1/2 c roughly chopped parsley
3 large heads of Belgian endive, roughly chopped
Heat the roaster to 350 degrees Fahrenheit (180 celsius, gas mark 4).
Put in the broth, add the chickens, and put the endive and parsley over it.
Cook for four hours.
The chicken will be beyond tender and will require gentle extraction from the pan. I decided to quarter the chickens while in the pan and serve them that way.
I served the onions and beets with both the chicken and the rabbit and it was quite good.
To make an herb pye
DESCRIPTION: A pie of lettuce & spinach, with herbs, cream & wine
Original:
Take lettuce and spinage, a little time, winter savory and sweet marjorum, chop them and put them into the pye, with butter, nutmegg, and sugar, a little salt, when it is drawn and a little cooled, put in clouted cream, sack and sugar.
Translation:
Take lettuce and spinach, a little thyme, savory, and sweet marjoram, chop them and put them into the pie with butter, nutmeg, sugar, and a little salt. When it is pulled from the oven and has cooled slightly, put in clouted cream, sack, and sugar.
Redaction:
Notes:
- I did not use lettuce in this recipe as I had a really great price on spinach and it was more expensive to include the lettuce than it was to use straight spinach.
- I also did not use clotted cream as I did not find any in time and was not comfortable with making it.
- I made a hot water pastry with the intention of using it as a coffyn, but that wasn’t communicated at the table, so it was eaten as a very thick-crusted pie.
10 ounces of fresh, adult spinach
1 T thyme
1 T savory
1 T marjoram
3 T butter
1 T nutmeg
pinch of sugar
pinch of salt
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees fahrenheit350 degrees Fahrenheit (180 celsius, gas mark 4).
Cook down the spinach in the butter with the herbs and spices.
Put the filling into the crust.
Bake for 20 minutes.
Take it out and let it cool for about 10 minutes and then sprinkle sack, some cream, and a pinch of sugar over the top.
Serve.
DESCRIPTION: A recipe for frumenty
Original:
Frumentie
Take a quart of sweet Cream, two or three sprigs of Mace, and a Nutmeg cut in half, put into your cream, so let it boil, then take your French Barlie or Rice, being first washed clean in fair water three times, and picked clean, then boyle it in sweet milk till it be tender, then put it into your cream, and boil it well, and when it hath boiled a good while, take the yolks of six or seven eggs, beat them very well, and thicken on a soft fire, boyl it, and stir it for it will quickly burn, when you thinke it is boyled enough, sweeten it to your taste, and so serve it in with Rosewater, and Musk Sugar, in the same manner you may make it with wheat.
Translation:
Take a quart of heavy cream, two or three springs of mace, and a nutmeg cut in half. Put the mace and nutmeg into the cream. Cook rice or barley in whole milk until it’s done, then add the cream and boil it well. When it has boiled for a while, take the yolks of six or seven eggs, beaten well and add it to the cooking frumenty. When you think that it is done, sweeten it to your taste and so serve it with rosewater and musk sugar in the same manner that you would with a wheat frumenty.
Redaction:
Note: I cut out a lot of the fat in this particular dish because it was insanely rich and after everything else that people ate, it would have been impossible to eat more than a spoon full of this. I did this by cooking the rice in cream and not adding the egg yolks (I tasted it and it was devastatingly rich without them).
1 qt heavy cream
2 1/2 c white rice
1 nutmeg, cut in half
3 T ground mace
1/2 c sugar
Heat the cream until just boiling.
Add the rice.
Drop the heat on the rice to low and simmer for about 20 minutes.
The rice I had was done by then.
I added the sugar and then removed the nutmeg before serving.
Before it went to the table, I did splash a bit more cream on the top.