I decided to try out this recipe from the British Museum’s The Medieval Cookbook by Maggie Black, simply because it used some of the same ingredients as the cherry pottage recipe. The recipe book suggests that Lombard was a very popular dish, despite its strange ingredients and method!
Ingredients (serves 6) – note I made a half batch
12 hard-boiled egg yolks
8tbsp honey
175g fine white breadcrumbs
Pinch of ground black pepper
For the Syrup:
225ml red wine
Good pinch of ground cinnamon and ground cloves
5tbsp honey
Method
Lombard is definitely not suited to modern tastes! It is unlike anything I have either made or tasted before … and not in a good way. Whilst it is edible, I would definitely not make it again as it does not have a very pleasant taste or texture and it takes a long time to make considering. However, the glaze is both tasty and easy, I’m sure it could be used on other things such as ice cream. To conclude, whilst unsavoury, I am glad I made this recipe as it was interesting to see how medieval and modern tastes are sometimes very very different.
As cherries are currently in season, I decided to make cherry pottage from the British Museum’s The Medieval Cookbook by Maggie Black.
“Any young hostess, married or not, would enjoy showing off this pretty dish.”
Ingredients (serves 6) – note I made a half batch
900g cherries
350ml red wine
175g white sugar
50g unsalted butter
225g soft white bread crumbs
Pinch of salt
Method
This was a very easy recipe to make and disregarding the pitting of the cherries, was quite quick to make. The taste of this dish really relies on the quality of the cherries, and as my Dad said “You can’t go wrong with cherries and wine!”. Whilst this pottage is a bit abnormal for the modern taste, it was still pleasant and flavourful – resembling a very fruity porridge.
Having already made two sweet Medieval recipes, I decided to try a savoury side dish to accompany a Roast dinner. This recipe comes from the British Museum’s The Medieval Cookbook by Maggie Black.
Ingredients (serves 6) – note I made a half batch
1tsp dried saffron strands
2tbsp boiling water
6 medium leeks (white part only)
3 medium onions
575ml (1 pint) chicken stock (optional – I didn’t use)
1/3tsp light brown sugar
Good pinch of white pepper, cinnamon and ground cloves
Yellow food colouring (optional – I didn’t use)
Method
This recipe was very simple and extremely quick to make, moreover its versatility allowed it to be a perfectly fine modern side dish. Whilst it was pleasant, it was perhaps a touch too sweet for modern tastes, however, it complimented the Pork well in lieu of apple sauce. I would make this dish again due to its speedy and easy nature, however it was average tasting and paled in comparison to the cream custard tart and fried fig pastries!
After the success of my last historical recipe trial, I decided to try another dessert recipe from the same book : the British Museum’s The Medieval Cookbook by Maggie Black.
Ingredients (serves 6) – note I made a half batch
450g dried figs, soaked, drained and minced (reserve the soaking liquid)
Powder dirt mixture made with 1/8 teaspoon each of goring ginger and cloves, and a pinch of pepper
1/4 teaspoon dried saffron strands moistened with the fig soaking liquid
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1 egg yolk, 2 egg whites
7-10 sheets of filo pastry
Oil for frying
222ml of honey (optional)
Method
These pastries were surprising delicious and moreish! The mixture is very simple and quick to make, however the process of rolling up the pastry is very time consuming, fiddly and messy. The frying is quite volatile but quick, make sure to check the pastries frequently to prevent over cooking.
We originally tasted the pastries with some double cream, but honey is far far superior. Instead of melting the honey however, I just squeezed/spread some on top of each roll, or used it as a dip. All in all, these pastries were very tasty and I shall be making them again, they reminded me a bit of modern donuts.
I decided this recipe, taken from The British Museum’s ‘The Medieval Cookbook’ by Maggie Black, would be a perfect introduction into the realm of cooking. This is because it is very similar to modern popular desserts we have today, especially the Portuguese pastel de nata which is a favourite of mine, so was (hopefully) sure to be a hit. In this post I will take you through the ingredients, method and reviews of this dish.
Ingredients (to serve 6)
For the pastry:
225g of plain flour
105g cold butter (recipe calls for 40g of this to be lard)
A little cold milk
For the filling:
A pinch of dried saffron strands pulverised
6 egg yolks
350ml of double cream
125ml of milk (I used semi-skimmed)
65g white sugar
pinch of salt
Method
Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees celsius whilst you prepare the pastry. For best results, use a 5 cm deep, 20cm diameter pie dish or loose-bottomed cake tin.
Whilst the pastry is cooking, prepare the filling for the tart.
Whilst this recipe was time consuming, it was easy to make and went down a treat. My Dad commented that it was delicious with the dominate egg taste combined with the sugar. He said you could tell it was different to a modern recipe due to the lack of cinnamon and how prominent the egg taste was. He also noted that the texture was very delicate, the pastry was nice and short and the tart had a lovely wobbliness to it.
In a three person household, this whole dish was eaten within 24 hours which is a real testament to how utterly delicious it was! I am inspired to make more historical recipes, and will definitely continue using the same recipe book.