World's oldest recipe book reveals dishes English kings enjoyed 600 years ago

Daily Mail ^ | 02nd December 2009 | Liz Hull

[ApplegateRanch]

I prefer Auntie's spotted dick.

Much superior to the Heinz.

[ApplegateRanch]

(Although I will pass on the doormice in honey.)

Since dormice taste like chicken anyway, just substitute game hens.

[ApplegateRanch]

Looks terrible, sounds horrid in the discussion...especially the ‘grain mustard with horseradish to stuff the fish’...

...BUT, reading the recipe, it actually seems something worth trying.

[wolfcreek]

We call that minced meat here in the colonies.

[eleni121]

Hardly the world’s oldest recipe book...

Ancient Greeks - Athenaeus’s from the the Deipnosophists.
Ancient Roman food, second-century cookbook of Apicius.

The Byzantines: plenty of recipes from the writings of Theodore Prodromus

[mass55th]

The BBC did two different series titled Supersizers Go and Supersizers Eat, which featured the history of food in various historical periods. I downloaded them from a UK torrent website. They are very entertaining, and although I had to turn my head at times because I couldn't deal with the preparation of some of the food, I really enjoyed these programs.

Here's the Wikipedia page which discusses both series:

Supersizers

Here's a link to a short YouTube video featuring the cook preparing eels for a meal from the Restoration Period:

Making an Eel Pie

[ConservativeMind]

Well said.

[Fenhalls555]

This was also very good:

The Victorian Kitchen

http://tinyurl.com/y8czatk

One of several spin-offs from this excellent series:

The Victorian Kitchen Garden

http://tinyurl.com/yaackpk

[Hegemony Cricket]

"Jugged Hare with Neeps & Tatties"

Hey now, this is a family site! ;-)

[mass55th]

Thanks for the links. The Victorian Farm series was very good too:

Victorian Farm

Historian Ruth Goodman does an excellent job, along with the two archaeologists in the program. Goodman also participated in a Tudor Feast program that was filmed at Haddon Hall.

Ruth Goodman

[SunkenCiv]

Aye.

[Fenhalls555]

Haddon Hall

http://tinyurl.com/y9lhtyk

[RightOnTheLeftCoast]

Yorkshire pudding is a favorite here. It’s really easy to make it. We prefer to have it popover-style. It’s a very nutritious alternative to potatoes, rice, etc.

1 c flour
1/2 c water
1/2 c milk
2-4 eggs (more = more protein for the kids!)

Preheat oven to 400. Put a non-stick muffin tin in the oven as it heats, with a dab of butter in the bottom of each well.

Put all ingredients in a mixer. Mix on HIGH.

When butter is browned, pull tin out of oven. Let it cool for a minute (while the mixer still runs). Distribute the batter into each well. Immediately plunge the tin back into the oven, without delay— this helps it puff up.

Cooks for about 20 minutes. Serve immediately. Any leftovers are great the next day with jam.

Trifle pudding is another marvelous Brit foodstuff. These two food inventions, plus cheddar and stilton cheeses and rum, make up for the rest of their cuisine, IMHO.

[GGpaX4DumpedTea]

“As a person of Scottish descent...”

I too have Scottish blood in my ancestry (my great-great g’ma was Scottish. I lived in N. Ireland three years and spent many a weekend in Scotland. I enjoyed fresh Loch Ness salmon and haggis where we stayed in Ft William on one visit. And you are correct about the cuisine there being different from the bland English cusine. Scots also generally consider themselves Scots, and not a part of England or what is English.

[Little Bill]

False Scot, Sold your King for a Groat.

[kalee]

lol Let me know what you think after you try it.

[ApplegateRanch]

As soon as I can find a local fish monger who'll pocket a few pilchard for me.

OTOH, 1,500 miles from the nearest coast, that might be awhile

[kalee]

Guess I shouldn’t wait for the dinner invitation to sample the pie. :)

[Cloverfarm]

Yorkshire pudding ... hey, thanks for the recipe. But how do I mix in the beef drippings?

Dittos about Cheddar cheese. And British beef cattle also yield taste-bud treats.

[kiltie65]

Credit where credit is due. Ode to a Haggis by Robert Burns. One of my cousins sent me two small tins (they were red tartan) with haggis inside. I kinda’ like haggis but even I wouldn’t eat it out of a tin. I gave one to my Dentist who gives it pride of place on his desk as a paper weight.