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Recipes p. 248 The Fifth Article The which telleth of ordering, devising and causing to be made all manner of pottages, civeys, sauces and all other viands. Now behoveth it to show how to prepare the viands named above, but first it behoves thee to know divers general terms, the which thou mays collect more fully by means of certain additions thereto, that be here and there throughout this book, to wit concerning binding for pottages, as bread, eggs, amidon, flour, etc., and throughout the thick soups. Item, to prevent thy pottage from burning, thou must move it in the bottom of the pot and look that the logs touch not the bottom and if already it have begun to burn, thou must forthwith change it into another pot. Item to keep milk from turning. Item that the pot boil not over onto the fire. Into pottages the spices should be put very well brayed and not strained and at the last moment. In sauces and in jelly the contrary. Item, To Kill Pigs. It is said that the males should be killed in the month of November, and the females in December; and such is their season, and for example we speak of "a shrovetide hen". Item, to make black puddings, have the blood of a pig collected into a fair basin or pan, and when you have had your pigling cleaned out and the haslet very p. 249 well washed and set to cook, and while it is cooking, do you take the clots of blood out of the bottom of the basin and throw them away; and afterwards have onions peeled and minced to the amount of half the blood, with half of the fat which is betwixt the intestines, minced as small as dice, together with a little brayed salt, and put it into the blood. Then take ginger, cloves and a little pepper and bray all together. Then take the small intestines, wash them well, reverse them and wring them out in running water and to get rid of the moisture, set them in a pan on the fire and stir; then add salt, and do it a second and a third time. Then wash them, and then turn them and wash them and set them to dry on a towel; and rub and wring them to dry them. (These be the big intestines, that have fat within them, and that be cut out with a knife.) After you have put in and measured in equal portions and quantities, for so much blood half as much of onions and for so much blood a quarter as much of fat, and when your black puddings have been filled therewith, cook them in a pan in the pot water of the haslet, and prick them with a pin when they swell, or else they will burn. Note, that the blood keepeth well for two days, in sooth for three, after the spices be therein. And some instead of spices take pennyroyal, the large savory, hyssop, marjoram, gathered when they be in flower and then dried and brayed instead of spices. And as to the haslet, set it in a copper pot to cook on the fire, whole and without salt, and put the length of the throat outside the pot; and when it is cooked take it out and keep it to make pottage. p. 250 Quœritur how the intestines shall be reversed to wash them; responsio: by a linen thread and a brass wire as long as a gauger's rod. Note, that some hang their pigs at Eastertide and the air yellows them; wherefore it is best to keep and salt them as they do in Picardy, although the flesh be not as firm, it seemeth; nathless bacon which is fair and white is much better to be served up than that which is yellow, for however good be the yellow, it is too much condemned and discourages one to look upon it. VENISON OF STAG OR ANY OTHER. He that would salt it in summer, it behoves him to salt it in a wash tub or a bath tub [with water and] coarse brayed salt, and then dry it in the sun. The haunch which is salted ought to be cooked first in water and wine to get rid of the salt, and then throw away the wine and water and afterwards set it to cook slowly in meat broth and turnips, and serve it in strips with water in a dish and venison. Item, he that hath young and small turnips should cook them in water and without wine for the first boiling and then throw away the water and then cook slowly in water and wine with chestnuts therein, or if he have no chestnuts, sage; then serve as above. In June and July, beef and mutton salted in pieces and well cooked in water with shallots; salted from morn to eve, or a day at most. COMMON POTTAGES THIN AND UNSPICED. And first POTTAGE OF OLD PEAS (POTAGE DE POIS VIELZ). Behoveth to shell them and to find out from the people of the place the nature of the peas of that p. 251 place (for commonly peas cook not well in well water; and in some places they cook well in spring water or river water, as in Paris, and in others they will not cook in spring water, as at Béziers) and when you have found this out it behoves to wash them in a pail of warm water, then set them in a pot of warm water on the fire and boil them till they burst. Then drain off the liquid and set it aside, and fill the pot with the peas with warm water and set it on the fire and boil and pour off a second time, if you will; then put them back without water, for they will give out enough and boil in that; and it behoves not to put the spoon into the pot after the purée is made, but shake the pot and the peas together and little by little drop warm water into them, or hotter than warm and not cold, and boil and cook them thoroughly before you add anything other than hot water, be it meat or anything else; do not put in salt or bacon or any seasoning until they be quite cooked. You may add sewe of bacon or meat, but not salt and the spoon ought not to be put in until they be well cooked; nathless they may be well moved about in the pot. On a meat day it behoveth after that they be drained, to add sewe of bacon or meat, and when they be nearly cooked, you may put bacon therein; and when you take the bacon out of the peas, you ought to wash it in the sewe of the meat, so that it be fairer to set in strips on the meat, and be not covered with bits of the peas. On a fish day, when the peas be cooked, you should have onions, which have cooked for as long as the peas in one pot and the bacon in another pot, and right p. 252 as you pour and add the sewe of meat to the peas, so on a fish day, when you have put your peas on the fire in a pot, you must set aside your onions sliced in another pot, and pour and add the pot-water of the onions to the peas; and when all is cooked, fry the onions and put half of them with the peas and the other half in the purée, which is spoken of hereafter, and then add salt. And if on a fish day or in Lent there be whaleflesh (craspois), you ought to use it as you use bacon on a meat day. As to new peas, sometimes they be cooked with sewe of meat and brayed parsley to make a green pottage and that is for a meat day; and on a fish day, they be cooked in milk with ginger and saffron therein; and sometimes à la cretonnée as will be shown hereafter. Item BEANS may be frizzled (frasées) at Eastertide in this manner, to wit if you would have fèves frasées, it behoves you to shell and wash them and put them without soaking them, skin and all, into a pot of boiling water on the fire and let them boil until the skin be all wrinkled and cooked; then take it off the fire and put in a spoon and skin them and frizzle them in their own heat, one spoonful after another, and cast them into cold water. After this, it behoves to wash them in warm water like peas, and set them to boil in cold water and when they be boiled till they burst, drain them; and throw away the pot water and fill up with meat broth on a flesh day, or with some other liquid on a fish day; and season with oil and onion well cooked and then fried, or with butter, and they can be made green again with bean leaves fresh brayed, moistened with warm water and strained; then do as with the p. 253 others [the peas], either with bacon on a meat day, or as for a fish day. PORRAY OR GREENS (PORÉE). There be three sort of porray, according to the saying of cooks, who call them white, green and black. White porray is so called because it is made of the white of leeks, chines, chitterlings and ham, in the autumn and winter seasons on meat days; and know that no other fat save pigs, fat is good therewith. And first you pick over, wash, slice and blanch the leeks, to wit in summer when they be young; but in winter, when the aforesaid leeks be older and harder, it behoves you to parboil them, instead of blanching them, and if it be a fish day, after what has been said, you must put them in a pot of hot water and so boil them, and also boil sliced onions and then fry the onions, and afterwards fry the leeks with the onions that have been fried already; then put all to cook in a pot of cow's milk, if it be out of Lent and on a fish day; and if it be in Lent one puts milk of almonds therein. And if it be a meat day, when these summer leeks be blanched, or the winter leeks parboiled as aforesaid, do you set them to cook in a pot of sewe of salt meat or pork, with some bacon therein. Note that sometimes for leeks one makes a thickening of bread. Item, white porray of beets is made as above in mutton and beef sewe mixed, but not in sewe of pork; and on a fish day with milk of almonds or cows' milk. Item, CRESS IN LENT WITH MILK OF ALMONDS. Take your cress and set it to parboil, with a handful of beets cut up, and fry them in oil, then set to boil in p. 254 milk of almonds; and when it is not Lent fry it in lard and butter until it be cooked, then dilute it with sewe of meat; or do it with cheese and serve it quickly or it will turn brown. Nathless, if you put parsley therein it should not be blanched. There is a kind of porray called spinach and it has longer leaves, thinner and greener than common porray and it is eaten at the beginning of Lent. Porray of beets that is washed, then cut up and parboiled, keeps greener than that which is first parboiled and then sliced. But still greener and better is that which has the outer leaves removed and is then washed and cut up very small, and blanched in cold water; then the water is changed and it is set to soak in fresh water, then well drained and set in a pot with bacon and mutton sewe and brought to the boil once; and when it has boiled for a little and you would serve it, set therein some parsley, picked over, washed and cut up and a little green fennel and boil once only. All considered, porray that is least boiled and not parboiled is the greenest and parsley ought not to be boiled, or only very little, for in boiling it loses its savour. Green porray on a fish day. Let it have the outer leaves removed and be cut up and then washed in cold water without parboiling it and then cooked with verjuice and a little water, and put some salt therein and let it be served boiling and very thick, not clear; and put at the bottom of the bowl, underneath the porray, salt butter, or fresh if you will, or cheese, or old verjuice. p. 255 Porray of sprouts is in season from, January to Easter and afterwards. Black porray is made with spiced strips of bacon; to wit the porray is picked over, washed, then cut up and blanched in boiling water, then fried in the fat of bacon slices; then do you moisten it with boiling water (and some say that if it be washed in cold water it is darker and more black) and you must set upon each bowl two slices of bacon. CABBAGES be of five sorts; the best be those that have been frostbitten and they be tender and soon cooked; and in frosty weather they must not be parboiled, but in rainy weather they must. White cabbages come at the end of August. Cabbage hearts at the end of the vintage. And when the heart of the cabbage, which is in the midst, is plucked off, you pull up the stump of the cabbage and replant it in fresh earth, and there will come forth from it big spreading leaves; and the cabbage takes a great deal of room and these cabbage hearts be called Roman cabbages and they be eaten in winter; and when the stumps be replanted, there grow out of them little cabbages which be called sprouts and which be eaten with raw herbs in vinegar; and if you have plenty, they are good with the outer leaves removed and then washed in warm water and cooked whole in a little water; and then when they be cooked add salt and oil and serve them very thick, without water, and put olive oil over them in Lent. Then there be cabbages which be called Easter cabbages, because they be eaten at Eastertide, but they be served from August; and when after sowing they are half a foot p. 256 above the ground, they must be pulled up and transplanted. And first concerning the cabbage hearts, to wit when the leaves be plucked off, and picked over and cut up, it behoves to parboil them very well and for much longer than the other cabbages, for Roman cabbages, require to have the green of the leaves torn into pieces and the yellow, that is to wit the veins, crushed in a mortar, then all blanched together in hot water, then drained and put in a pot of warm water, if you have not enough meat sewe; and serve with very greasy pot-water and some brayed bread therein. And know that cabbages require to be put on the fire very early in the morning and cooked for a very long time, much longer than any other pottage, and on a good, strong fire, and they should be diluted with beef fat and none other, whether they be hearts or early cabbages, or whatever they be save sprouts. Know also that the greasy pot-water of beef and mutton is proper thereto, but in no wise that of pork, which is only good for leeks. Then on a fish day you may parboil cabbages and set them to cook in warm water and add oil and salt. Item, therewith some put oatmeal. Item, instead of oil some put butter thereto. On a meat day you may put therewith pigeons, sausages and hare, coots and plenty of bacon. TURNIPS be hard and ill to cook until they have been in the cold and frost; you cut off the head and tail and other hairs or roots, then scrape and wash them in two or three cauldrons of hot¾very hot¾water, then p. 257 cook them in hot meat sewe, be it of pig, beef or mutton. Item, in Beauce after cooking them, they cut them up into slices and fry them in a pan and cast spice powder over them. HANDY OR IMPROVISED SOUP (SOUPE DEPOURVUE). Take parsley and fry it in butter, then pour boiling water on to it and boil it and add salt, and serve your sops as in the purée. Aliter, if you have some cold beef, cut it up very small and then bray a little bread moistened with verjuice and run it through the strainer and set it in a dish with spice powder over it. Warm it on the coal. It is good for three people. Aliter, on a fish day, take water and set it to boil with almonds in it; then peel and bray the almonds, moisten them with warm water, strain them and set them to boil with powder of ginger and saffron and serve in bowls; and in each bowl a slice of fried fish. Aliter, on a fish day, take meat broth and bread soaked in thin pot-water of meat, then bray it with six eggs, strain and put in a pot with greasy water spices, verjuice, vinegar and saffron; bring it up to the boil once and serve in bowls. Aliter, boil a little bacon in a pot and when it is half cooked take a fresh mackerel and cut it into pieces and set them to cook with the bacon and then take it all out and set minced parsley to boil until it bubbles once and serve. TO KNOW A GOOD CHEESE. Good cheese has six qualities: Non Argus, nec Helena, nec Maria Magdalena, sed Lazarus et Martinus, respondens pontifici. p. 258
Non mie blanc comme Helaine,
Non mie plourant com Magdalaine,
Non Argus, mais du tout avugle,
Et aussi pesant comme un bugle [boeuf]
Contre le poulce soit rebelle,
Et qu'il ait tigneuse cotelle [cotte].
Sans yeulx, bien plourer, non pas blanc.
Tigneulx, rebelle, bien pesant.
Not white as snow, like fair Helèn. Nor moist, like tearful Magdalen, Not like Argus full of eyes, But heavy, like a bull of prize. Well resisting thumb pressed in, And let it have a scaly skin. Eyeless and tearless, in colour not white. Scaly, resisting and weighing not light.
POTTAGES THIN AND SPICED. Primo, note that all spices that be for putting into pottages must be well brayed and not strained, save it be for a jelly; and into all pottages behoveth it to put the spices as late as may be, for the sooner they be put in, the more they lose their savour; and the bread crumbs should be strained. MUTTON COLOURED YELLOW (MOUTON AU JAUNET). Cut it into pieces all raw and let it be from the leg, cook it in water, then bray thereon a head of ginger and some saffron and moisten it with verjuice, wine and vinegar. CAPON BREWET (BROUET DE CHAPONS). Cook your capons in water and wine, then dismember them and fry them in grease, then bray the guts and livers of your capons with almonds and moisten them with your sewe and boil; then take ginger, cinnamon, clove, p. 259
galingale, long pepper and grain of Paradise and moisten them with vinegar and boil; and to serve it forth, put the solid part out into bowls and pour the pottage onto it.
ROSEE OF YOUNG RABBITS (ROSÉ DE LAPPEREAUX [etc.]), larks and small birds or chickens. Let the rabbits be skinned, cut up, parboiled, done again in cold water and larded; let the chickens be scalded for plucking, then done again, cut up and larded, and let larks and little birds be plucked only for parboiling in sewe of meat; then have bacon lard cut up into little squares and put them into a frying pan and take away the lumps but leave the fat, and therein fry your meat, or set your meat to boil on the coal, often turning it, in a pot with fat. And while you do this, have peeled almonds and moisten them with beef broth and run it through the strainer, then have ginger, a head of clove, cedar otherwise hight alexander [red cedar], make some gravy and strain it and when the meat is cooked set p. 260 it in a pot with the broth and plenty of sugar; then serve in bowls with glazed spices thereon. Red cedar is a wood that is sold by the spicers, and it is called "cedar whereof the sheaths of knives be made." OTHER THICK MEAT POTTAGES. CRETONNÉE OF NEW PEAS OR BEANS (CRETONNÉE DE POIS NOUVEAULX OU FÈVES NOUVELLES). Cook them until they become a purée and then pour away the liquid, then take cow's milk very fresh¾and say to the woman who shall sell it to you that she give it not to you if she have put water therein, for often they add to their milk and it is not fresh if there be water in it, it will turn.¾And first boil this milk before putting anything into it, for again it will turn [if you do not]; then bray first ginger to give appetite, and saffron to colour it yellow; nathless if you would thicken it with yolks of eggs dropped slowly therein, the same yolks of eggs will suffice to colour it and also to thicken it, but milk turneth more quickly with yolks of eggs than with a thickening of bread and saffron for colouring. Wherefore, if you would thicken it with bread, it must be white bread and not risen and it must be put to soak in a bowl with milk and broth of meat, then brayed and run through a strainer. And when your bread is strained and your spices not so, set all to boil with your peas; and when all be cooked, add thereto your milk and some saffron. Again you may use another thickening, to wit peas or beans, brayed and then strained; and do you take whatsoever thickening best pleaseth you. When the thickening is of yolk of eggs, it behoveth to beat them, put them through the strainer p. 261 and run them very slowly into the milk, after it hath been well boiled with the new peas or beans and the spices, and hath been take off the fire. The safest way is to take a little milk and moisten the eggs in the bowl and then [do so] again and again, until the yolks be well mixed with plenty of milk by the spoon; then put it into a pot away from the fire and the pottage will not turn. And if the pottage is thick moisten it with the sewe of the meat. This done, behoveth it to have chickens quartered, or veal, or a gosling boiled and then fried and do you put two or three pieces in each bowl and the pottage over them. CRETONNEÉ for a fish day, let the fried meats be of tench, pike, soles or dab fried. POULTRY FLAVOURED WITH CUMMIN (COMMINÉE DE POULAILLE). Cut it into pieces and put it to cook in water and a little wine, then fry it in fat; then take a little bread dipped in your broth and take first ginger and cummin, moisten them with verjuice, bray and strain and put all together with meat or chicken broth, and then colour it either with saffron or with eggs or yolks run through a strainer and dropped slowly into the pottage, after it is taken off the fire. Item, best it is to make it with milk as aforesaid and then to bray your bread after your spices, but behoveth it to boil the milk first lest it burn, and after the pottage is finished let the milk be put into wine (meseemeth that this is not needful) and fry it. Many there be that fry it not, nathless it tastes best so. (Bread is the thickening and afterwards he saith eggs, which is another thickening, and one should since, as is said in the chapter concerning the cretonnée. p. 262
Verjuice and wine.¾If you would make your pottage with milk behoveth not to use wine or verjuice.)
COMMINÉE FOR A FISH DAY. Fry your fish, then peel almonds and bray them and dilute with purée or fish broth and make milk of almonds; but cow's milk is more appetising, though not so healthy for the sick; and for the rest do as above. Item, on a meat day, if you cannot have cow's milk, you may make the dish of milk of almonds and meat as above.
p. 263
fry your meat. And this pottage ought to be the brown hue of fat and as thick as a soringue.
(I do not believe that it behoveth [to use] wine or vinegar.)
Note that because of the parsley only is it called "garnished" (houssié) brewet, for just as one saith "fringed" (frangé) with saffron, so doth one say garnished with parsley; and it is the manner of speaking of cooks.
p. 264
through a very fine sieve and mix with milk of almonds. And if it be not thick enough, then run in flour of amidon or rice boiled and add a drop of verjuice and put therein great plenty of white sugar. And when you have served it forth, powder thereon a spice that is hight red coriander and set pomegranate seeds with comfits and fried almonds round the edge of each bowl. See hereafter concerning this under Blankmanger.
p. 265 (Note what is required; for some cooks say that German broth ought not to be yellow, and this one saith that it should. So if it ought to be yellow the saffron ought not to be passed through the strainer, but it ought to be well brayed and moistened and put thus into the pottage; for that which is strained is to give colour; that which is sprinkled on the top is said to be "fringed " (frangié).) DELICATE ENGLISH BREWET [SOUBTIL BROUET D'ANGLETERRE]. Take peeled and cooked chestnuts and as much or more of hard yolks of eggs or pork liver: bray all together, moisten with warm water, then run through the strainer; then bray ginger, cinnamon, cloves, grain [of Paradise], long pepper, galingale and saffron to give colour and set them to boil together. SAVOY BREWET (BROUET DE SAVOIE). Take capons or pullets and boil them with very lean bacon and livers; and when they be half cooked, take them off and put in breadcrumbs soaked in the sewe, then bray ginger, cinnamon, and saffron and take them out; then bray the livers with plenty of parsley, strain and afterwards bray and strain the bread and boil all together. GENESTE is called geneste because it is as yellow as the flowers of broom (geneste) and it is yellowed with yolk of eggs and saffron and this is done in summer instead of civey and it is done as is said hereafter, save that there be no onions therein. HARE CIVEY (CIVÉ DE LIÈVRE). First, cleave the breast of the hare, and if it be fresh taken, as one or two days since, wash it not, but set it to toast upon the grill, i.e. to grill on a good coal fire or on the spit; p. 266
then have cooked onions and fat in a pot and put your onions in with the fat and your hare by gobbets, and fry them on the fire, moving the pot very often, or fry them in a frying pan. Then toast and burn some bread and soak it in the sewe of the meat with vinegar and wine; and beforehand have brayed ginger, grain [of Paradise], clove, long pepper, nutmegs and cinnamon and let them be brayed and moistened with verjuice and vinegar or meat broth; pour it out again and set it aside. Then bray your bread, moisten it with broth and strain the bread (and not the spices) through the strainer, and put the broth, onions and fat, spices and toasted bread all to cook together, and the hare likewise; and take care that the civey is brown, sharpened with vinegar, tempered with salt and spices.
p. 267 in bowls and pour pottage over it and on the pottage, in each bowl, set four or five crayfish tails, with powdered sugar over all. MORE THICK POTTAGES WITHOUT MEAT. SORINGUE OF EELS (SORINGUE D'ANGUILLES). Skin and then cut up your eels; then have onions cooked in slices and parsley leaves and set it all to fry in oil; then bray ginger, cinnamon, clove, grain [of Paradise] and saffron, and moisten with verjuice and take them out of the mortar. Then have toasted bread brayed and moistened with purée and run it through the strainer, then put in the purée and set all to boil together and flavour with wine, verjuice and vinegar; and it must be clear. ESPIMBECHE OF ROACHES (ESPIMBECHE DE ROUGETS) Parboil and roast your roaches; then take verjuice and powder, cameline and parsley; boil them together and pour over. YELLOW POTTAGE OR YELLOW SAUCE (POTAGE JAUNET OU SAUSSE JAUNETTE) on cold or hot fish. Fry in oil without any meal, pike, skinned perch or other fish of this sort, then bray almonds and dilute them with wine and verjuice and strain and set on the fire; then bray ginger, clove, grain [of Paradise] and saffron and moisten them with your broth and when the pottage boils, put in your spices; and to serve put in sugar and let it be thick. ROAST MEATS. STUFFED PIGLING (POURCELET FARCI). Let the pig be killed by cutting his throat and scalded in boiling water and then skinned then take the lean meat and p. 268 throw away the feet and entrails of the pig and set him to boil in water; and take twenty eggs and boil them hard and chestnuts cooked in water and peeled. Then take the yolks of the eggs, the chestnuts, some fine old cheese and the meat of a cooked leg of pork and chop them up, then bray them with great plenty of saffron and ginger powder mixed with the meat; and if your meat becometh too hard, soften it with yolks of eggs. And open not your pig by the belly but across the shoulders and with the smallest opening you may; then put him on the spit and afterwards put your stuffing into him and sew him up with a big needle; and let him be eaten either with yellow pepper sauce or with cameline in summer. (Note, that I have indeed seen stuffed pig and it is very good. And that is how it is now done and pigeons likewise.) BOARS' UMBLES (BOURBELIER DE SANGLIER). First behoveth to put it in boiling water and soon have it forth and stick it all over with cloves; set it to roast and baste it with sauce made of spices, to wit ginger, cinnamon, clove, grain [of Paradise], long pepper and nutmegs, moistened with verjuice, wine and vinegar and baste therewith without boiling; and when it is roasted boil all together. And this sauce is called Boar's Tail and you will find it hereafter (and there it is thickened with bread and here not.) SWAN. Pluck him like a chicken or a duck and scald or do again [in hot water]; put him on a spit skewered in four places and roast him whole with beak and feet and pluck not his head; eat with yellow pepper sauce. p. 269 Item, who will may glaze him. Item, in killing split him from head to shoulders. Item, they be sometimes skinned and clad again in their feathers. PASTIES. CHICKENS be set in a pasty on their backs with the breast upward and large slices of bacon on the breast, and then covered. Item in the Lombard manner, when the chickens be plucked and prepared, take beaten eggs (to wit yolks and whites) with verjuice and spice powder and dip your chickens therein; then set them in the pasty with strips of bacon as above. MUSHROOMS of one night be the best and they be little and red within and closed at the top; and they must be peeled and then washed in hot water and parboiled and if you wish to put them in a pasty add oil, cheese and spice powder. Item, put them between two dishes on the coals and then add a little salt, cheese and spice powder. They be found at the end of May and June. PASTIES of FRESH VENISON. You must parboil and scour venison, then lard it and make pasties; and pasties of all sorts of fresh venison be made thus; and it must be cut into big slices like faggots and so it is called pasté de bouly lardé. BEEF PASTIES. Take good, young beef and remove all the fat and set the lean to cook in pieces until it boil once, and then take it to the pastry cook to be minced; and the fat with beef marrow. The meat of a beef's cheek cut into slices and set in p. 270 a pasty; then when the pasty is cooked, the sauce of a young duckling (halebran) must be cast therein. MUTTON PASTIES. Well minced up small with shallots. FRESHWATER FISH. CARP. Some prefer the soft-roed to the hard et e contrario. And note that the sterile be better than either. Item, to prepare it, remove the gall that is right at the back of the throat, and this done you may put the head to cook whole and it will cook well and fairly; and if the gall were not taken out the head would always be bloody and bitter. Wherefore when the gall cometh not out whole without breaking, you should forthwith wash the place and rub in salt, and if the gall cometh out whole you should not wash the head nor anything: else, but it behoveth to put the head to boil first and soon afterwards the tail, and then afterwards the remnant, all on a slow fire. Boiled carp is eaten with green sauce and if any be left over it is put in galentine. Item, STEAMED CARP (CARPE À L'ESTOUFFÉE). First, put minced onions in a pot to boil with water and when the onions be well cooked, cast in the head and soon afterwards the tail, and soon afterwards the pieces [of the body] and cover it well over, so that no steam cometh forth. And when it is cooked, have ready your seasoning of ginger, cinnamon and saffron, moistened with wine and a little verjuice, to wit the third part, and set all to boil together well covered up; and then serve forth in bowls. Note, that the Germans say of the French that they p. 271 put themselves in great danger by eating their carp so underdone. And it hath been observed that if French and Germans have a French cook who cooketh carps for them, those carps being cooked after the French fashion, the Germans will take their portion and will have it cooked somewhat more than before and the French not so. EEL REVERSED (ANGUILLE RENVERSÉE). Take a large eel and steam it, then slice it along the back the length of the bone on both sides, in such manner that you draw out the bone, tail and head all together, then wash and turn it inside out, to wit the flesh outwards, and let it be tied from place to place; and set it to boil in red wine. Then take it out and cut the thread with a knife or scissors, and set it to cool on a towel. Then take ginger, cinnamon, cloves, flour of cinnamon, grain [of Paradise], nutmegs, and bray them and set them aside. Then take bread toasted and well brayed, and let it not be strained, but moistened with wine wherein the eel hath been cooked and boil all together in an iron pan and put in verjuice, wine and vinegar and cast them on the eel. LAMPREYS. Be it known that some bleed the lamprey before they steam it and some steam it before they bleed or scald it. To bleed it, first wash your hands very well, then split its mouth in the midi, the chin and put your finger in and pull out the tongue and bleed the lamprey into a dish, and put a little spit into its mouth to make it bleed the better. And if your fingers or hands be covered in blood, wash them and likewise the cut with vinegar and run it into the dish and keep this blood, for it is the fat. p. 272 As to steaming, have hot water on the fire, boiling, and steam it like an eel; and with a blunt knife peel away the inside of the throat and throw away the skin and roast it to a turn. And to make the thick sauce (boe, i.e. boue) take ginger, cinnamon, long pepper, grain [of Paradise] and a nutmeg and bray them and set them on one side; then take bread toasted until it is quite black and bray it and moisten it with vinegar and run it through the strainer; then set the blood, the spices and the bread to boil all together and bring them to the boil once only, and if the vinegar be too strong, temper it with wine or verjuice; and then it is muddy; and it is black and just thick enough and not too thick, and the vinegar is slightly the strongest taste and it is a little salt; then pour it hot onto the lamprey and let it simmer. Item, another and quicker sauce may be made. Take the blood and some vinegar and salt and when the lamprey is roasted to a turn, boil the sauce, bring it once to the boil only, and pour it over your lamprey and leave it to simmer between two dishes. CRAYFISH cooked in water and wine and eaten with vinegar. SEA FISH ROUND AND FLAT. Round sea fish in winter, flat in summer. Note that no sea fish is good when it is taken in rainy or damp weather. COD. When it is taken in the far seas and it is desired to keep it for ten or twelve years, it is gutted and its head removed and it is dried in the air and sun and in no wise by a fire, or smoked; and when this is p. 273 done it is called stockfish. And when it hath been kept a long time and it is desired to eat it, it behoves to beat it with a wooden hammer for a full hour, and then set it to soak in warm water for a full two hours or more, then cook and scour it very well like beef; then eat it with mustard or soaked in butter. And if any remain in the evening, let it be fried in small pieces like shreds and spice powder thereon. FRESH COD prepared and cooked like gurnard with white wine and eaten à la jance; and the salt fish eaten with butter or mustard. If the salt fish is too little soaked it tastes too salt, and if too much it is not good; wherefore who ever is buying it ought to taste it by eating a little. FRESH MACKEREL is in season in June, albeit it is found from the month of March. Clean it out by the ear, then dry with a clean rag and set it to roast without washing it at all, and it is eaten with cameline or fine salt; and if salted with vinegar and shallots. And it is also put in pasties with spice powder thereon. RAY (or SKATE) is cleaned out through the navel and keep the liver, and cut it into small pieces and cook it like plaice, then skin it and eat it with cameline garlic sauce. Ray is good in September and better in October, for then it eats fresh herrings. GALENTINE FOR RAY in summer. Bray almonds and moisten them with boiling water and run through the sieve; then bray ginger and garlic and moisten with this almond milk and strain it and boil all together and spread it over the pieces of ray. Ray that has been cooked may be fried without flour in oil and eaten hot with cameline sauce and that is better than cold galentine. p. 274 DIVERS WAYS OF PREPARING EGGS. ONE HERBOLACE (ARBOULASTRE) or two of eggs. Take of dittany two leaves only, and of rue less than the half or naught, for know that it is strong and bitter; of smallage, tansey, mint and sage, of each some four leaves or less, for each is strong; marjoram a little more, fennel more, parsley more still; but of porray, beets, violet leaves, spinach, lettuces and clary, as much of the one as of the others, until you have two large handfuls. Pick them over and wash them in cold water, then dry them of all the water, and bray two heads of ginger; then put your herbs into the mortar two or three times and bray them with the ginger. And then have sixteen eggs well beaten together, yolks and whites, and bray and mix them in the mortar with the things abovesaid, then divide it into two, and make two thick omelettes, which you shall fry as followeth. First you shall heat your frying pan very well with oil, butter, or such other fat as you will, and when it is very hot all over and especially towards the handle, mingle and spread your eggs over the pan and turn them often over and over with a flat palette, then cast good grated cheese on the top; and know that it is so done, because if you grate cheese with the herbs and the eggs, when you come to fry your omelette, the cheese at the bottom will stick to the pan; and thus it befals with an egg omelette if you mix the eggs with the cheese. Wherefore you should first put the eggs in the pan, and put the cheese on the top and then cover the edges with eggs; and otherwise it will cling to the pan. And when your herbs be cooked in the pan, cut p. 275 your herbolace into a round or a square and eat it not too hot nor too cold. ENTREMETS, FRIED DISHES AND GLAZED DISHES (DOREURES). FRUMENTY (FROUMENTÉE). First it behoves you to hull your wheat as is done for peeled barley, then know that for ten bowls there is needed a pound of hulled wheat, the which is sometimes to be had from the spicers all ready hulled for a silver penny [5d.] a pound. Peel and cook it in water until the evening, and leave it all night covered by the fire in warm water, then take it out and peel. Then boil milk in a pan and do not stir it, for it would turn; and straightway without delay set it in a pot so that it smell not of brass; and also, when it is cold, skim off the cream on the top so that this cream may not make the frumenty turn, and once more boil the milk and a little of the wheat with it, until there is no more wheat; then take yolks of eggs and break them into it, to wit for each sester [8 pints] of milk a hundred eggs, then take the boiling milk and beat the eggs with the milk, then take off the pot and throw in the eggs and take it off; and if you see that it is likely to turn, put the pot in a pailful of water. On a fish day, meat broth; and it is meet to put in saffron if the eggs do not make it yellow enough; item two heads of ginger. FAULX GRENON. Cook the livers and gizzards of chickens, or some veal or a leg of pork or of mutton in water and wine, then mince it very small and fry it in lard; then bray ginger, cinnamon, clove, grain [of Paradise], wine, verjuice, beef broth or its own, and p. 276 great store of yolks of eggs, and pour onto your meat and make all boil well together. Some add saffron, for it should be of a yellowish colour, and some add bread toasted, brayed and strained, for it should be thickened with eggs and bread and likewise it should be sharpened with verjuice. And when you serve it cast powdered cinnamon onto each bowl. MORTREWS (MORTEREUL) is made in like manner to faulx grenon, save that the meat is brayed in a mortar with cinnamon spice; and there is no bread but cinnamon powder over it. TAILLIS to serve in Lent. Take fine raisins, boiled milk of almonds, cracknels, galettes and crusts of white bread and apples cut into little squares and boil your milk and add saffron to colour it and sugar and put all in together until it is thick enough to be cut. It is served in Lent, instead of rice. STUFFED POULTRY (POULAILLE FARCÉE). Take your chickens and cut their throats, then scald them and pluck them, and be careful when you pluck them not to tear the skin; then do them again in water, then take a quill, and insert it betwixt the skin and the flesh and blow the bird up; then open it betwixt the two shoulders and see that you make not too large a hole, and draw out the intestines, and leave in their skin the legs the wings, the neck and all the head and the feet. And to make the stuffing, take mutton, veal and pork and chicken livers and mince them all up together raw, then bray them in a mortar with raw eggs and cheese and good spice powder and a very little saffron and just enough salt. Then fill your chickens and sew up the hole, and with the rest of your stuffing make balls like p. 277
to the pastilles of woad and set them to cook in beef broth or in fair boiling water with great plenty of saffron and let it not boil too much lest they fall to pieces; then spit them on a very thin spit. And to glaze them take great plenty of yolks of eggs and beat them with a little saffron brayed therein, and glaze therewith; and if you would have a green glaze, bray green stuff and then great plenty of yolks of eggs well beaten and passed through a strainer for the greenstuff, and therewith glaze your poultry when it is cooked and your balls likewise. And put your spit into the vessel wherein is your glaze and run your glaze all along it, and set it back at the fire twice or thrice, so that your glaze may take hold; and have a care that your glaze come not before too hot a fire lest it burn.
p. 278 therewith yolk of egg) and moisten with good vinegar, and when it is moistened set it on your chicken and with and on the top of the aforesaid chicken set hard boiled eggs cut into quarters and pour your sauce over it all. Aliter, take the chicken and pluck it, then set it to boil with salt until it be cooked, then take it off and put in quarters to get cold; then put hard boiled eggs to cook in water, and put some bread to soak in wine and verjuice or vinegar, as much of one as of the other; then take parsley and sage then bray ginger and grain [of Paradise] and run it through the strainer and run in yolks of eggs and set the hard boiled eggs in quarters on the chicken and cover it with your sauce. FLAWNS IN LENT (FLAONS EN KARESME). Prepare and steam eels; cook them afterwards in water so hot that you can remove the flesh without the bones and leave also the head and tail and take only the flesh and bray saffron in the mortar, then bray it onto the eel's flesh and moisten with white wine and of that make your flawns; and put sugar over them. Item, flawns have a savour of cheese if made of the roes of luce and carp and of brayed almonds or amidon, and of saffron moistened with wine and plenty of sugar thereon. Item, they be made with the meat of tench, luce or carp, and amidon and saffron, moistened with white wine and sugar thereon. TO MAKE A TART (TOURTE), take four handfuls of beets, two handfuls of parsley, a handful of chervil, a sprig of fennel and two handfuls of spinach, and pick them over and wash them in cold water, then cut them up very small; then bray with two sorts of cheese, to p. 279
wit a hard and a medium, and then add eggs thereto, yolks and whites, and bray them in with the cheese; then put the herbs into the mortar and bray all together and also put therein some fine powder. Or instead of this have ready brayed in the mortar two heads of ginger and onto this bray your cheese, eggs and herbs and then cast old cheese scraped or grated onto the herbs and take it to the oven and then have your tart made and eat it hot.
p. 280 so that it may rub the clearer. But if it run not well, set fire on each side to keep it hot that it may run better, and run it two or three times until it be quite clear, or through a towel folded three times. Then take your dishes and serve forth your meat thereon and have cooked crayfish to set upon the meat of the legs and tail; and pour as much of your jelly (which you shall have heated up again) over the meat for the meat to lie and be covered therein, for there should only be a little meat. Then set it for a night to get cold in the cellar, and in the morning stick therein cloves and bay leaves and flour of cinnamon and scatter red anise. Note that to have it ready in two hours, it is meet to have quince seed, fern and cherry gum and crush them and set them in a linen bag to boil with the meat. Item, on a fish day, jelly is made as above of luce, tench, bream, eels and crayfish and of pike. And when the fish is cooked, you set it to dry on a fair white cloth, and skin it and clean it very well, and throw away the skins and the broth. Item TO MAKE BLUE JELLY, take of the aforesaid broth, be it of flesh or fish, and set it in a fair pan and boil it again on the fire, and get from the spicer two ounces of tournsole and set it to boil therewith until it be of a good colour, then take it off; and then take a pint of loach and cook it somewhere else, and spread the loach on your dishes and let the broth run onto it as above and then leave it to cool. Item, thus is made a blue jelly. And if you would make armorial bearings on the jelly, take gold or silver, whichsoever pleaseth you best, and trace [your design] with the white p. 281
of an egg on a feather, and put the gold thereon with a brush.
POMMEAULX. Take the lean part of a leg of mutton raw and as much of the leg of a lean pig; and let them be minced together very small; then bray in a mortar ginger, grain [of Paradise] and cloves and scatter the powder on your mincemeat, and moisten it with white of egg without the yolk; then knead the spices and the raw meat with your hands into the shape of an apple, then when the shape is well done, set them to cook in water with salt, then take them off, and have skewers of hazelwood and skewer them and set them to roast; and when they be roasted have parsley brayed and passed through a strainer and flour mixed therewith, neither too thin nor too thick, and take your pommeaulx off the fire and put a dish under them, and grease your pommeaulx by turning the spit over the dish; then put them to the fire as often as need be until the pommeaulx be quite green.
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SNAILS that be called escargols, must be caught in the morning. Take those snails that be young and small and have black shells, off vines and elder bushes, then wash them in water until they put forth no more slime; then wash them once in salt and vinegar and set them to cook in water. Then it behoves you to draw the aforesaid snails out of their shells at the end of a pin or needle, and then you should remove their tail which is black (for that is their turd); and then wash them, and set them to cook and boil in water and then take them out and set them in a dish or bowl, to be eaten with bread. And some say likewise that they be better fried in oil and onions, or other liquid after that they be cooked as aforesaid, and they be eaten with spice powder and be for rich folk.
p. 283 thereon. And without putting them in the oven they be cooked in fat.
OTHER ENTREMETS.
LARDED OR SEASONED MILK [LAIT LARDÉ]. Take cow's milk or ewe's milk and set it to boil on the fire and cast in pieces of bacon and saffron; and take eggs, to wit whites and yolks, beat them well and cast them in all at once without stirring and boil all together; and after this take it off the fire and let it turn; or without eggs you may make it turn with verjuice. And when it has cooled, wrap it very tightly in a piece of linen or thin stuff and squeeze it into whatsoever shape you will, either flat or long, and weight it with a big stone, and let it cool on the dresser all night; and the next day cut it up and fry it in an iron pan, and it cooks by itself without other fat, or with fat if you will; and it is set in dishes or bowls like strips of bacon and stuck with cloves and pine-kernels. And if you would make it green, use tournsole.
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powder of spices; and let the paste be well saffroned and then let them be fried in oil. And if a binding be necessary amidon binds and rice too. Item, the flesh of sea crayfish is good instead of meat.
p. 285 above as below, neither more nor less; and for a good reason. PANCAKES IN THE MANNER OF TOURNAY (CRESPES A LA GUISE DETOURNAY). First, it behoves you to have provided yourself with a copper pan holding a quart, whereof the mouth must be no larger than the bottom, or very little more and let the edge be of the height of four fingerbreadths, or a good three and a half. Item, it behoves to fill it with salt butter and to melt, skim and clean this and then pour it into another pan and leave all the salt and some fresh fat, very clean, in equal quantities. Then take eggs and fry them and take the whites away from half of them and let the remnant be beaten up, whites and yolks together, then take the third or fourth part of warm, white wine and mix all together. Then take the fairest wheaten flour that you can get and beat them together long enough to weary one person or two and let your paste be neither thin nor thick, but such that it may run gently through a hole the size of a little finger. Then set your butter and fat on the fire together as much of one as of the other, until it boils; then take your paste and fill a bowl or a big spoon of pierced wood and run it slowly into your grease, first in the middle of the pan then turning it about until your pan be full; and let then go on beating your paste without stopping, so as to make more crisps. And this crisp that is in the pan must be lifted with a little spit or skewer, and turned upside down to cook it, then taken out and put on a dish and the next must be begun; and all the time let someone be moving and beating up the paste unceasingly. p. 286 STUFFED STRAWS (PIPEFARCES). Take the yolks of eggs and flour and salt and a little wine and beat them well together and cheese cut into strips and then roll the strips of cheese in the paste and fry them in an iron pan with fat therein. One does likewise with beef marrow. SAUCES NOT BOILED.
MUSTARD. If you would make provision of mustard to keep for a long time, make it in the harvest season and of soft pods. And some say that the pods should be boiled. Item, if you would make mustard in the country in haste, bray mustardseed in a mortar and moisten it with vinegar and run it through the strainer and if you would prepare it at once; set it in a pot before the fire. Item, if you would make good mustard and at leisure, set the mustardseed to soak for a night in good vinegar, then grind it in a mill and then moisten it little by little with vinegar; and if you have any spices left over from jelly, clarry, hippocras or sauces, let them be ground with it and afterwards prepare it.
p. 287 together and put in brown sugar last of all; and that is winter cameline. And in summer they do the same, but it is not boiled. And in truth, to my taste, the winter sort is good, but in [summer] that which followeth is far better; bray a little ginger and a great deal of cinnamon, then take it out and have toasted bread moistened, or plenty of bread raspings in vinegar, brayed and strained. Note that three differences there be between string ginger (gingembre de mesche) and colombine ginger. For the string ginger has a darker skin and is softer to the knife to cut, and lighter inside than the other; Item better and always dearer. The galingale which has the reddest violet hue when cut is the better. Of nutmegs the heaviest and firmest to cut be the best. And likewise galingale which is heavy and firm to cut, for sometimes it is spoilt, mouldy and light as dead wood; that is not good, but that which is heavy and firm to the knife like a nut, that is good. GARLIC CAMELINE FOR SKATE. Bray ginger, garlic and crusts of white bread moistened with vinegar; and if you add liver thereto it will be better. WHITE OR GREEN GARLIC SAUCE FOR DUCKLINGS OR BEEF. Bray a clove of garlic and some white breadcrumbs untoasted, and moisten with white verjuice; and if you would have it green, for fish, then bray also some parsley and sorrel, or one of them, or rosemary. MUSTY GARLIC (AULX MOUSSUS) FOR FRESH HERRINGS. Bray the garlic without peeling it, and let it be well brayed and moistened with must and serve it with the peel. p. 288
GREEN SPICE SAUCE. Well bray ginger, clove, grain [of Paradise] and take them out of the mortar; then bray parsley or herb bennet, sorrel, marjoram, or one or two of these four, and white breadcrumbs moistened in verjuice, and strain and bray again very well, then strain once more and put them all together and season with vinegar.
p. 289 BOILED SAUCES. Note that in July the old verjuice is very weak and the new is too crude; wherefore in the vintage season, verjuice half old and half new mixed is the best. Item, in pottage you dilute it with vegetable water, but in January, February, etc., the new is the best. YELLOW OR SHARP PEPPER. Take ginger and saffron, then take toasted bread moistened with sewe of meat (or still better with vegetable sewe) and boil and when it boils add the vinegar. BLACK PEPPER. Take clove and a little pepper and ginger and bray them well; then bray burnt bread dipped in this sewe of meat or thin vegetable water, which is better, then let them be boiled in an iron pan and when it boils put in vinegar; then put it into a pot on the fire to keep hot. Item some add cinnamon thereto. GALENTINE FOR CARP. Bray saffron, ginger, clove, grain [of Paradise], long pepper and nutmegs and moisten with the greasy sewe in which the carp has been cooked, and add thereto verjuice, wine and vinegar and let it be thickened with a little toasted bread, well brayed and colourless (nathless strained bread maketh the best sauce) and let it all be boiled and poured over the cooked fish, then put on to plates. It is good warmed up on a dish on the grill, better than quite cold. Note that it is fair and good without saffron and note that it sufficeth to set on each plate two slices of carp and four fried gudgeons. SAUPIQUET FOR CONEY, RIVER FOWL OR WOOD PIGEONS. Fry onions in good fat, or mince them and p. 290 set them to cook in the dripping pan with sewe of beef, and add not verjuice or vinegar until it boils, and then add half verjuice and half wine and a little vinegar, and let the spices be strongest. Then take half wine and half verjuice and a little vinegar, and set all in the frying pan beneath the coney, pigeon or river fowl, and when they be cooked, boil the sauce and have some pieces of toast and put them in with the birds.
CALIMAFRÉE OR LAZY SAUCE (SAULCE PARESSEUSE). Take mustard and powdered ginger and a little vinegar and the greasy sewe of the carp and boil them together; and if you would make this sauce for a capon, instead of putting the greasy sewe of the carp, put verjuice, vinegar and the fat of the capon.
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plenty of good cinnamon, ginger, cloves, grain [of Paradise], half a nutmeg and mace and galingale, and bray them very well, moisten them with equal quantities of verjuice and vinegar and let the sauce be clear. And when the pasty is about cooked, pour the sauce therein and set it in the oven again to boil once only.
(Note that Halebrans be little ducklings which cannot fly until they have had the August rains.)
And note that in winter you put more ginger for the spice to be stronger, for all sauces ought to be stronger in winter than in summer.
A BOAR'S TAIL (UNE QUEUE DE SANGLIER). Take umbles of pigs, hares and river fowl and set them on the spit with a dripping pan below and real wine and vinegar. Then take grain [of Paradise], ginger, clove, nutmegs, long pepper and cinnamon and bray them and take them out of the mortar; then bray toasted bread moistened with wine and run through the strainer; then pour all the liquid into the dripping pan and the spices and bread into an iron pan or pot, with sewe of meat, and put therein whatsoever roast you are cooking and stick it first all over with cloves.
Note that nutmegs, mace and galingale make the head to ache.
SAUCE FOR A CAPON OR HEN. Set a very small quantity of breadcrumbs to soak in verjuice and saffron and bray them; then put them in the dripping pan, with four parts of verjuice and the fifth part of the fat of the hen or capon and not more, for more would be too much, and boil it in the dripping pan and serve it forth in bowls.
SAUCE FOR EGGS POACHED IN OIL. Have onions cooked and parboiled for a long time like cabbage, then
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fry them; afterwards empty the pan wherein you have fried your eggs so that nothing remain therein, and in it put water and onions and a fourth part of vinegar, to wit, let the vinegar form a fourth part of the whole, and boil it and pour it over your eggs.
BEVERAGES FOR THE SICK.
TIZANNE DOULCE. Take water and boil it, then for each sester [here no doubt the sester of 8 pints] of water put in a bowl heaped with barley, and it matters not if it be hulls and all, and two parisis [2 1/2d.] worth of liquorice, item, figs, and let it be boiled till the barley bursts; then let it be strained through two or three pieces of linen, and in each goblet put great plenty of crystallised sugar. Then the barley is good to give to poultry to eat to fatten them.
Note that the good liquorice is the newest and it is a fresh greenish colour, and the old is more faded and dead and is dry.
BOCHET. To make six sesters of bochet take six pints of very soft honey and set it in a cauldron on the fire, and boil it and stir it for as long as it goes on rising and as long as you see it throwing up liquid in little bubbles which burst and in bursting give off a little blackish steam; and then move it, and put in seven sesters of water and boil them until it is reduced to six sesters, always stirring. And then put it in a tub to cool until it be just warm, and then run it through a sieve, and afterwards put it in a cask and add half a pint of leaven of beer, for it is this which makes it piquant (and if you put in leaven of bread, it is as good for the taste, but the colour will be duller), and cover it warmly and
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well when you prepare it. And if you would make it very good, add thereto an ounce of ginger, long pepper, grain of Paradise and cloves, as much of the one as of the other, save that there shall be less of the cloves, and put them in a linen bag and cast it therein. And when it hath been therein for two or three days, and the brochet tastes enough of the spices and is sufficiently piquant, take out the bag and squeeze it and put it in the other barrel that you are making. And thus this powder will serve you well two or three times over.
POTTAGES FOR THE SICK.
FLEMISH CAUDLE (CHAUDEAU FLAMENT). Set a pot of water to boil, then for each bowl beat up four yolks of eggs with white wine and let it run slowly into your water and stir it very well, and put in salt to the right amount; and when it has well boiled take it from off the fire.
Note. If you are only making one bowl for a sick person you must put in five yolks.
MILK OF ALMONDS. Parboil and peel your almonds and set them in cold water, then bray them and moisten them with water in which onions have been cooked and run through a strainer; then fry the onions and put a little salt therein, and boil it on the fire, and then add sops. And if you are making milk of almonds for the sick, do not put in onions and instead of using water of onions to moisten the almonds as is aforesaid, moisten them with clean warm water and boil it and put in no salt, but plenty of sugar. And if you want to make it for drinking, run it through the strainer or through two pieces of linen, and add plenty of sugar to the drink.
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CHICKEN MOULD (COULIS D'UN POULET). Cook the chicken until it is all soft, and bray it with all its bones in a mortar, then moisten it with its own gravy, drain it and add sugar.
Note that the bones ought to be boiled first, then taken out of the mortar, strained and the mortar cleaned; then bray the meat and great plenty of sugar.
Note that after the great heats of June, spiced pottages come into season, and after St Rémy's Day (Oct. 1st) civey of veal, hare, oysters, etc.
OTHER SMALL THINGS THAT BE NEEDFUL.
THIS IS THE MANNER OF MAKING PRESERVES (COMPOST). Note that it must be begun on St John's Day, which is the 24th day of June.
First, you shall take 500 new nuts towards St John's Day, and look that the shell and the kernel be not yet formed, nor the shell too hard or too soft as yet, and pierce them in three places right through or in a cross. Then set them to soak in Seine water or spring water and change it daily; and they must be soaked for ten or twelve days, until they become black and you can taste no bitterness when you bite them; then set them to boil for a while in sweet water, for the space of time wherein you can say a Miserere, or as long as you shall see is needful, that they be neither too hard nor too soft. Afterwards empty away the water, and set them to drain upon a sieve, and then melt a sester of honey, or as much as shall suffice to keep them all therein and let it be liquid and well skimmed; and when it shall have cooled down until it is just warm, put your nuts therein and leave them for two or three days, and then
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set them to drain. Take as much of your honey as they may soak in, and set the honey on the fire, and bring it well up to the boil once only, and skim it, and take it off the fire; and in each of the holes in your nuts set a clove on the one side and a crumb of ginger on the other, and afterwards put them in the honey as long as it shall be warm. And you shall turn them twice or thrice a day, and at the end of three days take them out; and boil the honey again and if there be not enough add some more and boil and skim and boil it, then put your nuts into it; and so every week for a month. Then leave them in an earthen pot or in a little cask, and turn it once a week.
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take out the centre, and cut them into quarters, and do as with the turnips.
Item, when peaches be in season, take the hardest and peel and cut them.
Item, towards St Andrew's Day [Nov. 30th] take roots of parsley and fennel, and scrape them over, and divide them into little pieces, and cut through the fennel and take out the hard centre, but do not take out that of the parsley, and do everything as for the things abovesaid no more and no less.
And when all your preserves are ready, you can do what is required, according to the recipe which follows;
First, for every 500 nuts take a pound of mustard seed and half a pound of anise, a quarter and a half of fennel, a quarter and a half of coriander, a quarter and a half of carroways, to wit a seed which is eaten in comfits, and powder them all up; and then bray them all in a mustard-mill and soak them well in very good vinegar and set them in an earthen pot. And then take half a pound of horse radish, to wit a root which is sold by herbalists, and scrape it well and cut it up as small as you can, and grind it in a mustard-mill, and soak in vinegar. Item, take half a quarter of clove wood, called stem of cloves, half a quarter of cinnamon, half a quarter of pepper, half a quarter of ginger, half a quarter of nutmeg, half a quarter of grain of Paradise, and reduce them all to powder. Item, take half an ounce of saffron of Ort dried and pounded, and an ounce of red cedar, to wit a wood which is sold by spicers and it is called "cedar from which knife sheaths be made". And then take twelve pounds of good honey, thick and white, and melt it on the fire and
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when it is well cooked and skimmed, let it settle, then strain it and cook it again, and if it scums, you must strain again or allow it to get cold; then steep your mustard in good red wine and vinegar in equal parts and put it in the honey. You shall moisten your powders with wine and vinegar and put them in honey, and boil your cedars awhile in hot wine, and afterwards put the saffron with the other things and a handful of coarse salt. Item and this done, take two pounds of the raisins which be called raisins of Digne, to wit small ones, with no pips or seeds of any sort therein, and let them be fresh, and bray them well in a mortar and soak them with good vinegar, then run them through a strainer and put them with the other things. Item, if you add thereto four or five pints of must or boiled wine, the sauce will be all the better.
TO MAKE COTIGNAC (QUINCE MARMALADE), take quinces and peel them, then cut them into quarters and take out the eye at the end and the pips, then boil them in good red wine and then let them be run through a strainer; then take honey and boil it for a long time and skim it and afterwards set your quinces therein and stir them well up and boil until the honey is reduced to half the amount; then cast therein powdered hippocras, and stir until it is quite cold, then cut it into pieces and keep it.
FINE [SPICE] POWDER. Take of white ginger an ounce and a dram, of selected cinnamon a quarter, of cloves and grain [of Paradise] each half a quarter of an ounce, and of lump sugar a quarter and reduce them to powder.
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NUT JAM. Take new nuts before St John's Day, and peel and pierce them, and set them to soak in fresh water, for nine days and each day renew the water; then let them dry, and fill the holes with sticks of clove and ginger and set them to boil in honey, and leave them therein as a conserve.
TO PREPARE WATER FOR WASHING THE HANDS AT TABLE. Set sage to boil, then pour out the water and let it cool until it is just warm. Or you may instead use camomile or marjoram, or you may put in rosemary; and boil them with orange peel. And bay leaves too are good.
HIPPOCRAS. To make powdered hippocras, take a quarter of very fine cinnamon selected by tasting it, and half a quarter of fine flour of cinnamon, an ounce of selected string ginger (gingembre de mesche), fine and white, and an ounce of grain [of Paradise], a sixth of nutmegs and galingale together, and bray them all together. And when you would make your hippocras, take a good half ounce of this powder and two quarters of sugar and mix them with a quart of wine, by Paris measure. And note that the powder and the sugar mixed together is [hight] the Duke's powder.
For a quart or a quarter of hippocras by the measure of Béziers, Carcassonne or Montpellier, take five drams of fine cinnamon, selected and peeled; white ginger selected and pared 3 drams; of cloves, cardamom, mace, galingale, nutmegs, nard, altogether a dram and a quarter, most of the first and less of each of the others in order. Let a powder be made thereof, and with it put a pound and half a quarter (by the heavy weight) of lump sugar, brayed and mingled with the aforesaid
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spices; and let wine and sugar be set and melted on a dish on the fire, and mixed therewith; then put it in the strainer, and strain it until it runs a clear red. Note, that the sugar and the cinnamon ought to predominate.
SAGE. To make a little cask of sage, take two pounds of sage and cut off the stems, then put the leaves into the cask. Item, have half an ounce of cloves in a linen bag and hang it within the cask by a cord; item, you may put in half an ounce of bay; item, half a quarter of string ginger, half a quarter of long pepper and half a quarter of bay. And he that would have sage on the table in winter, let him have an ewer of sage water and pour it upon his white wine in a hanap.
TO MAKE WHITE WINE RED AT TABLE, take in summer the red flowers that grow in the corn and be called perceau or neele or passerose, and let them dry until they can be made into powder, and cast it privily into the glass with the wine and the wine will become red.
IF YOU WOULD HAVE VERJUICE AT CHRISTMAS FROM YOUR VINE ARBOUR, when you see the grape opening before it is in flower, cut it off by the stem and the third time let it grow till Christmas. Master Jehan de Hautecourt says that one ought to cut the flock below the grape and the other shoot beneath will put out new grapes.
IF YOU WOULD HAVE CHOKE PEARS OF A RED COLOUR IN NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER, put hay to cook, and cover the pot so that no smoke cometh forth. Note that it behoves you to put on the pears fennel seed boiled in new wine and then dried, or comfits.
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TO MAKE WHITE SALT, take a pint of coarse salt and three pints of water, and set them on the fire until the salt is melted in the water, then strain it through a cloth, towel, or sifter, then set it on the fire and boil it well and skim it, and let it go on boiling until it is quite dry and the little grains that have been throwing up water be dry; then turn the salt out of the pan and spread it on a cloth to dry in the sun.
TO WRITE ON PAPER A LETTER WHICH NONE SHALL SEE IF THE PAPER BE NOT HEATED, take sal ammoniac and moisten and melt it in water; then write therewith and let it dry. And this will last for about eight days.
TO MAKE GLUE, it behoves you peel holly when it is at the sap (which is commonly from the month of May up to August) and then boil the bark in water until the topmost layer separates; then peel it off, and when it is peeled, wrap up that which remains in elder leaves or other large leaves, and set it in some cool place, as in a cellar, or within the earth, or in a cold dung heap, for the space of nine days or more, until it be decayed. And then behoveth it to pound it like brayed cabbage and to make it up into cakes like woad, and then go wash the cakes one after another, and break them up like wax; and let them not be too much washed in the first water, nor in too hard a water. And after you may break it all up together and knead it in running water and put it in a pot and keep it well covered.
And he who would make glue for water, let him warm a little oil and therein melt his glue; and then lime his line.
Item, another sort of glue is made from corn.
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IF YOU WOULD KEEP ROSES RED, take a dozen buds and put them together as in a ball, and then cover them round with linen and tie them up with thread into a ball and make as many balls as you would preserve roses; and then set then in a crock of Beauvais earthenware and of none other, and fill it with verjuice; and as the verjuice is sucked up fill it up again, but let the verjuice be very good. And when you would have the buds full blown, take them out of the bags and set them in warm water and let them soak for a little.
TO MAKE ROSEWATER WITHOUT LEAD ALEMBIC take a barber's basin, and cover it with a kerchief spread right over the mouth in the manner of a drum, and then lay your roses on the kerchief, and above your roses set the bottom of another basin filled with hot cinders and live charcoal.
TO MAKE ROSEWATER WITHOUT EITHER LEAD ALEMBIC OR FIRE take two glass basins and do as is said at the back of this page [i.e. above] and instead of ashes and charcoal, set it in the sun; and in the heat thereof the water will be made.
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holes of the sieve, and after that spread it over the dresses.
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(And with such things do the peacocks feed their chicks, for you have often seen a hen sit upon a peahen's eggs with her own, and the shells break at the same time, but the little peacocks cannot live long for their beaks be too tender, and the hen doth not seek soft things for them according to their nature; and the chickens live well on corn or soft paste, which is not so meet a food for peacocks. Again, you will see that though you give a hen the best corn and the best sifted in the world, she will scratch it to find worms or flies.)
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POISONS FOR SLAYING A STAG OR A BOAR. Take the root of the herb aconite, which hath a blue flower, and bray it in a mortar and put it in a bag or a piece of cloth, and wring it to get out the juice; and set this juice in a basin in the sun, and at nightfall set it under cover in a dry place that neither water nor any other dampness get to it, and go on putting it back into the warmth of the sun until it has become a thick jelly, like gummed wax, and put it in a well closed box. And when you would use it for shooting, smear it between the barbs and the iron socket, so that when the beast is wounded, it enters into the flesh, for if you do otherwise, to wit if you otherwise anoint the iron, when it enters into the beast's hide the ointment remains in the hide and the hit is of no avail.
MEDICINE TO CURE THE BITE OF A DOG OR ANOTHER MAD BEAST. Take a crust of bread and write what follows: †Bestera †bestie †nay †brigonay †dictera †sagragan †es †domina †fiat †fiat †fiat†.
TO SEPARATE WATER FROM WINE. Put water and wine in a cup and have a thread of cotton and plunge one end thereof to the bottom of the cup and let the other end hang over the edge and below and outside the cup, and you will see that the water will run colourless along the thread. And when the water has all dripped away, you will see the wine begin to drip red. (It would seem that the same could be done with a cask of wine.)
WAFERS (GAUFFRES) be made in five ways. By one method you beat up the eggs in a bowl, then add salt and wine and throw in flour, and mix them, and then put them on two irons, little by little, each time as
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much paste as the size of a leche or strip of cheese, and press them between the two irons and cook on both sides; and if the iron doth not separate easily from the paste, grease it beforehand with a little cloth moistened in oil or fat. The second method is like to the first, but you put in cheese, that is to wit you spread out the paste as though to make a tart or pasty, and then you add the cheese in leches in the middle and cover the two ends; this the cheese remaineth between the two pastes and is this set between two irons. The third method is that of Strained Waffles (Gauffres couléisses) and they be called strained for this reason only, that the paste is clearer and it as it were boiled clear, after the aforesaid manner; and onto it one scatters grated cheese; and all is mixed together.—The fourth method is flour made into a paste with water, salt and wine without either eggs or cheese.
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TO MAKE A LIQUID FOR MARKING LINEN. Take coom, that is the black grease that is at the two ends of the axle of a cart and add ink and oil and vinegar and boil all together, and then warm your mark and dip it therein and stamp it onto your linen.
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inside with a knife, then set them to soak in good, fresh water for nine days and change the water daily then boil them, letting them come once to the boil only, in fresh water, and this done, spread them on a cloth and let them dry thoroughly, then put them in a pot of honey until they be quite covered therewith, and boil on a slow fire and skim. And when you think that the honey is cooked (to try if it be cooked, have some water in a spoon, and pour a drop of the honey into the water and if it spreads it is not done, and if the drop of honey remains in the water without spreading, then it is done), then you must take out your pieces of orange peel and set out a layer in order and sprinkle powdered ginger thereon, then another layer, and sprinkle etc., usque in infinitum; and leave them for a month or more and then eat them.
TO MAKE SAUSAGES. When you have killed your pig, take the flesh of the ribs . . . and the best fat, as much of the one as of the other, in such quantity as you would make sausages; and cause it to be minced and hashed up very small by a pastrycook. Then bray fennel and a little fine salt, and afterwards take your brayed fennel and mix it very well with a quarter as much of fine [spice] powder; then mix thoroughly your meat, your spices and your fennel and afterwards fill the intestines, to wit the small ones. (And know that the intestines of an old pig be better for this, than those of a young one, because they be larger). And afterwards put them in the smoke for four days or more and when you would eat them, put them in hot water and boil them once and then put them on the grill.
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TO TAKE SALT OUT OF BUTTER, put it in a bowl on the fire to melt and the salt will precipitate at the bottom of the bowl, and salt thus precipitated is good for pottage; and the rest of the butter remaineth sweet. Otherwise put your salt butter in fresh sweet water and rub and knead it with your hands therein and the salt will remain in the water.
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filled up with other meat, then coloured or glazed as above; but there is too much to do, it is not a work for a citizen's cook, nor even for a simple knight's; and therefore I leave it.
Item DES ESPAULES DE MOUTON, quia nichil est nisi pena et labor. (And the same concerning shoulders of mutton, for it is nought but pain and trouble.)
Item HEDGEHOGS can be made out of mutton tripe and it is a great expense and a great labour and little honour and profit, wherefor nichil hic.
TO HULL BARLEY OR CORN TO MAKE FRUMENTY. You must have very hot water and put the corn or barley in it, and wash and knead it long and carefully; then pour and drain away all the water and let the corn or barley dry and then bray it with a wooden pestle, then winnow it in a washing basin.
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