Our period Fronch feast menu

[madbaker]

Since I had two requests, here it is. I've omitted the references, but it's mostly Menagier.


Edited to add: Here is a great shot of the pygge and cock.

Nibbles
Hand-washing water (water, orange peel, rosemary)
Trenchers (basic yeasted wheat bread in small loaves, cut square and split)
Tisane (barley water)
Roasted apples
Figs
Sugared almonds

First course
Fine Manchet (sourdough bread, cooked onsite a few hours earlier - I did this, of course)
Parma Tarts (pork tarts)
Streamed greens (basically a salad)
Mushrooms and cheese (variety of French mushrooms, cooked with Brie and Parmesan - this was fabulous as the cheese was just this side of burned, so it was clumpy yummy brown cheese goo)
Grilled fish
Green sauce
Tower of rice
Green soup of fava beans
Meatballs (presented in a bread castle)

Second course
Helmeted Cock astride a Pygge (Roasted chicken, posed riding the roasted whole suckling pig; armed with a paper helm, shield, banner, etc. It was very tasty and incredibly impressive.)
Stuffing for pig
Sage sauce
Chicken cumin pottage
Roasted vegetables (beets, celery root, carrots, garlic, fennel)
Garlic sauce
Clary fritters

Third course
Wafers with Neufchatel cheese
Pears in wine
Ginger cheese tarts
Brie and Muenster
Sugared almonds
Pistachio marzipan in a laurel wreath shape

What I'm reading: Harry Harrison, Deathworld

Comments

[ornerie.livejournal.com]

do you have a platform available for publishing your recipes? we need more period medieval (as opposed to the also yummy but more popular elizabethan/etc stuff) european stuff out there....

so you did the mushroom pastez without the pastez? is that where the cheesy mushroom goodness came from? mmmm.....

[madbaker.livejournal.com]

Yup. I was a bit skeptical because I only remembered them in pies, but there's an addendum saying that you can roast the mushrooms and serve them with spices and cheese. It's pretty similar to the recipe in Scully²'s Early French Cookery.

We also dressed the tables according to the Boke of Kervynge, wrapped the trenchers in linen napkins before they were presented, didn't have forks on the table, etc. It was a lot of work but well worth it. Our two main cat wranglers did a great job whipping everything/body together.

[ornerie.livejournal.com]

so you just cooked the shrooms and stirred in cheese and poudre forte? I may need to do that this weekend....

(my fave is to do it with gruyere, asiago and a touch of brie. yum!)

I'm so glad it went well, and even more glad that it was well recieved :)

[madbaker.livejournal.com]

We consulted our cheese expert, and she recommended these as being relatively well-documented to the period. We also used a mixture of shrooms, including morels. It was faboo.

I just added a link to the pygge above, if you want to take a look.

[loup_noir]

Sounds impressive. Did anyone get images? I know that Rose said her apprentice (whoever that is) did, but I haven't seen anything yet. Would love to see the spread.

Did you have someone do the carving and presentation bits or did the pygge get whisked off and hacked to gobbets in private? Linen napkins....yay.

How about during the meal entertainment?

[roswtr.livejournal.com]

I just posted the links to Cassandra's pictures in my lj; I'll let everyone who wants one know when cds are available. You haven't met Cassandra -- she's a relative newcomer.

The pygge was presented to Tangwystyl and the hall, and Sir Geoffrey Mathias was the carver. He asked Tangwystyl what cut of meat she would like, and she asked for the brains. He was a little startled, but handled it gracefully. :) And she let him back out of braining the poor piggie, and he cut her some meat. The rest of the meat was carved "offstage" and then brought back in on platters.

Entertainment was spaced throughout. Geoffrey Mathias played some recorder pieces, several fabliaux were recited, there were a couple of songs and some dancing girls, and mastersantiago did some magic.

[loup_noir]

I just checked your journal and didn't see the links. Will check back later.

[callistotoni.livejournal.com]

I'm not seeing this post either.

I'm wondering if there are certain types of posts (e.g. graphic-heavy ones) that us free-account people can't see.

[goldenstag.livejournal.com]

CD: I'd appreciate one, since it's gonna be a bear to deal with grabbing these with my *)(*&!! dial-up connection. T'anks!

[goldenstag.livejournal.com]

(Obviously if the CDs are available Sunday, no need to mail ...)

[scendan.livejournal.com]

Did you have Fronch dressing and Fronch fries?

*runs away*

[madbaker.livejournal.com]

I forgot to mention that to drink, we served Peru.

[wingedcorset.livejournal.com]

Any chance I could get a recipe for the ginger cheese tarts?