300 year old recipes

[locks]

I found The Salt article on NPR today "Three ways cooking has changed in the last 300 years" really interesting. It's easy to see why we don't cook like the "Unknown Ladies" of London did 300 years ago; we don't have servants and don't raise our own animals! But it would be fun to try some of the recipes, at least the ones without the offal and bone marrow.

I'd like to try the "Spinage Tort or Pye" (still made in Provence today) and cut the sugar or leave it out as in a quiche. Do you think currons might be currants? It's not in the Middle English cooking terms. I guess the "paist" is simply pie dough and the "crossbar" probably lattice-top.

The Lemmond Cream reminds me of csziggy's great grandmother's recipes. Did she come from England?

[dixiegrrrrl]

1. What's fascinating is the use of teh Olde English

in the 1600/1700's which gave way to more decipherable English in the 1800's,
making old cookbooks more understandable.

I have some vintage Southern cookbooks, from the early 1900's....recipes for possum and raccoon and gator
and a delicious sounding "Squirrel Pie".

speaking of marrow....until the early 1900's, cooking meats with bones was common, it is what made stuff jell,
the original aspic was simply the result. And it helped keep people's bones strong.
nowdays, folks cringe at the idea of "head cheese", but I remember my grandma making "stuff" that jelled when chilled and she sliced it like luncheon meat, it was pretty good tasting.
Americans don't eat animal ....."parts" much anymore.

[spinbaby]

2. A link to the article

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2013/08/12/211408192/three-ways-cooking-has-changed-over-the-last-300-years

[locks]

3. Thanks!

[Lucinda]

4. Thanks for the link!

I have a big fascination with food history!

[maddezmom]

6. Thanks....really interesting.

[pinto]

7. Good stuff. Thanks for the snag.

[Lucinda]

5. I think you may be correct about the currants.

I've been watching The Supersizers Go... on Hulu and they devote each episode to a specific era in food history - it's not uncommon to see sweet and savory mixed in historic recipes.

[pinto]

8. Yeah, I'd hazard a guess that currons = currants. Transliteration French / English.