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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 1d

Glad you've enjoyed it!

Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 1d

/3. I hope you enjoyed the week of medieval vegetarian food as much as I did. I'm away to Germany tomorrow and then Czechia for a historical cookery course in an 18th-century castle (follow jennie.hood.142 on Threads or IG for details of that) but I'll be back with more medieval cookery soon. 🔥

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 1d

/2. Boil everything until the chickpeas start to break down, add more water if needed. Add rosemary, sage, parsley and a little garlic. You can make this with tinned chickpeas too. It’s simple but the herbs, spices and garlic prevent it from being bland and it tastes much richer than you expect.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 1d

It's the final post for National MEDIEVAL Vegetarian Week: Chickpea Broth from Cuoco Napoletano (Italian, C15th).
Soak dried chickpeas. Put them in a pan with some flour, oil, salt, crushed peppercorns, ground cinnamon, and some of the water from the soaked chickpeas. /1

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 1d

/2. Stack them and drizzle with melted butter and honey, then sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar. Melty cheese and herbs with cinnamon and honey is absolutely fantastic. These should come with a warning label because it's impossible to stop eating them once you start - they're so good!

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 1d

Toledan Mujabbana - The Exile’s Cookbook (Andalusian, C13th)

Cheese buns from 13th century al-Andalus. The dough is mixed with cheese, aniseed and herbs. Circles of dough are rolled out and more cheese is piled in the centre of each one, then they are rolled up into buns and baked.
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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 2d

Yes, it needs properly mashed up and, and to be honest, I *could* have pounded it in a mortar and pestle for ages, but I *might* just have blitzed it up in a blender. 🤭

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 2d

/4. This recipe contains one of my favourite Medieval cookery directions ever – “do not let them boil for more than two Our Fathers”. We had a quick discussion about how quickly you should recite the prayer and whether it should be in Latin or English. Then boiled them for a couple of minutes 🤷‍♀️

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 2d

/3. I used cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and black pepper. Verjuice is a tart, non-alcoholic juice made by pressing unripe grapes or, in some cases, sour apples like crab apples. Where we would add vinegar or lemon juice into recipes to provide a hint of acidity, medieval recipes often use verjuice.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 2d

/2. Peel, roughly chop and parboil an aubergine. Drain, coat in flour, fry. Grind up a quarter of it with garlic, oregano, breadcrumbs, pepper, saffron, salt and a little verjuice to make a sauce. Fry the sauce gently until it thickens, then dish up the aubergine with the sauce and "fine spices".

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 2d

Aubergine - Cuoco Napoletano (Italy, C15th).

This is lovely – it doesn’t look particularly appetising, but it tastes fantastic. Soft, sweet fried aubergine in a garlic-herb-vinegar fresh sauce. If you like dishes like baba ganoush, you’ll like this. Part 2 has the details...
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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 2d

These are hearty and so tasty I'm thinking of making a sign for Ye Olde Gregge's Bakehouse for the next medieval show. 🥨😆

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 2d

Mushroom and Cheese Pasties from Le Menagier de Paris (French, c.1393).
I loved these! Parboiled chopped mushrooms, grated cheese, a little oil and some powder fort - a mix of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and plenty of black pepper.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 3d

/3. Interestingly, broad beans (fava beans) were the only type of beans available to medieval European cooks. They had chickpeas too, but all the other types of beans we know today – kidney, pinto, haricot, butter, runner, etc. – are from the Americas.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 3d

/2. ‘Powder douce’ means ‘sweet powder’ and mine has cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, mace, pepper and a lot of sugar. Sugar with savoury food is one of the things that takes some getting used to with medieval food so you can skip the sugar if you don’t fancy it.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 3d

Benes Yfryed - Forme of Cury (English, c.1390).
Fried broad beans with onion, garlic and spices. Boil the beans “almost until they burst”. Drain, add minced onion and garlic and fry until cooked, then add powder douce and serve. ‘Powder douce’ is a spice mix in many medieval recipes. /1

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 3d

/3. These are still a popular dish today, often folded and stuffed with cheese or nuts, and it's easy to see why - they're really lovely. We demolished a big stack of them in a very undignified few minutes.🤣

The Exile’s Cookbook is by Professor Daniel Newman.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 3d

/2. These are yeasted semolina pancakes, cooked on one side until the bubbles rise and the pancake is cooked. Drizzle with butter and honey, sprinkle with cinnamon, sugar and black pepper, which is a really fantastic combination of flavours.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 3d

Honeycomb Qatayif - The Exile’s Cookbook (Andalusian, C13th).

Ibn Razīn al-Tujībī was a Muslim scholar born in Spain who fled to Tunis during the Christian reconquest. He wrote a cookbook, ‘Best of Delectable Food and Dishes from al-Andalus and al-Maghrib’, translated as The Exile’s Cookbook. /1

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 4d

/3. Powder Douce is "sweet powder" and mine is a mix of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, mace, pepper and sugar. Bake it all in a shortcrust pie crust. Honestly, it works 😁

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 4d

/2. But it's actually very more-ish, I really liked it. Another source includes cheese, so you could add cheese if you like. Chop and parboil an onion. Mix with egg and breadcrumbs, butter, saffron, salt, raisins, a little sugar and some Powder Douce.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 4d

Halfway through National MEDIEVAL Vegetarian Week. 😄

Tart in Ymbre Day from Forme of Cury (England, c.1390).
Ember Days are fast days in Western Christian traditions. This sounds odd - egg and onion tart with raisins, sweet spices and a bit of sugar. We ended up calling it "quiche-cake".
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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 4d

/3. This is 14th century.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 4d

/2. Boil for a few minutes and then served with grated cheese and “sweet spices" - a mix of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, mace, pepper and sugar. Sugar and savoury is typical of medieval cookery and it's a bit weird, but it works well here; neither overpowers the other and the dish is a total winner.

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Medieval Food With Jennie @medievalfoodjennie.bsky.social · 4d

Rafioli de Herbe – Libro di Cucino (Venice).
This feels quite modern, but the flavours are medieval. The pasta is made with flour, egg and sugar. The filling is fresh cheese, egg, herbs, spices. I used ricotta with parsley, sage and the crushed seeds of a cardamom pod.
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