A Modest Banquet

A Modest Banquet--Ciorstan MacAmhlaidh, OHA, AA

A Modest Little Banquet

Ciorstan MacAmhlaidh, OHA, AA

Great Western War was coming up, and I wanted to do something special for Saturday Night dinner. The assembled multitude of people about our campsite meant that there would be somewhere between twenty to thirty people sitting down to dinner, and I had volunteered to cook that night.

What to do? Well, the first thing, hit the books for simple and tasty food. I figured that, never having done a banquet before, that too much food would be better than too little, so I decided that, variety-wise, about one dish per four people seemed about right; quantity-wise, I assumed I would make about a half-cup to a cup of each item per person of each dish, by volume.

I used Cindy Renfrow’s “Take a Thousand Eggs or More,” and “The Medieval Kitchen,” put together by Odile Redon, Francoise Sabban and Silvano Serventi, plus a couple of dishes from the Tournaments Illuminated “On Dutch Cookery” article some years ago. I don’t consider myself well-grounded in recipe literature or medieval thought on bodily humours and what to eat to counteract or emphasize the same, so putting together a few recipes in addition to the roast meats I planned consisted mainly of poking my finger through the tables of contents and saying to myself, that sounds really good, and yet I also wanted a fairly well-rounded meal with respect to modern notions of protein and carbohydrate consumption without going overboard on fats, and I also wanted to enable those who did not care for either or both lamb or pork to be able to get protein from other dishes in the meal (e.g., ovo-lactose vegetarians could and would get a good meal, however, Vegans would not be able to eat anything but salad and the pears in the Whole Pear Pie). My goal was to stick with authentic medieval dishes, but I did include two plausibly medieval interlopers.

Here’s the list of dishes I chose:

1. †Stew Jacobin, a clear soup with bread sippets and grated cheese
2. Roast leg of lamb, with Garlic-Pepper sprinkled thereon and garlic cloves in the meat
3. Grilled pork loin chops with ‡Sage-Ginger Sauce
4. A Sallat, dressed with oil, vinegar and savory spices
5. Mushroom Pottage
6. †A Special Pie
7. ‚Pumpkin or Winter Squash Tart
8. ‚Whole-Pear Pie

The character mark indicates the source:

† On Dutch Cookery
‚ The Medieval Kitchen
‡ Take a Thousand Eggs or More

Observe these dishes. The pie crust involved in three out of seven of the dishes meant that they could be prepared ahead and chilled. The meats would be cooked on site, over a fire pit. The Mushroom Pottage— well, that was a special cheat I’ll explain in a bit, and could be heated up quickly in a pot over the fire. The soup was homemade chicken broth frozen solid prior to the event, and heated up in a pot, as Stew Jacobin is really all about the presentation. So, half of the dishes involved simple heating and roasting/grilling on site and half did not involve any on-site cooking at all, thereby cutting down cooking and prep time at the event in favor of socializing with ‘my’ guests.

Well, the first thing to do was to analyze the tasks. The majority of cooking was done in advance, using the freezer and easily-packed containers.

• Shop. Preferably once, but actually, I made a second trip two days prior to the event, since I bought the meat at the last minute for the sake of freshness. This task would also include listing out all the ingredients in proper quantity.
• Make and freeze broth.
• Make and freeze pies.
• Prep meat.

At the event, the list of items would be:

• Start fires, two firepits. I wanted even coals.
• Heat broth to just boiling (the cheese on the sippets turns rubbery if not hot enough)
• Spice/insert garlic and roast lamb (done with a foil wrap instead of a more period flour/water/fat crust for time/transport considerations)
• Heat and stir mushroom pottage
• Grill chops
• Assemble the soup with cheese sippets in the diners’ bowls
• Toss/serve the sallat
• Serve forth the Special Pie and Tart

• Send around and then serve forth the Whole Pear Pie as the subtlety

Back at home, prior to the event, I made up two great big pots of chicken broth, which meant buying a big tray of cheap chicken bits (necks and backs), cleaning out my refrigerator drawer for just-past-their-prime veggies (carrots, onions, celery; leeks), and raiding my garden for a couple of fresh bay leaves, thyme, garlic, and rosemary, and adding some peppercorns and grains of paradise This was cooked until the chicken fell off the bones, then everything solid was strained out and thrown away. The broth was then skimmed of fat and cooking-scum, then frozen into two big blocks.

The pork chops were going to be those really thick slices cut from pork loin roast that one finds at the Norwalk Costco. These were layered into a big container and salt water was poured over, for brining, and then refrigerated; since these were bought two days prior to the feast, they were not frozen. Two big legs of lamb were also bought fresh; I planned to force peeled garlic cloves through the meat with a knife and sprinkle a garlic and pepper blend over them prior to roasting. I suppose I could have done the lamb prep in advance and simply put foil packages on the fire, but I didn’t think of this at the time because I didn’t write out a task list. Silly me. The salad was a big bag of pre-cut salad greens, and the dressing was a simple oil/wine vinegar/pepper/garlic blend.

I made up the Sage-Ginger Sauce in advance, using sage from my front yard. This was chilled and stored. I also casually tossed a new jar of apple-mint jelly into the storage container for those who just had to have it with their lamb, since I’m one of them. I listed out all of the serving dishes and serving/cooking utensils I would need, and packed them.

I’m assuming that since I’ve given easily-found sources, these recipes will be likewise easily found. The redaction work has already been done by the authors, however, since “The Medieval Kitchen” was prepared by European cooks, the recipes therefrom are best performed by weight rather than volume—which is something the average US cook is not used to doing as we cook by volume. I believe cooking by weight produces a superior, more consistent result as one’s ingredients are not subject to variance; for example, flour is subject to the worst variances due to air and moisture content. I made an awful lot of pate brisee for pie crusts and the cover of the Whole Pear Pie (which was decorated with cut-out pastry leaves, Caidan crescents and brushed with a water/egg glaze) that I don’t think would have been so successful if I had not weighed the ingredients instead of measuring them by volume.

Oh, and the Mushroom Pottage? Therein lies a tale. Once upon a time I bought a bag of breaded mushrooms from Smart & Final, thinking they looked appealing. I stupidly put them into the refrigerator instead of the freezer, and the breading fell off the mushrooms as they thawed. Well, rather than throw them away…

And there were some leftovers, especially of Special Pie and Squash Tart. As these are essentially custard/cheese/fruit/nut pies, they went back into a storage cooler. Breakfast, anyone?

My lesson, in summary, is that a big dinner need not bind one to the camp kitchen for the majority of one’s event, nor does it need to be terribly complex. The key is planning ahead, organization and patience. Medieval cuisine is fascinating and full of very tasty food suitable for even the pickiest of eaters—myself included.

I want to thank Lord Æduin of Skye and Lady Meghan MacInnes of Kinlochaline for their assistance that night. Without them, my Modest Little Banquet would not have gone off as quickly and as smoothly as it did!

Click for Recipes

Bibliography

Floris van Montfort and Hannah of Hanecnolle, On Dutch Cookery, http://www.blancefloer.demon.nl/page10.htm, accessed most recently on1/28/05. This is the authors’ reprint of a Tournaments Illuminated article, in its entirety; Issue #125, Winter 1998.

Odile Redon, Francoise Sabban and Silvano Servienti, “The Medieval Kitchen, Recipes from France and Italy,” translated by Edward Schneider, University of Chicago Press 1998

Cindy Renfrow, “Take a Thousand Eggs or More,” Second Edition, Vol. I

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