14th century English guide to cooking
The Forme of Cury
(
The Method of Cooking
,
cury
from
Old French
queuerie
, "cookery")
[2]
is an extensive 14th-century collection of
medieval English recipes
. Although the original manuscript is lost, the text appears in nine manuscripts, the most famous in the form of a
scroll
with a headnote citing it as the work of "the chief Master Cooks of
King Richard II
".
[3]
[4]
The name
The Forme of Cury
is generally used for the family of recipes rather than any single manuscript text. It is among the oldest extant
English cookery
books, and the earliest known to mention
olive oil
,
gourds
, and spices such as
mace
and
cloves
.
Context
[
edit
]
The collection was named
The Forme of Cury
by
Samuel Pegge
, who published an edition of one of the manuscripts in 1780 for a trustee of the
British Museum
,
Gustavus Brander
.
[5]
It is one of the best-known
medieval
guides to cooking.
The Forme of Cury
may have been written partly to compete with
Le Viandier
of Taillevent
, a French cookery book created at about the same time. This supports the idea that banquets were a symbol of power and prestige for medieval lords and kings.
[6]
Approach
[
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]
In the preamble, the authors explain that the recipes are meant to teach a cook how to make common dishes and unusual or extravagant banquet dishes.
[7]
They also note that the recipes were written with the advice of the best experts in medicine and philosophy.
[6]
The Forme of Cury
is the first known English cookery book to mention some ingredients such as
cloves
,
olive oil
,
mace
and
gourds
. Many recipes contain what were then rare and valuable spices, such as
nutmeg
,
ginger
,
pepper
,
cinnamon
and
cardamom
. In addition to imparting flavour, many of the spices called for were included specifically to impart rich colouring to the finished dishes for the purpose of, as Pegge says, "gratifying the sight".
[8]
[9]
There is a particular emphasis on yellows, reds and greens, but
gilding
and silvering were also used in several of the recipes.
[8]
Yellow was achieved with
saffron
or egg yolk, red with "sanders" (
sandalwood
) or
alkanet
, and green often with minced parsley. There are recipes for preparing many types of animal meat, including
whale
,
crane
,
curlew
,
heron
,
seal
and
porpoise
.
[7]
There are about ten vegetable recipes, including one for a
vinaigrette
salad, which indicates influence from Portugal and Spain, as French cooks rarely used vegetables at that time. There are also several
pasta
dishes, evidence of Italian influence.
[6]
Some recipes in
The Forme of Cury
appear to have been influenced by the
Liber de Coquina
, which had contributions from Arabic cuisine. For example, the recipe for
mawmenee
(see illustration) corresponds to the Arabic
mamuniyya
(a rich
semolina
pudding). The confectionery-like
payn ragoun
confirms the connection with Sicily (which had been Arab, Catalan and Norman), as it uses the Arab technique of cooking in soft ball syrup.
[6]
Sample recipes
[
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]
Sawse madame
[
edit
]
Sawse madame. Take sawge, persel, ysope and saueray, quinces and peeres, garlek and grapes, and fylle the gees þerwith; and sowe the hole þat no grece come out, and roost hem wel, and kepe the grece þat fallith þerof. Take galytyne and grece and do in a possynet. Whan the gees buth rosted ynouh, take hem of & smyte hem on pecys, and take þat þat is withinne and do it in a possynet and put þerinne wyne, if it be to thyk; do þerto powdour of galyngale, powdour douce, and salt and boyle the sawse, and dresse þe gees in disshes & lay þe sowe onoward.
[10]
In modern English:
Sauce Madame. Take
sage
,
parsley
,
hyssop
and
savory
,
quinces
and
pears
,
garlic
and
grapes
, and stuff the
geese
with them, and sew the hole so that no dripping comes out, and roast them well and keep the
dripping
that falls from them. Take the
gelatin
and dripping and place in a cooking-pot. When the geese are roasted enough, take them off and chop them in pieces, and take what is within and put it in a cooking-pot and put in wine if it is too thick. Add to it powder of
galangal
,
powder-douce
and salt, and boil the sauce and dress the geese in dishes and lay the sauce on.
[11]
Makerouns
[
edit
]
The Forme of Cury
contains a cheese and pasta casserole known as
makerouns
, the earliest recipe for what is now known as
macaroni and cheese
.
[12]
It was made with fresh, hand-cut pasta which was sandwiched between a mixture of melted butter and cheese. The recipe given (in
Middle English
) was:
Take and make a thynne foyle of dowh. and kerve it on pieces, and cast hem on boiling water & seeþ it well. take cheese and grate it and butter cast bynethen and above as losyns. and serue forth.
In modern English:
Make a thin sheet of dough and cut it in pieces. Place them in boiling water and boil them well. Take cheese and grate it and add it and place butter beneath and above as with losyns [a dish similar to
lasagne
], and serve.
[13]
Modern recreations
[
edit
]
The Cafe at the Rylands, in Manchester's
John Rylands Library
where the manuscript is kept, cooked
Tart in Ymber Day
,
Compast
,
Payn Puff
,
Frumenty
and
Gingerbrede
, accompanied by Piment (spiced wine), for invited guests in 2009.
[14]
See also
[
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]
Notes
[
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]
- ^
The page offers recipes for "Drepee":
Take blanched Almandes grynde hem and temper hem up with gode broth take
Oynouns
a grete quantite parboyle hem and frye hem and do þerto. take smale
bryddes
parboyle hem and do þerto Pellydore and salt. and a lytel
grece
.
and "Mawmenee":
Take a pottel of wyne greke. and ii. pounde of sugur take and clarifye the sugur with a qantite of wyne an drawe it thurgh a straynour in to a pot of erthe take flour of
Canell
. and medle with sum of the wyne an cast to gydre. take pynes with Dates and frye hem a litell in grece oþer in oyle and cast hem to gydre. take
clowes
an flour of canel hool and cast þerto. take powdour gyngur. canel. clower, colour it with saundres a lytel yf hit be nede cast salt þerto. and lat it seeþ; warly with a slowe fyre and not to thyk, take brawn of
Capouns
yteysed. oþer of Fesauntes teysed small and cast þerto.
[1]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"The Forme of Cury"
. Project Gutenberg
. Retrieved
17 March
2016
.
- ^
"cury"
.
Oxford English Dictionary
(Online ed.).
Oxford University Press
.
doi
:
10.1093/OED/1060805612
.
(Subscription or
participating institution membership
required.)
- ^
Hieatt & Butler 1985
, pp. 20?30
- ^
Hieatt 1988
, pp. 45?52
- ^
Wright, Clarissa Dickson
(2011).
A History of English Food
. Random House. pp. 46, 50?52.
ISBN
978-1-905-21185-2
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
Bouchut, Marie Josephe Moncorge; Bailey, Ian (trans.); Hunt, Leah (trans.).
"Forme of Cury and cookery books in English"
.
Mediæval
. Old cook
. Retrieved
24 August
2016
.
- ^
a
b
"The Forme of cury ? Pygg in sawse sawge"
.
British Library
. The Master-Cooks of King Richard II. 1390
. Retrieved
23 August
2016
.
- ^
a
b
The forme of cury, a roll of Ancient English cookery: compiled, about AD 1390, by the master-cooks of King Richard II
. Pegge, Samuel, 1704?1796. Cambridge.
ISBN
978-1-107-70727-6
.
OCLC
911037262
.
{{
cite book
}}
: CS1 maint: others (
link
)
- ^
Woolgar, C. M. (1 January 2018).
"Medieval food and colour"
.
Journal of Medieval History
.
44
(1): 10.
doi
:
10.1080/03044181.2017.1401391
.
ISSN
0304-4181
.
S2CID
165273557
.
- ^
Hieatt & Butler 1985
, p. 104
- ^
As cooked
by
Clarissa Dickson Wright
on the
BBC Four
show
Clarissa and the King's Cookbook
- ^
James L. Matterer.
"Makerouns"
. Godecookery.com.
Archived
from the original on 20 October 2018
. Retrieved
20 October
2010
.
- ^
"The Forme Of Cury"
. Gutenberg.org.
Archived
from the original on 1 August 2018
. Retrieved
27 February
2014
.
- ^
"Oldest English recipes cooked up at John Rylands"
. Manchester University. 4 December 2009
. Retrieved
6 April
2015
.
Bibliography
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]
External links
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