Monthly Archives: November 2012

Digestive Beverages (Hadimat), Medieval Middle Eastern Redactions, Syrup of Rose Water

Syrup of Dried Roses

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We’re into the season for colds, flu and just blah.  In period, a variety of drinks and foods were laid out to help with these maladies.  Nyguil is a few centuries from being invented yet so you had to go with what was on hand.  Some people discovered that roses could be made into food and drink.  Here is one recipe that uses a syrup made of roses that helps to fortify.  (Single malt scotch really wasn’t an option here.)

Syrup of Dried Roses

 Translation:

Take a ratl of dried roses, and cover with three ratls of boiling water, for a night and leave it until they fall apart in the water.  Press it and clarify it, take the clear part and add it to two ratls of white sugar, and cook all this until it is in the form of a syrup.  Drink an uqiya and a half of this with three of water its benefits: it binds the constitution, and benefits at the start of dropsy, fortifies the other internal organs, and provokes the appetite, God willing. (Anonymouse Andalusian Cookbook, pp. A-73)

Ingredients:

3 C rose petals

5 C water

6 C white sugar

Redaction:

For this redaction a little rose history is needed.  The information gathered for actual historic types of roses is rather thin.  So The rose petals used are actual rose petals from Pakistani.  The likely hood is high that these roses petals are from a Damasks type of rose.  There are two types of Damasks, summer and autumn.  These two differentiated by their bloom times.  One in summer and one in autumn.

A ratl = 1 lb.  1lb of rose petals is a LOT of rose petals.

As a reference the bag is 4 ounces of roses.  That’s about 6 cups of dried rose petals there.  That’s a lot…a lot! of rose petals.

So due to the lack of space for so many rose petals, I have changed the measurements for some thing a little more reasonable for the cooking pots I have on hand.

First I boiled 5 cups of water, then poured this over the 3 cups of rose petals (roughly 2 – 3 oz).

The water and roses sat over night imparting a wonderful smell through out the house.  Mmm…roses that aren’t cloying!

To remove the rose water, I hand squeezed balls of the rose petals to get every drop of moisture.

Now I could have placed a muslin cloth over another bowl and drained the water out that way then squeezed the cloth tightly.  This was just more fun and I had some really cool pictures of rose balls that formed after all the squeeeeeezing was done.  I used my squeeeeezing arm dontcha know.

This is what fresh rose water looks like.  Almost like a bowl of blood.  It’s not.  The smell is incredible.  Rose with out being cloying.  DO NOT DRINK THIS!!  This is incredibly astringent!!  If sugar were not added to this liquid no one, unless knocking on deaths door, would be able to choke this down.  Yes, it is that bad!

The rose scented/flavored water returned is roughly 4 cups.  This was then placed into a pot, to which I added 6 cups of sugar.

The mixture was boiled till a thick syrupy consistency was achieved.

At this point the syrup is ready to be bottled and served.  To serve the ratio is 1 part syrup to 2 parts water.  The syrup is very astringent.  You’ll want to cut the taste with water.  If the syrup is to astringent add more sugar.  In period sugar was used medicinally as a digestive stimulant, not an every day in every food imaginable additive.  So if the syrup needs a little help, add a bit of sugar.  It helps!!

 

Bedouin style #2 Brisket, Plain Dishes (Sawadhij)

Bedouin style #2 Brisket

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I have come across meat cooked in the Bedouin style mentioned in Rodinson.   However I have yet to be able to find any other description other then “cooked in the Bedouin style”.  This leaves me with out a compass and to my own devices.   This makes a few people I know a little nervous.  Never know whats going to show up for dinner on days like this!

Now doing a reverse redaction like this takes a few things into account.  A lot of “What if…(s)”.  So I’m going to go down this rabbit hole and show you where it took me.

Ingredients:

1 brisket

1 oz of Ras el Hanout or Rogan Josh.  I adore both of these atraf al-tib spice blends.  I did not mix my own blend of these but rather purchased from my local spice merchant store named Savory Spice.  Great group of gals there!

Redaction:

The first time I did this recipe, I took the brisket and just rubbed the spice on then stuffed it into the oven on a rack in the oven for 6 hours.  Why a rack?  Well they hooks for meat under which they would have placed a dessert or another dish with sweet water (Rodinson, pp. 280) to collect the fat for use in another way.  Fat was a very important ingredient and not wasted.

The second time I tried this recipe, I pricked the meat all over with a knife. 1/2 inch cuts all over for better depth penetration for the spices.

This is one ounce of spice well rubbed onto a market cut brisket.  I then wrapped this in plastic and set aside for 24 hours in the fridge.  (The wrapping and setting aside is so not period here.  For those who are saying aged meat, I have not seen any recipes for period Middle East cooking where meat was aged.  I am thinking it was a bit to hot and meat would rot/maggot infested to fast.)

Now for the oven part.  Oven’s were definitly a part of the Middle East cooking experience, just not the Bedouin.  The Bedouin’s would use fire pits in which meat was wrapped in leaves and cooked.  I had to improvise on what a city person might serve to visiting Bedouin guests (merchants perhaps in town/friends of the family?).

The meat was placed on a rack with a pan that held about an inch of water.  This cuts down on the smoke from burning fat.  You’ll have to replace the water about ever 2 hours or so to keep spicy fatty smoke from rolling through the house.

I put the fat side up so the fat would melt down and over the meat.  I feel this makes the meat both juicier and more tender.

The mention of racks or hooks for meat is mentioned through out many period recipes with two sections devoted to describing pots, pans and how to cook sides of meat or whole animals, Rodinson, pp. 280-286/303-304.  I would not suggest placing a sweet pudding underneath this brisket as the rubs are of the savory/spicy sort.  I do not believe the Bedouins would have been able to use fat as an in town cook would due lack of oven facilities.  That is my belief.  Have not seen documentation for a portable oven, yet though!

The meat was cooked for 6 hours at 325.

Definitely well cooked!

And here is the meat sliced into.  Moist and ringed with spices cooked into the fat/meat.  I did take a bit of the Ras el Hanout and mix with olive oil for a dipping sauce.  The taste was awesome!  Very worth a try.

 

Atraf al-tib, Ingredients and Spices

Atraf al-tib

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In the Medieval Arabic Cookery book, pg. 132, Atraf al-tib is defined as…”a spice mixutre frequently used in cookery, made of lavender, betel, bay leaves, nutmeg, mace, cardamom, cloves, rosebuds, beech-nuts, ginger and pepper, it being necessary to grind the pepper separately.  This could be compared to English poudre douce or poudre forte as a period pre-made spice mixture.

Another description, on pg. 155, …”Fragrant bundles’ which are considered so important by the author of Wusla that he defines them before launching into the truly culinary chapters of his work. Another category, which is mentioned almost as often, is formed by abzar harra, ‘hot seeds’, presumably spicy seeds.

So we move from one very specific order of spices, then move the mention of ‘Fragrant bundle’, plural along with the mention of spicy seeds.  As the Middle East was an epee center for spice trade.  This would be the equivalent of having spice stores on every street with a grocery store.  Well we have that now, back then there were spice merchants on market streets.  It would be inconceivable that only one flavor style was imposed.  Most recipes include spices, in no particular order, that pull from parts of the first definition of spices but including others.

This theory is supported by the next excerpt.

“The usual term for a spice mixture was atraf al-tib (sides of scent), other wise called afawih (al-)tib (mouths of scent) or afway jayyida (good mouths); these odd names may refer to the paper packets in which the spices were sold.  Other recipes refer to merely abazir (spices, seeds).  All these terms might have refereed to standardized spice mixtures, bu they also seem to be used quite loosely.  Badhinjan mukhallal calls for ‘those afwah, namely toasted caraway, and coriander and salt, add to what preceded, and mustard’. (Rodinson, pg. 284)

Spices, and their combination, seemed to be loosely interpreted by definitly incorperated into recipes based on what the user liked or thought was best.  Every ones idea of the right combination probably changed from chef to chef and cook to cook.

 

 

 

Egg seperating guide, Ingredients and Spices

Seperating an egg

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This post is a bit of a quickie.  A tutorial on how eggs were separated, yolk from the white with out using a plastic egg separating device.  I know these an be bought in the store and are soooo convenient.  Period wise not so much.

Now this works with most eggs.  I’ve found organic eggs have a thicker shell and tend to fragment a bit more then the generic white egg.

The first step is to gather your egg(s) and a small bowl.  Place the bowl under the egg and give the egg a quick sharp tap on the shell (as close to the middle as possible).

Open the egg and let the whites fall into the bowl, while holding the yolk in one half of the shell.

 

In this picture there is a good bit of white left with the yolk.  Tip the half shell, and the whites should fall into the bowl leaving behind the yolk.  The 2nd half of the shell can be used to cut along the whites, severing between the yolk and whites.

The yolks are safe to use in a sealed container for about 24 hours in the fridge.  The whites can be frozen for a few weeks or left in a sealed container for 3-5 days.

This is the method I use for separating out an egg yolk and whites.  I have seen a spoon extract the yolk, but this requires a deftness I’m not quite comfortable with.  I’ve also seen a complicated use of shell spoon and cup to separate everything, a bit production and wasted motion.  (an entertaining video on Youtube though)  However just using the shell is probably the most simplistic and most period method.  If for some reason you are not comfortable with this, get an egg separator for those times when a recipe calls for until you’re willing to experiment with just using an egg shell and break a few eggs and yolks.

 

 

 

A Feast of Ice & Fire, Library, Supportive Research Books

A Feast of Ice & Fire; A guilty pleasure

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Sooooo….at Pennsic, I was shopping at the book tent.  Three times in an hour.  My shopping buddy, was busy getting a belt to fit himself and took over an hour.  That meant “Hey I’m going to check out the books while you get your belt.” “Cool, see you in a few.”.  20 minutes later and $80, I go in search of said companion.  “Oh, it’ll be another 20 minutes.  The belt is being tailored for me while I wait.” “Ok, I had a couple of other books I had my eye on…I’ll be right back!”.  20 minutes and another $45, I again go in search of my friend. “It’ll be another 15 minutes.” “Omg!!  I can not go back to the book tent! I’m going to spend EVERYTHING on books if I do!!!”  So I spent the next 20 minutes, in withdrawals trying NOT to go back to the the book tent for another 3 books I had my eye on.  White knuckled chewing commenced.

The upside to the second round of shopping is that I indulged in a very secret guilty pleasure.  I bought a book that brings to life the foods from A Game of Thrones.  C. Monroe-Cassel and S. Lehrer, in their book A Feast of Ice & Fire, do a fantastic job of bringing most of the foods described by George Martin to life.

A view of the book

A Feast of Ice and Fire: The Official Companion Cookbook

I know I know!  I can hear you now going “That is soooo not period!”.  Weeeell yes and no.  George Martin states he is not a foodie, couldn’t cook if his life depended on it.  The fine ladies who do the book though are cooks.  And they do a very nice job in period research for most of the recipes, tying the food described to both period recipes and to modern recipes.  So for each recipe, a reader gets the period recipe and a modern equivalent.

Now the part I don’t like about this book is that the period translation is in the original language, either old English (which I can handle) or the original Latin/German with out an English translation (which I do NOT like).  Each recipe also has the corresponding period book/information per recipe.  Very nice!  I disappointed that the ladies who do this book did not look into the Middle Eastern recipes for some of the Dorne recipes.  But that is a very small issue over all.

This book is probably one of the best I have come across for people new to period cooking and who want to start by dipping their toes into the warm saucy ocean of period goodness. An A+ for cooking and a B- for period recipe listing (only because I wanted to read the original German recipes in English).   If unsure, if cooking is right for you, this is THE book to start with.  Great recipes, easy to play with the redactions (you do not have to follow their measurements at all) and beautiful presentation.