How to Milk an Almond Stuff an Egg And Armor a Turnip A ...

ingredient in brackets. This means either that
it is described as optional in the original or
that it is something, usually salt, that is not
mentioned in the original but that we think
should have been—one of our sources says
that he doesn’t mention salt because everyone
knows to put it in—or, occasionally, that it is
something in the recipe that we were unable
to get and so omitted. Which it is should be
clear from context.
In our recipes, spices such as cinnamon or
cloves are ground unless stated not to be.
Some of the early English recipes use the
thorn (þ), a letter that is no longer used in
English. It is pronounced “th.”
Pie Crust Recipes
Our only period English recipe for pie
crust is late period (p. 45: “To make short
paest for tarte,” from A Proper Newe Book); it
consists only of a list of ingredients, and we
believe is intended as a fancy rather than plain
pie crust. There is also a German recipe in
Sabina Welserin. What we normally use is a
simple modern recipe that contains only
period ingredients and is made partly with
whole wheat flour, on the guess that most
period flour was coarser than ours and that the
finest white flour would probably not have
gone into pie crust. It is:
¾ c white flour ⅓ c salted butter
¼ c whole wheat flour 2 ½ T water
Mix flours, cut butter finely into flour with
two knives or a food processor, then mix the
water into the flour-butter mixture without
crushing the flour and butter together. Makes
a single 9" crust.
An alternative, for recipes that specify a
crust but do not say what sort, is to simply
knead flour and water with a little salt. The
result is much tougher than a pastry crust,
which has both advantages and disadvantages.
The quantities for one 9" pie are:
3 c flour about 1 ¼ c water
¼ t salt
7
Sourdough
A number of our recipes use sourdough as
leavening. There are recipes for making your
initial batch of sourdough using wild yeast
from the air, but we have never done it; we
always started with a batch of sourdough from
someone else.
You can keep sourdough in the refrigerator
for quite a long time, but before using it you
will want to spend several days getting the
culture back to strength. Start by combining ¼
c sourdough with ½ c water and ½ c flour;
leave it covered at room temperature for 24
hours. Take ¼ c of that, combine with ½ c
water and ½ c flour, leave it covered for 12
hours. Repeat, again for 12 hours. Finally take
½ c of your now pretty lively sourdough,
combine with 1 c water and 1 c flour, leave it
for 6 hours, use it in your recipe. If you are
going to require more than that, scale up the
final stage accordingly. Put whatever
sourdough is left into jars to give to all your
friends so that they can use sourdough in their
cooking too. Or find a good sourdough
pancake recipe and use the rest for that. And
remember to put some sourdough back into
the refrigerator.
Almond Milk
Almond milk is an ingredient common in
Medieval European recipes, particularly in
Lenten dishes (milk, eggs, and meat broth all
being forbidden in Lent). The recipe below is
a basic one. For some recipes we make a
thicker almond milk with more almonds
relative to the amount of water; other recipes
say “draw up a good milk of almonds with
broth (or wine),” in which case the broth or
wine is substituted for the water in making the
almond milk.
To make almond milk: Take ¼ c (1 ¾ oz)
almonds. Put them in a food processor, run it
briefly. Add a little water, run it longer.
Continue adding water and running the
processor until you have a milky liquid. Strain
through several layers of cheesecloth. Put the
residue back in the food processor, add a little
more water, and repeat. Continue until the