Fearless Kitchen

Recipe: Assyrian Spinach Pies

Recipe Source: Patent, Greg.  A Baker's Odyssey.  John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken, 2007 pp. 166 - 7.

Right before the big camping event we took recently, we evaluated our planned menu and determined that it was a little scant.  (Certain people allege that they later retracted that determination.  If true, it didn't matter.  I was already feeling inadequate about the amount of food.)  I cast about for something I could make that wouldn't require a lot of extra trips to the store, and came up with this recipe.  It was not medieval, but there was nothing in it that was specifically not-medieval.  It had the added advantage of being relatively cheap and combining vegetables (my personal obsession) and starch (which fills people up.) 

I have got to say that anything that could go wrong with this recipe did go wrong.  Cutting up the dough into little balls was a waste of time, since they just oozed back into each other like The Blob.  Likewise, rolling out all the dough into circles ahead of time just resulted in loud obscenities and frustration.  I suspect that part of the problem was with me - I had committed to helping a friend pick up a gaggle of children from different day cares, and I was desperate to get it done before I left.  Had I waited until I got home that night, I suspect things would have gone easier.  (And picking up the kids was absolutely 100% worth it.)  As it was, I found that folding the pies into little triangles was too fiddly and I didn't have time for it.  Instead I folded them up into half-moon like shapes, which was good.   I ran out of time and had to ask my husband to take over.  He did admirably, and by the time I got home the breads were all finished and happy. 

I made a few changes.  First, I doubled the recipe.  When we do these dinners we rarely know how many people to expect and I wanted to be prepared.  Secondly, I omitted the pomegranate seeds, because it was July and I had no pomegranates.  (This is a pity, because pomegranate is the best fruit ever and would have been perfect here.)  The procedural changes I've already discussed above, although I've included both types of pie here.  The result was a delicious side dish that satisfied pretty much everyone.  People were able to grab a little pie to snack on while out and about during the day, and we cut up the larger pies to feed more people during the dinner that night (thank you Carol for the suggestion.) 

Assyrian Spinach Pies (serves 40; approx. $0.55/serving)

4 1/2 tablespoons active dry yeast (2 packages)

4 cups warm water, divided

1 teaspoon ground mahlab (available in Greek and Middle Eastern groceries, or in my Amazon store under "food."  This is an important flavor component in the dough and you should really use it if you can.)

10 cups all purpose flour

4 tablespoons sugar

4 teaspoons salt

2/3 cup olive oil

5 tablespoons olive oil

2 onions, chopped

2 lb baby spinach, chopped

2 cups chopped walnuts

8 ounces crumbled feta cheese

2/3 cup lemon juice

2 teaspoons black pepper

Equipment:

• Stand mixer
• Medium mixing bowl (or an additional bowl for your stand mixer)
• Large mixing bowl
• Rolling pin
• Saute pan or wok
• Cookie sheets

1. Make the dough in two batches unless you're doing this in a commercial stand mixer (hence the two bowls mentioned in equipment.)  These instructions will be given for two batches.
2. Sprinkle 2 1/4 teaspoons of the yeast into 1/4 cup of the warm water.  Add 1/2 teaspoon mahlab and stir well.
3. Let stand at room temperature about 10 minutes, until the yeast is proofed.  Repeat for the remaining yeast and mahlab.
4. In the bowl of the stand mixer, combine 1/2 the flour, 1/2 the sugar and 1/2 the salt. 
5. Add half the remaining warm water (1 3/4 cups) and 1/3 cup olive oil. 
6. Add one of the yeast mixtures and knead on speed 2 for 2 minutes.
7. Increase to speed 5 and knead 3 - 5 minutes, until the dough is smooth and elastic and just slightly sticky. 
8. Turn this mixture into a lightly oiled bowl (per equipment above) and repeat for the remaining dough ingredients.
9. Cover both dough bowls with plastic wrap and let sit until doubled in size, about 1 1/2 hours.
10. When the dough has risen, cut the dough into 48 individual pieces, shape into balls, and let sit another 1/2 hour at room temperature covered by kitchen towels.
11. To make the filling, heat the 5 tablespoons olive oil in the saute pan over medium heat. 
12. Add the onions and cook until golden, stirring occasionally, until golden. 
13. Transfer the onions to the large bowl.  Add the spinach, walnuts, feta and lemon juice.  Mix well.  I promise that if you are using fresh spinach, the spinach will not make the pies soggy. 
14. Preheat your oven to 375 and prepare your cookie sheets according to your preference.  They do not need to be greased. 
15. Roll out a circle of dough to a diameter of about 6 inches on a lightly floured surface. 
16. Spoon some of the filling into the center of the dough.  Fold over the dough and press to seal firmly around the edges.  Repeat until all the remaining dough has been used. 
17. Bake 25 - 30 minutes. 
18. Serve and enjoy. 

Recipe: Roasted Carrots with "Sauce of Minimal Cost"

Recipe Source (sauce): Grewe, Rudolf and Constance B. Hieatt (eds.)  Libellus de Arte Coquinaria: An Early Northern Cookery Book.  Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Tempe, 2001 p. 33

When you see a recipe for a "Sauce of Minimal Cost," how is it possible to not find an excuse to make it?  I found this one in a collection of medieval recipes that has been found, in slightly different variations, in four different libraries in (I believe) three different languages.  The Danish version is thought to be the earliest of the four, although it is thought that the recipes have been translated from an earlier German text that has not been found yet.  I decided to make it for the medieval dinner we gave on a recent camping trip, although I was kind of stumped.  What would I serve it with?  Meat would be unwieldy, as I was unsure if I would get any cooking time and I didn't want to store meat for two days in a cooler without cooking it.  But what kind of vegetable would stand up to such a (frankly) strongly-flavored sauce?  I decided to roast some carrots, mostly on a whim. 

Roasted Carrots with "Sauce of Minimal Cost" (Serves 20; approx. $0.63/serving)

5 lb carrots, peeled and cut into serving-sized pieces

2 tablespoons olive oil

Kosher salt and black pepper to taste

4 onions, very finely diced (by hand, not in the food processor.  The original specified "chop as small as peas.) 

3 bunches parsley, finely chopped

2 cups Lemony Vegetable Broth

1/2 cup white wine vinegar

Equipment:

• Roasting pan
• Bowl
• Immersion blender

1. Preheat your oven to 450 degrees.
2. Put the carrots into the roasting pan.  Drizzle with the olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste, and mix to ensure that all of the carrots have some of this mixture. 
3. Roast 40 minutes or until the carrots are reasonably tender.
4. Meanwhile, combine the parsley, broth and vinegar in a bowl. 
5. Using the immersion blender, mix well. 
6. Add the onions and stir with a spoon. 
7. Serve the carrots topped with some of the sauce. 

Recipe: Peas and Leeks with Spices

Recipe Source: Apicus.  Cookery and Dining in Imperial Rome.  Joseph Dommers Vehling, ed. and trans.  1977 reprint of the 1936 edition published by Walter M. Hill of Chicago, page 128.

This is yet another vegetable dish I made for the medieval enthusiasts' dinner I served while camping recently.  I will freely admit that this recipe, which dates to the first century AD, predates what we consider the medieval period by about 500 years.  That said, Apicus is cited in a number of medieval texts and so I feel perfectly comfortable using his recipes in a medieval context. 

I did make a few changes to the original recipe, mostly in the form of omissions.  Lovage is not readily available in modern Boston.  Green basilica may be plain old basil, but I'm not sure.  I used ground coriander and cumin as well as dill seed here; the dried or fresh forms of none of them were specified, and I've never even seen fresh cumin.  For the broth I used the Lemony Vegetable Broth I'd made earlier, mostly in the interests of preservation.  I used white wine - neither red nor white was specified - for the sake of presentation.

My one real complaint about how this dish turned out was color.  The color you see in the picture was what I wanted.  By the time that I served it, the vibrant greens had really faded significantly.  Otherwise, the dish had a great flavor and was much more filling than it looked. 

Peas and Leeks with Spices (serves 20; approx. $0.81/serving)

3 pounds frozen green peas (or shelled fresh green peas)

5 leeks, thinly sliced

1/4 cup ground coriander

1/4 cup ground cumin

5 tablespoons black pepper, coarsely ground

2 tablespoons dill seed

2 cups white wine

2 cups Lemony Vegetable Broth

Equipment:

• Large saucepan

1. Heat the peas gently in the saucepan.  If you're using frozen peas, you'll know you're ready for the next step when they begin to give up some water.
2. Lay the leeks on top of the peas.  Sprinkle the cumin and coriander on top.  Cook another 2 - 3 minutes.
3. Add the remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. 
4. Simmer 4 minutes or so, until the leeks are relatively soft. 
5. Taste for salt.  If necessary, add a pinch of salt or to taste. 
6. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Recipe: Byzantine Radishes

Recipe source: Seth, Simeon.  "The Collection, in alphabetical order, of the properties of foods dedicated to Emperor Michael Doucas, written by Simeon Seth, Master of the Palace of Antiochus."  1071 AD.  Greek to French translation by Marc Brunet, 1939.  French to English translation by Henry Marks, self-published in a volume on Byzantine Cuisine as appendix D.  Per the author, books may be ordered from Henry Marks, 1270 Montecello Drive, Eugene OR 97404. 

Phew!  That was a mouthful.  I made this dish for a recent dinner we gave for medieval enthusiasts on a camping trip we took.  I definitely wanted to include some Byzantine foods, both because I wanted to offer foods from as many different medieval cultures as I could and because someone once told me that "there are no sources for Byzantine food," which as you can well imagine was a direct challenge.  The dish served a number of purposes.  First, it was documentable.  Even if the original author said nothing more than that radishes with vinegar and salt are an appetizer, we can still point to where the author said that (page 28 of the appendix in this publication, to be specific.)  Secondly, it was Easy.  I got my husband to slice up the radishes while watching the Yankee game the day before we left, and I'm pretty sure that most of them wound up in the bowl.  Third, it was a vegetable.  Very often at large dinners the meal consists of meat and starch, which is Not Healthy.  And finally, my husband really, really likes radishes. 

Wow, is it me or was all that (including the source information) a really long-winded way to describe a dish with three ingredients?

Anyway.  I chose white wine vinegar because wine vinegar would have been the most likely used in a Byzantine context.  Red wine vinegar would have discolored the radishes too much and would have had an overly strong flavor.  White had the delicacy I was looking for in this situation.  If I were not trying for historical accuracy I would have used rice vinegar - it is an even more delicate flavor, about as mild as you can get without being insipid.  I decided to mix the salt and vinegar together purely for ease of transportation.  Mr. Marks recommended sprinkling the salt and vinegar on separately, but Simeon Seth himself gives no indication either way.  There may be more salt in this solution than suits you.  My husband and many of our guests had been working out in the hot sun all day and were going to need more salt than I would normally use.  Feel free to reduce the amount of salt.

Byzantine Radishes (serves 20; approx. $0.29/serving

2 bunches radishes, trimmed and thinly sliced

3 tablespoons kosher salt

1/2 cup white wine vinegar

Equipment:

• Small bowl
• Whisk

1. Arrange the radish slices on your serving platter.
2. Whisk the vinegar and salt together in the small bowl.
3. Drizzle the dressing over the radishes and serve.

Note 1: If you are not going to serve these right away, store the radishes in the refrigerator until ready to serve.  Do not apply the dressing until the moment you are ready to serve.

Note 2: For people looking for the asparagus dish I served at the same event: increase the proportion of salt to vinegar.  The source is the same. 

Recipe: Couscous Cooked in Broth

Recipe Source: Ibn Razin.  "Book of the Excellent Table Composed of the Best Foods and the Best Dishes."  13th century AD, probably Murcia.  Published and translated in Medieval Cuisine of the Islamic World, by Lilia Zaouali, M. B. DeBevoise trans.  University of California Press, Berkeley, 2007 p. 123

I will be the first to tell you that I simply abhor couscous.  There is a very good and very unappetizing reason for this, and I will spare you the details except to let you know that it involved the gross anatomy lab at a medical school in upstate New York.  However, while I am not alone in my distaste for this frankly inoffensive pasta-like product, I know that I am in the distinct minority.  When I was trying to plan my menu for the big medieval dinner on our camping trip a little while ago, I knew that I needed some sort of starchy dish that would fill people up.  I found this recipe for couscous and decided that it fit most of my needs. 

The original recipe wanted the dish to be served with the meat and vegetables that went into the broth used to cook the couscous.  That really wasn't an option.  I needed the dish to be vegetarian, and there weren't enough vegetables that went into the broth to serve with the couscous.  An alternative version listed in the same recipe suggested eggplant.  I decided to cook some eggplant in the same broth as the couscous and serve it on the side - not everyone likes eggplant.  My friend Laura brought some marinated mushrooms to donate to the spread; some people really liked them with the couscous.  I don't have the recipe for the mushrooms, unfortunately. 

At any rate, this was a fairly tasty dish that was enjoyed by many.  It was also very simple to cook and traveled well. 

Couscous Cooked in Broth (serves 20; approx. $0.70/serving)

2 lb couscous

5 cups Lemony Vegetable Broth, divided

2 eggplant, roughly diced

1 tablespoon olive oil

Equipment:

• Saucepan for cooking the couscous
• Saute pan or wok

1. Cook the couscous according to the package instructions, using the vegetable broth instead of water.
2. Heat the oil in the wok. 
3. Add the eggplant and saute until the oil is mostly absorbed. 
4. Add the additional 1 cup broth and bring to a boil.
5. Reduce heat and simmer until the eggplant is softened.
6. Serve with the eggplant on the side, or for a more authentic presentation serve with the eggplant on top of the couscous.

Recipe: Medieval Dumplings "in the Toledo style" (Mujabbana)

Recipe Source: Ibn Razin.  "Book of the Excellent Table Composed of the Best Foods and the Best Dishes."  13th century AD, probably Murcia.  Published and translated in Medieval Cuisine of the Islamic World, by Lilia Zaouali, M. B. DeBevoise trans.  University of California Press, Berkeley, 2007 pp. 107 - 8.

This little treat was made for the camping trip I've mentioned before, but I didn't serve it for the big dinner.  I served it just for an intimate dinner of a few friends the night before.  I didn't have to make a medieval dish for this meal, but I wanted to, and frankly this dish looked good to me.  It comes to us from Andalusia, during a period when this region of Spain was pretty solidly Muslim.  According to Zaouali, it bears some resemblance to a modern Tunisian dish.

I used the same recipe and technique that I used for the Ashak recipe I'd posted previously; the ingredients were the same, and both have been described as essentially being "ravioli."  I did, however, double the recipe.  The original recipe called for fresh cheese to be grated; a difficult concept for me to get my head around.  I decided to use pecorino; I had a lot of it on hand, it was more cost-effective than other cheeses I could think of, and it is made of sheep's milk.  (I'm not sure what the breakout between sheep and cows was in Andalusia in the 1200s, but I know that sheep and goats are easier to grow in arid climates than cows are.) 

The original recipe was also a little unclear on the cooking method.  The title of the recipe in this book was "Fried Mujabbanain the Toledo Style."  However, the instructions said to bake the dumplings in the same oven you would use for biscuits.  Well, I tried to fry them in some untoasted sesame oil, but the smoke point of of the sesame oil was not friendly to my smoke detectors.  I decided instead to boil them.  I probably ought to have baked them, but I was concerned about keeping them moist. 

The result was a fairly tasty dish, if I do say so myself.  Despite the use of honey in the sauce, the flavor was not cloyingly sweet.  Once cooked, these traveled well in the cooler and reheated fine in an aluminum roasting pan on top of our Big Green Egg, so I'd definitely say that this is a dish you can make ahead with impunity. 

Medieval Dumplings (Mujabbana) in the Toledo Style (serves 8; approx. $1.49/serving)

2 lb flour

2 teaspoons salt

2 eggs    

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 cup water

8 ounces grated peccorino cheese

2 tablespoons anise seed

2/3 bunch cilantro, finely chopped

1/2 cup honey

2 sticks unsalted butter

2 tablespoons ground cinnamon

2 tablespoons sugar (I used rose-scented sugar that a friend gave me, but that wasn't specified in the recipe.  Use granulated or turbinado sugar if that's what you have.)

Equipment:

• Saucepan
• Large saucepan with boiling water
• Slotted spoon or skimmer
• Rolling pin
• Pint glass or biscuit cutter
• 2 large bowls

1. Sift the flour and 1 teaspoon salt into the bowl.  Make a well in the center and add the egg and 1 tablespoon olive oil.
2. Slowly add 1/2 cup water.  Knead thoroughly to form a smooth dough. 
3. Divide the dough into two balls, cover with a damp cloth and let sit 1 hour.
4. Combine the cheese, anise seed and the cilantro in one of the bowls. 
5. When the dough is ready, roll it out on a lightly floured work surface.  Work in batches here. 
6. Cut out rounds (or whatever) using your chosen cutter.  (In this case I used a floral cookie cutter, which was probably a little silly but whatever.) 
7. Put a small amount of the filling (maybe 1/4 - 1/2 teaspoon, depending on the size of your dumplings) into the middle of each dumpling and fold in half.  Use your fingers to seal the edges well.  Repeat until all the dumplings have been used.  Only re-roll and re-use scraps once; any more than that and they will become tough.
8. Boil, in batches if necessary, until the dumplings float to the surface.  Use the slotted spoon or skimmer to fish them out of the water and transfer them to your serving vessel. 
9. When all of the ravioli have been cooked, melt the butter and honey in the saucepan. 
10. Mix well and pour over the ravioli.  Sprinkle the cinnamon and sugar over the lot and mix well.
11. Serve, or store and reheat later. 

Recipe: Sugar Plate

Recipe Source: Heiatt, Constance B. with Brenda Hosington and Sharon Butler.  Pleyn Delit.  University of Toronto Press, Toronto, 1996 recipe 134.  Recipe originally published (untranslated) in Curye on Inglyschfrom a 14th century manuscript entitled God Kokery. 

As I've mentioned, I recently prepared a meal for a large group of medieval history enthusiasts.  It wasn't too difficult to come up with material for the savory part of the meal, but dessert was a little more challenging.  It had to be something that would travel well without refrigeration, wouldn't take up much space, wouldn't take too much time to prepare (my time was really limited this year) and could be reliably dated to the period between 600 - 1600 AD.  I found this recipe and it fit the bill perfectly. 

I made no actual changes.  I made three different batches of the stuff (two photographed, because I wanted to make sure their picture was taken), and each batch turned out differently.  This despite following the recipe exactly, each time!  The first batch is the darker batch on the left.  This one got a little over-caramelized, giving it a stronger caramel and smoke flavor and a weaker rosewater flavor.  People who don't care for rosewater would probably prefer this batch.  I also added food coloring to the batch, as suggested by the recipe (although not required.)  The second batch (pictured on the right) turned out about the way that I wanted.  The third batch was prepared on a very humid day, which may account for the grainy texture. 

I guess my biggest complaint about this recipe, besides the elusiveness of consistency in terms of texture, was the strength of the rosewater flavor.  As a general rule, a little rosewater goes a long way.... unless you're cooking it.  Cooking the rosewater seems to dissipate the flavor.  Most of the time when I use rosewater in something it goes in at the end of the recipe, after the heat has been turned off, but in this case the recipe specifically called for the rosewater to be combined with the sugar before cooking.  According to the translator/redactor, there is a similar French recipe from the same period that calls for significantly more rosewater.  If you like rosewater (and I sure do,) that recipe is probably the one for you.  On the other hand, many people liked this recipe and the subtlety of the rosewater flavor.  So the choice is really yours. 

As a side note, I did not redact this recipe myself.  The above editors did.  Also, I did this in three batches.  I do not know how well the recipe scales up.

Sugar Plate (serves 20; approx. $0.17/serving)

6 cups sugar

6 ounces rosewater

Rice flour for dusting

Equipment:

• Saucepan
• Candy thermometer
• Pastry brush dipped in ice water
• 2 - 3 cookie sheets lined with aluminum foil
• Ice water bath
• Sharp pizza cutter or knife

1. Lubricate the cookie sheet with the lubricant of your choice.  I used cooking spray in this case, which is clearly not medieval.  Lard would have been appropriate, or butter, but neither really appealed to me. 
2. Dust the cookie sheet with rice flour. 
3. Combine the rosewater and the sugar in the saucepan.  Bring to a boil over medium-low heat.  If crystals start to form on the side of the pan, brush them away with the pastry brush dipped in ice water.
4. Boil WITHOUT STIRRING (this will be difficult; it was for me) until the mixture reaches the hard-crack stage (300 degrees on the candy thermometer.)  I personally found that leaving the thermometer in the pan had a better result; I have no idea if this constitutes "proper" technique. 
5. As soon as the hard-crack stage is reached, put the pan into the ice water bath to stop cooking.  (I don't have to tell you not to let the water get into the pan...)
6. Pour the mixture onto the prepared cookie sheets. 
7. Let the mixture cool for a couple minutes, then cut into diamond shapes with the pizza cutter.  
8. Let it cool completely and break along the lines you cut earlier.   

Recipe: Lemony Vegetable Broth

Recipe Source: Botascos, Jim.  The New Greek Cuisine.  Broadway Books, New York, 2006 p. 280

I needed some broth for a big dinner I was preparing.  Many of the recipes I had in mind called for broth of some sort.  I initially bought prepared chicken broth in an effort to save time and energy, but upon further review decided that chicken broth was probably not the best choice here.  First of all, this dinner was taking place while camping.  Cooler space was going to be at a premium and re-heating some of these dishes would have been challenging at best.  Secondly, I had no idea who was coming to this dinner, and I wanted to make sure that there were things that were acceptable to vegetarians.  Enter this broth.

I made a couple of changes.  First, I doubled the recipe.  I probably didn't need double the recipe for this occasion, but it's always better to have homemade broth on hand.  I used a handful of Grains of Paradise in place of whole peppercorns, because I could find the Grains of Paradise readily.  I omitted the tomato paste, because this dinner was at a medieval re-creation event and tomato paste does not show up in medieval recipes.  Finally, I added a bunch of sliced lemons.  This was because both my husband and I really enjoy the flavor of lemons and I wanted to add the lemon flavor to the dishes I planned to make.  There were a couple of procedural changes too. 

The result was exactly what I wanted it to be.  The picture is a little unclear, because the camera had a hard time focusing on a frankly cloudy broth, but the taste was spot on and the smell was amazing.  It's a great broth to have on hand whenever you might want a soup or even just to dress up some rice. 

Lemony Vegetable Broth (makes 24 cups; approx. $0.37/cup)

1 bunch parsley stems

1 head of garlic, peeled

10 whole grains of paradise, or to taste

4 bay leaves

6 celery stalks, diced

4 carrots, diced

4 onions, diced

4 tablespoons olive oil

2 gallons water

Kosher salt to taste

8 lemons, sliced

Equipment:

• Roasting pan
• Stock pot
• Strainer

1.  Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. 
2. Combine the celery, carrots and onion in the roasting pan.  Drizzle the olive oil over the vegetables, mix well, and roast 15 - 20 minutes.
3. Place the parsley stems, garlic, grains of paradise and bay leaves in the stock pot.
4. Add the roasted vegetables and the water.  Add a pinch of kosher salt or to taste. 
5. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, skimming frequently. 
6. Lower the heat.  Add the lemons and simmer 40 minutes. 
7. Strain into a clean container.  Use immediately or freeze.