Fearless Kitchen

Recipe: Cucumbers with Herbs and Vinegar

Okay, I was mistaken. The farro recipe wasn't my last recipe from the Maine trip. I had originally intended to test a recipe for a future event that weekend but I was thwarted. The original recipe called for red miso, which was distinctly not present in my local grocery store. (This is why I rarely use my local grocery store except for cat litter.) I had, however already purchased a large quantity of cucumbers. I certainly wasn't going to let them go bad. Way back at the end of April I provided the lunch for a similar event and found myself with a lot of leftover cucumbers. At the time, I dressed them up with some leftover herbs, vinegar and oil. It was probably one of the most popular dishes I served that day, but I didn't get any pictures so I didn't actually get to post it. I decided that I would kill two birds with one stone and serve it again at the Maine event. Without further fuss, here it is.

Cucumbers with Herbs and Vinegar (serves 30; approx. $0.69/serving)

7 English cucumbers, diced

1 bunch parsley, finely chopped

1 bunch cilantro, finely chopped

5 tablespoons olive oil

7 ounces white wine vinegar

Equipment:

• None.

1. Combine all the ingredients in a serving bowl.
2. Toss well to combine.
3. Serve.

Recipe: Farro

Recipe Source: Martino of Como. The Art of Cooking. Luigi Ballerini, ed. Jeremy Parzen, trans. University of California Press, Berkeley, pp. 64 - 5

This is probably the last of the recipes I made for this year's big medieval party up in Maine. My husband has certain frankly strict ideas about what appropriate food is for these situations: meat and carbohydrates and not necessarily in that order. Me, I like vegetables and I like them to be plentiful. He would rather not see vegetables on offer at all. (However, since I am cooking I shall continue to offer vegetables and lots of them.) Anyway, while I had made plenty of bread ahead of time and frozen it, I wanted to have another carb dish on hand to forestall complaining er, satisfy those who wanted carbs. Just plain rice wasn't going to cut it for me, not this year and not when I had so many non-period dishes on the table. I wanted something with some fiber, maybe something a little unusual. As it happens I had a supply of farro laid in; I decided to use it here.

I usually try to avoid making changes to medieval recipes when I re-create them, but sometimes you just haven't much choice. I was bringing this dish camping. It was likely to be sitting out for some time, if it received any refrigeration at all. This meant that the fatty pullet broth and egg yolks were both contraindicated. Well, that's okay. Had this dish been made during Lent Master Martino would also have needed to switch to a vegetarian version. I omitted the eggs altogether and used a vegetable broth for the broth. To get the proportions of liquid to grain correct I referred to an article from Whole Living magazine, which you can find here.

Farro (serves about 20; approx. cost per serving not available)

8 cups vegetable broth

2 1/2 cups farro

2 tablespoons black pepper

1 tablespoon ground cumin

Pinch saffron

¾ teaspoon kosher salt

Equipment:

• Large saucepan with lid

1. Combine the broth and the saffron in the saucepan and bring to a boil.
2. Add the farro, salt and the spices.
3. Reduce heat, cover and simmer until tender, about 45 – 50 minutes.
4. Serve.

 

 

 

Recipe: Kohlrabi Borani

Recipe Source: Kremezi, Aglaia. Mediterranean Hot and Spicy. Broadway Books, New York, 2009 pp. 88 – 9.

Many years ago I joined a CSA program. I was really, really dissatisfied with it. The food was of very poor quality – I mean, I don't need my food to be all that pretty but rotten and wormy just annoys me. Furthermore, there was absolutely no inventory list provided with the box of vegetables and not all of the produce consisted of things one might find in the local supermarket. I'm an adventurous eater with a wealth of resources to draw on, but I need at least a little something to go on. One of the strange, alien vegetables was this thing that looked vaguely like a Klingon turnip. I had no idea what it was and neither did anyone else that I knew.

Later I left that job. I started this blog. I learned that the Klingon turnip was in fact a kohlrabi. Of course I never saw kohlrabi in the supermarket, but it kind of stayed in the back of my mind as a personal challenge. I would find kohlrabi and I would make something tasty from it.

A few weeks ago I took the dog for a walk at a local farm. That's right. The site used to be the estate of some wealthy New Englander and now it's a park. The people who run this site manage a small farm. It is a nice farm and they have a little farmstand on site. This particular week I found my quest was likely to be fulfilled. There was not one kind of kohlrabi but two: purple and green. I bought one of each and contemplated what I would do with my treasure.

What I wound up doing was re-making the beet borani dish I made for the Fourth of July and bringing it north for the big medieval event. This is not a period recipe and I have no idea as to whether or not kohlrabi is period, much less period to the part of the world from which we get borani. Borani, however, is named after a Persian queen from very early in the medieval period, so I decided it was appropriate enough to serve. It was quite a hit.

Kohlrabi Borani (serves about 30 as a side dish; approx. $0.35/serving)

1 bunch (about 5) green kohlrabi

1 bunch (about 5) purple kohlrabi

1 bunch dill, chopped

½ bunch marjoram, chopped

5 cloves garlic, crushed

2 cups toasted walnuts, chopped

4 cups Greek yogurt

Equipment:

• Large saucepan
• Sauté pan with lid
• Large bowl

1. Separate the kohlrabi bulbs from the greens. Dice the bulbs. Wash and coarsely chop, but do not dry, the greens.
2. Bring a saucepan of lightly salted water to a boil.
3. Add the diced kohlrabi bulbs and cook until tender. Drain.
4. Heat the sauté pan.
5. Add the kohlrabi greens. Reduce the heat, cover and allow to steam for about 4 minutes. Shake the pan a couple of times during this period to prevent burning.
6. Combine all the ingredients in the large bowl. Mix well.
7. Refrigerate at least 3 hours before serving.

Recipe: Sauce for Beef

Recipe Source: Van Der Noot, Thomas. Het eerste gedrukte Nederlandsche kookboek, circa 1510. Willy van Cammeren posted it to the Internet here in 2001. Christina van Tets translated it to English. You can find this and other medieval cookbooks online at www.medievalcookery.com.  The original recipe is available here. 

I have occasion to re-create medieval recipes on a fairly regular basis and this is a great and good thing. I enjoy it very much. The thing is that, not unlike my modern cooking, I tend to focus on a couple of areas of the world. Most of my medieval cooking is either Italian or Middle Eastern with a heavy emphasis on the latter. This makes sense. A lot of the recipes and techniques that we consider French now had their origins in Italy and the Italian cooks Catherine de Medici brought with her when she married the King of France. As for the Middle Eastern part of my usual repertoire, well, we don't have any extant recipes from that part of the world that require any sort of pig product for obvious reasons. I am allergic to pork. When I re-create recipes from the medieval Islamic world, I don't have to make as many changes and substitutions as I do for many Western recipes. Plus, food from that part of the world tends to taste good then as now.

The thing is, I don't want to be a one-trick pony. I don't want to be known as just a Middle Eastern cook. I want to be a cook, period, one who can handle a variety of recipes and origins and flavors. Maybe – and this is a shocking thought to even hold – there is someone out there who does not care for the flavors of the medieval Islamic world. What can I do for them? This year for the big medieval event up in Maine I made a concerted effort to find at least one Western dish to serve my guests. The website, www.medievalcookery.com, has cookbooks from all over the world posted. Some of them are books I haven't seen available in any other format. I went to the website and found some recipes from the Netherlands. I'm a New Yorker born and bred. This book comes from 1510, which is well before the founding of New Amsterdam, but I like to think that a dish like this would certainly have been known to the settlers there. Certainly all of the ingredients would have been relatively easy to come by in either location.

The only change I made when re-creating this recipe was to omit the eggs. Perhaps this was inappropriate, but I was serving this at a camping event with minimal refrigeration and potentially scorching heat. There is absolutely no mention in the original recipe of cooking or in any other way applying heat to the eggs, and before you say "But they didn't die so they must have cooked the eggs somehow," think about the recipe for a traditional Caesar salad dressing. So I left them out in the interests of public safety. I did have to substitute my usual juice combination for the verjuice. I served this up with some roasted beef and it was quite popular.

Sauce for Beef (makes enough to serve with beef for about 25 people; approx. $0.27/serving)

½ cup breadcrumbs

¾ cup white grape juice

¼ cup lime juice

6 Granny Smith apples, diced

6 garlic cloves, crushed

2 tablespoons olive oil

Equipment:

• Sauté pan
• Large bowl
• Immersion blender

1. Heat the oil in the sauté pan.
2. Add the apples. Sauté until they are very soft.
3. Transfer the contents of the sauté pan to the bowl.
4. Add the breadcrumbs, juice combination and garlic cloves. Use the immersion blender to process to a thick paste.
5. Serve alongside roasted beef.

 

 

Recipe: Carrot Barida

Recipe Source: al-Warrāq, Ibn Sayyār. Annals of the Caliphs' Kitchens. Nawal Nasrallah, trans. Brill Press, Leiden, 2007 pp. 228 – 9.

I made this dish for our big Saturday evening dinner at that camping event up in Maine that I've mentioned. I try to keep the recipes for that event medieval and I really needed a vegetable side dish. It needed to be something that would travel well, preferably without refrigeration, and something that would serve a lot of people. If it served a lot of people for a little money that would be even better. In that respect, this dish worked out even better than intended. Personally, I detest carrots, so I was never going to care much for this dish. Other people certainly seemed to enjoy it, though.

I didn't make a whole lot of changes, as is usually the case when I'm working on a medieval recipe. My fresh herbs were parsley and marjoram – I'd have added cilantro but I found out that one of our guests does not care for cilantro. The murrī became soy sauce, which is a widely accepted substitute. I was out of ground ginger quite unexpectedly, so I had to leave both that and the spikenard out. The rue became rosemary, as rue is no longer considered appropriate for culinary use and rosemary is at least a vaguely similar plant.

Carrot Bārida (serves about 50; approx. $0.14/serving)

5 pounds carrots, peeled and sliced

2 onions, chopped

¼ bunch marjoram, chopped

¼ bunch parsley, chopped

½ cup olive oil

½ cup red wine vinegar

½ cup soy sauce

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

½ teaspoon ground pepper

1 teaspoon ground calangal

½ teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon caraway seeds

½ teaspoon ground cloves

3 sprigs of rosemary, chopped

Equipment:

• Large saucepan
• Saute pan

1. Fill the saucepan with salted water and bring to a boil.
2. Add the carrots and boil until tender. Drain.
3. Heat the oil in the sauté pan.
4. Add the onions. Saute until golden and very soft.
5. Add the remaining ingredients up to the rosemary. Saute until fragrant.
6. When you are ready to serve this dish, arrange the carrots on a platter.
7. Pour the mixture from the sauté pan over them.
8. Sprinkle the rosemary over the top and serve.

Recipe: Pomegranate Sauce

Recipe Source: Martino of Como. The Art of Cooking. Luigi Ballerini, ed. Jeremy Parzen, trans. University of California Press, Berkeley, p. 134

We went to that big event for medieval history buffs up in Maine a little while ago, the same one we go to every year. Every year we cook a big dinner and share it with anyone who shows up. I do try to keep the menu relatively medieval, although I wasn't so successful with that this year. Anyway, the main course this year was roasted beef (cooked, as usual, in the Big Green Egg) served with a couple of different sauces. This was one of the sauces involved.

Now, if you happen to own a copy of Martino's The Art of Cooking, you may be a tad confused by the title and citation. There is no recipe for pomegranate sauce listed on page 134 of the book. There is, however, a recipe for lemon sauce. If you look a little more closely at that recipe you'll notice that pomegranate juice is a recommended variation. Me, I'm a huge fan of pomegranate. Given the opportunity to make something nice and pomegranate-y I took it. The only significant change I made was my usual verjus substitution, consisting of white grape juice and lime juice. If you can get verjus use it.

Pomegranate Sauce (makes enough sauce for approx. 50 servings of beef; approx. $0.14/ea.)

2 cups almond milk

1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

2 teaspoons fresh ginger

1 pinch saffron

1 cup pomegranate juice

¾ cup white grape juice

¼ cup lime juice

Equipment:

• Saucepan
• Bowl
• Fine strainer

1. Combine the almond milk, ginger, cinnamon and saffron in the saucepan.
2. Bring to a boil then simmer 3 – 4 minutes or until fragrant.
3. Pour the almond mixture through the strainer into a bowl.
4. Add the pomegranate juice, white grape juice and lime juice. Combine thoroughly.
5. Serve cold or at room temperature.

Recipe: Iraqi Flat Bread

Recipe Source: This recipe is a combination of the khubuz al-Tannour recipe from Nawal Nasrallah's Delights from the Garden of Eden and Ibn Sayyār al-Warrāq's Nabatean Water Bread recipe from Annals of the Caliphs' Kitchens, which was translated by Nawal Nasrallah. Some of my own adaptations have been included here.

So, I've had my eye on a particular recipe in Annals of the Caliphs' Kitchens for a while. The recipe is for a bread called Nabatean water bread and it's used as a base for some other dishes, such as a tharid that was supposed to be served on Nabatean water bread. I was also enthusiastic about this recipe because I've been assured several times that there are no extant bread recipes from the medieval period because everyone just knew how to make bread. The thing is that something kept stopping me from working on this recipe. I think that the thing that stopped me was chemistry. Bread baking is chemistry. I barely passed chemistry. Also, the Nabatean water bread recipe called for seven and a half pounds of flour and I was doubtful as to whether or not my stand mixer could handle it. (I haven't been that kind to my stand mixer lately.) Dr. Nasrallah mentioned that she published a version of that recipe in her book on Iraqi cookery, Delights from the Garden of Eden. I had been planning on picking that book up anyway, so I decided to get myself a birthday present and ordered it from Amazon.com. Then I used the two to kind of adapt and make a version for me. I don't know how authentic it is, being, you know, not Iraqi. It is, however, delicious.

I do want to make a few notes about this recipe. The biggest change that I made was to use sugar to activate the yeast. Neither recipe called for sugar and I suppose it is entirely possible that the yeasts would have woken up on their own, but I just couldn't make myself do it. I dispensed with the stand mixer, using a combination of a wooden spoon and very, very wet hands. Keeping your hands wet is very, very important. If this is a problem for you do not make this bread. (Personally I'd recommend working it out, because this bread just plain rocks.) This dough takes on a life of its own. It devours everything in its path. (Is this because I used the sugar to activate the yeast, or is that common?) I thought it was going to eat the cat. It was absolutely worth it, though.

I made this to test a recipe for a class I was teaching on tannūr cookery at an even up in Maine and served our dinner on top of it. All three of us – me, my husband and our daughter – loved this bread. It has taken the place of pita in my heart. I'd like to try it with the combination of flours recommended in Dr. Nasrallah's modern version, I just didn't have enough of any of them. I'd like to think that this would be a great recipe for kids to help with, especially kids in the 2 – 5 year age range. They'll enjoy the messiness, the sponginess of the dough. The bread freezes remarkably well.

Iraqi Flat Bread (makes 16 small-to-medium sized breads; approx. $0.10/ea.)

1 ½ tablespoons active dry yeast

2 tablespoons raw sugar

4 ½ cups warm water

10 cups white bread flour (or a combination of white bread flour, whole wheat flour and wheat bran)

1 tablespoon kosher salt

Equipment:

• Big Green Egg or other tannūr like cooker. A brick oven will work. You can also make this in your oven and Dr. Nasrallah's book has extensive instructions on doing so.
• Very, very large bowl
• Aluminum foil
• Combine the yeast with the water and the sugar in a very, very large bowl.
• Set aside and wait until the yeast mixture becomes frothy.
• When the yeast is proofed, add the flour and salt. Stir with a wooden spoon until all the water is incorporated.
• Knead with wet hands until the dough is very soft and rather wet. Wet your hands every time the dough starts to stick to your hands. Cover and let rise about an hour in a warm place.
• Preheat your tannūr with a pizza stone to 500 ̊.
• Divide your dough into about 15 pieces. With wet hands, press each piece into a flat round disc. (I like to set them onto aluminum foil, Dr. Nasrallah prefers parchment paper.)
• Bake each piece directly on the pizza stone 10 minutes. Remove carefully and cool before serving.
• Important note: Do not stack the breads while they are cooling.

Recipe: Spicy Cabbage “Genghis Khan”

Recipe Source: Cramer, Marc. Imperial Mongolian Cooking. Hippocrene Books, New York, 2003 p. 169

Okay, I will be the first one to admit that Genghis Khan did not actually consume this dish cooked this way. He would have had no access to things like hot peppers or bell peppers, for one thing, and I'm not sure that vegetables made up a large part of the diet of the extremely nomadic horde. It's a really tasty dish, though.

What's that? Did Fearless actually refer to a cabbage dish as being "tasty?" Yes, yes I did and I'll tell you why: because it was tasty. I've been trying to find tasty cabbage recipes and I'll admit that it's hard because I've always hated cabbage. The thing is, we joined a CSA group this year. Cabbages of various types grow quite well in New England and well, I've paid for them. These are Napa cabbages. They are not nearly as "whiffy" as the abhorred green/white cabbage or red cabbage. I had a couple of them lying around and needed to use them up. I also needed a dish to bring to a big camping event we attended up in Maine this year. I decided that even though this was not a medieval dish it would do quite well for the purpose and I was right.

I made a few changes as you might expect. I had two cabbages so I used two cabbages, but I didn't increase the other quantities by a whole lot. I decided that whatever the title, the original recipe was somewhat lacking in spice so I decided to add three jalapenos to the dish. I also added cumin to the five spice powder because I like it. The Napa cabbage was also a change, but I've already discussed that. This dish went over extremely well at the Saturday night dinner. I highly recommend this if you should find yourself in possession of cabbage.

Spicy Cabbage "Genghis Khan" (Serves 20; approx. $0.76/serving)

2 heads Napa cabbage, cleaned and diced

1 ½ teaspoons kosher salt

3 onions, diced

3 jalapeno peppers, diced

1 ½ tablespoons olive oil

12 ounces sliced mushrooms

1 yellow bell pepper, sliced

1 orange bell pepper, sliced

1 teaspoon Chinese five spice powder

1 ½ teaspoons cumin

2/3 cup water

1 tablespoon cornstarch

1 tablespoon mushroom soy sauce

1 tablespoon Aleppo pepper or to taste

Equipment:

• Large bowl
• Large wok

1. Sprinkle the cabbage with the salt and let sit 40 minutes.
2. Heat the oil in the wok.
3. Add the onions and jalapenos. Sauté until the onions are transparent.
4. Add the remaining vegetables. Sauté until softened.
5. Add the cabbage. Sauté until just wilted.
6. Combine the water with the cornstarch and soy sauce. Add to the wok.
7. Cook until the sauce is thickened and serve.

Recipe: Chickpeas Sent Sovi

Recipe Source: Anonymous. The Book of Sent SovÍ. Joan Santanach, ed. Robin Vogelzang, trans. Barcino- Tamesis, Barcelona, 2008 pp. 146 – 7

I love Maine. I'm privileged to go up there once per year at least, for a large historical re-enactment gathering. This year my husband and I drove up separately, and I will freely admit to having been in a foul mood when I set out. It was the kind of mood that legends are made of, but once I crossed the border my mood improved. It's like the very air up there puts a smile on my face. Anyway, I usually cook a big dinner for the Saturday night meal at this gathering. I try to make most of the recipes actually medieval. This year I was less successful in that aspect than in other years, but I did manage to get a few new period recipes onto the table, and this was one of them.

I was trying for a good, substantial vegetarian entrée here, and I think I got it. The combination of almond milk and chickpeas should be very filling, and the herbs make it pleasantly aromatic. As is usually the case with my attempts at medieval re-creation recipes I haven't made a lot of changes from the original. In fact I'd say that the only change I made was to omit the marjoram, because I'd unexpectedly run out. I think that the original was intended for use with very fresh chickpeas, but since those are very difficult to come by I felt that using canned chickpeas was perfectly acceptable. They'd have used dried chickpeas if need be on a fasting day. I used my usual combination of lime juice and white grape juice for the unavailable verjuice. It travels well, providing that you have some means of reheating it, and despite being a vegan dish should appeal to a good variety of people. Vegetarian food, after all, shouldn't be a penance. I'd say it was a pretty successful dish, because I've been asked for the recipe. Without further ado, here it is.

Chickpeas Sent Sovi (serves about 20 as a side dish; approx. $0.30/serving)

3 15-oz cans chickpeas, drained and very thoroughly rinsed

3 cups almond milk

2 onions, chopped

3 tablespoons olive oil

Water

¾ cup white grape juice

¼ cup lime juice

¼ cup chopped fresh basil

¼ bunch chopped fresh parsley

Equipment:

• Large saucepan
• Medium saucepan
• Colander

1. Combine the white grape juice and the lime juice. Set aside. If you have verjuice, feel free to use 1 cup of verjuice instead of the juice mixture.
2. Bring a medium saucepan full of salted water to a boil.
3. Add the onions and cook for no more than three minutes – preferably more like two.
4. Drain the onions thoroughly.
5. Combine the chickpeas, almond milk, olive oil and onions in the large saucepan. Bring to a boil.
6. Reduce the heat and simmer until the chickpeas are tender but not falling apart.
7. Remove from heat. Add the juice mixture, basil and parsley.
8. Serve.