François Pierre La Varenne's 1653 Cream-Tart

Following on from my Turkish Omelette or “Aumelette à la Turque” from last week, I wanted to do something more from François Pierre La Varenne.  The pioneering French writer penned the most pivotal cookery book of the seventeenth century, paving the way for modern French cookery and thereby, influencing world cuisines in the coming centuries. That book was called the Le Cuisinier françois, translated as The French Cook a few years later; a follow-up was Le Pâtissier françois and was also translated as The Perfect Cook.   The omelette recipe and the recipe(s) I tackled this week come from the second work.

At Christmas time, I tried a full-sized neat (beef) tongue mince pie with a period recipe for puff pastry and the pastry was a pretty resounding failure, though the rest was pretty great.  I thought I would try puff pastry again, using a seventeenth century French recipe, instead of an eighteenth century English one.  Probably not surprisingly, the pastry was much better, though other parts of the dish were not – most especially the mush that was my first attempt at a crème de pâtissier.  I will get to all that in my comments but here, first, is a workable recipe for “a Cream-Tart, according to the Pastrymen’s usual form and manner” (une tourte à la crême de pâtissier) made with period(ish) pastry cream and puff pastry (pâte feuilletée).  It comes from comparing the recipes in Le Pâtissier françois (1653) and its often-poor translation The Perfect Cook (1656).  Today’s entry is just my modern adjusted recipe; in the coming days, I will present more of my struggles and some history.

Cream-Tart Recipe

Ingredients:

• Puff pastry for a 10-inch tart pan plus decorative strips - about 300g (see period recipe below)   
• 1 batch of adapted Pastrymen’s Cream (see recipe below) – the original recipe calls for 3 scoops, each the size of an egg. Also see notes for an even more modern cheat.
• 120g butter 
• 50g of sugar plus more for sprinkling
• ½ tsp cinnamon
• 30g currents
• 10g of pine nuts 
• 35g of candied lemon peel

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 205°C/400°F.

Melt your butter in a medium saucepan over medium/low heat.

Add your prepared cream, sugar, cinnamon, currents, pine nuts and peel.

Stir vigorously with a wooden spoon to combine.

Remove from heat and set aside.

Roll out 2/3 (200g) of your puff pastry big enough to fit a 10-inch pie or tart pan. 

Roll onto your rolling pin. Place on tart pan and roll back off, leaving the pastry.  Gently push into the pan. 

Trim edges and then aside and cover any excess, along with remaining 100g of pastry.

Poor cream mixture into pastry shell in pan.

Roll out remain puff pastry and cut into strips.  

Place strips over cream filling as the period translation says: “separated the one from the other, at a pretty distance.” Pinch at the edges to attach to rim of crust. 

Bake in the middle of the oven for approximately 25 minutes until just beginning to colour.

Remove and sprinkle more sugar over the surface of the tart.

Return to the oven for 5 minutes or until a deep golden colour. 

Serve warm.

Puff Pastry (called in the period books “leaved pastry” or “pâte feuilletée”)

Ingredients:

• 475g / 3.25cups of flour plus extra for dusting
• 7g of salt 
• 1 cup water plus extra if needed.
• 225g / 1cup of butter, chilled.

Instructions:

On a large, clean work surface, make a mound of your flour.

Make a well in the centre of the mound.

Add salt to the well.

A small amount at a time, pour your water into the well and work it into the flour and salt mixture, first using a fork then your hands.  

Continue to add water just until you get a smooth, firm dough, adding flour if it gets too sticky. 

Form a squarish ball and allow to rest 30 minutes. 

Roll pastry out as square as you can, about an inch/2.5cm thick.

Cut or shave thin slices off your butter and cover the centre of your pastry, leaving space at the corners.

Fold the corners to the centre and pinch together seams so that the butter is completely enclosed.

Working carefully, roll out your pastry, with the butter inside, to an inch-thick square again.  

Dust your pastry with flour.

Fold the corners to the centre again.

Roll out and fold in another 3 times.

Cover and keep cool until using. 

Crème de Pâtissier or a Pastry Cream 

Ingredients:

315ml / 1 1/3 cup of whole milk, divided

2 eggs, divided

40g / 4 ½ tbsp of flour

56g / 4 tbsp of butter

Instructions:

Put 250ml of milk in a skillet on medium heat.

Meanwhile beat 1 egg in a medium bowl.

Whisk in your flour. 

Whisk in remaining (85ml) milk.  You should have a thin batter-like mixture at this point.

Break your second egg into the mixture and whisk to beat egg and combine. 

When your milk on the stove just comes to a boil, add a spoonful or 2 of it to your egg/flour mixture.  Whisk to temper.  

Reduce heat to low. 

Add the egg mixture, a little at a time to the milk on the stove.  Stir constantly until combined.

Add your butter and again stir well to combine. 

Allow to cook on low heat for about five minutes.  The mixture will thicken and even congeal, this will work itself out baking in the tart. 

Set aside. 

Notes: 

If you can find store-bought crème pâtissier, you could use 3 heaping tablespoons of it in place of the tricky period pastry cream.  However, the seventeenth century version does not have sugar or vanilla which most modern crème pat does. If using omit the sugar from the tart recipe itself but save some for sprinkling.  

You will probably have extra puff pastry left over from the above recipe

I will save most of my failures/adjustments for tomorrow’s entry but I was generally pleased with the lamination and taste of this puff pastry and, in the end, the filling has a really nice flavour and decent texture. The pine nuts and lemon peel added things beyond just sweet and the savoury notes were welcomed. In hindsight, you probably don’t need or want puff pastry as the base of this tart as it gets a little dense but it was very nice on the top.  

Eggs in Moonshine (Not that Kind) From 1660 and Before.

As a follow-up to my Omelette in the Turkish Mode from yesterday, I present some fairly simple instructions for another one of the many egg dishes that Robert May included in his 1660 The Accomplisht Cook. I made this sweeter treatment of eggs the same day as the omelette – it acting like a kind of dessert - but ran out of time to fully write up both recipes. The dish has a bit of  history and is probably referenced by the Bard, himself. Unfortunately, or fortunately as the case maybe, “moonshine” seemingly only came to mean what it does today in the late eighteenth century, over one hundred years after Robert May talked about cooking eggs in it. No homemade alcohol in this one, but read on for what was actually a pretty interesting and tasty way to cook eggs. Once again, recipe first, then some explanation.

Eggs in Moonshine Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 sprig of rosemary
• Juice of half an orange
• Juice of half a lemon
• A dash of white wine vinegar (optional)
• 56g/ 2oz/ 4 tbsp of butter
• 2g/ ½ tsp of sugar plus more to taste for sprinkling
• 4 eggs
• A generous pinch of salt
• A generous pinch of cinnamon
• Soldiers ie. toasted or fried strips of bread (optional)

Instructions

In a small bowl, place your rosemary in your orange juice. This will allow it to steep a little before you use it. Set aside.

If you want a bit more bite to a sweet dish, add your dash of vinegar to another small bowl containing your lemon juice and also set aside.

On medium-high heat, heat your butter in a medium frying pan until foaming.

Add your orange juice with the rosemary sprig, along with your sugar, to the pan. Stir with a wooden spoon to combine. Continue to cook until boiling and the mixture is looking a little syrupy.

Turn the heat down to medium-low.

Move the rosemary sprig into the middle of the pan and carefully break your 4 eggs around it. Cook to your desired doneness but I recommend leaving the yolks runny or at least custardy.

\

Take out rosemary sprig and discard.

Carefully remove the eggs to a serving platter.

Salt your eggs. Sprinkle over cinnamon and sugar (if you like sweet) and your lemon juice (and vinegar) to balance it out.

Serve, with soldiers if desired.

Historical Thoughts on “Moonshine” and “Eggs”

I have yet to figure out why exactly these eggs are “in Moonshine.” In Robert May’s time, the word was used as you would “sunshine” today. An insult that shows up in period writing is calling someone a dog who barks at the shine rather than the moon itself. In a text on a religious debate, one writer says of his opposition: “they bark at moonshine now and then, To show that they are Dogs rather then Men.” Maybe from this meaning and the fleeting nature of the moon's light, “moonshine” also meant something ephemeral and useless. Another literary jab in a religious context actually uses the name of the dish itself. The writer contends: “There will be those that...if they can but shoot a Pellet or two of Latin now and then (though no more to the purpose than Eggs and Moonshine) they'll Huff and Strut with as much Scorn and Stateliness, as the One-eyed man is said to do amongst them that are stark Blind.” In other words, he is ridiculing those that get all uppity if they can use a bit of Latin, not realising it has no relevance to the matter at hand. Or at least no more than the egg dish does. This usage actually survives in semi-modern writing. C.S. Lewis has the character of Trumpkin (played by Peter Dinklage in the recent movie) dismiss Prince Caspian’s plans in the novel that bear's the young monarch's name in the Narnia series (1952). Trumpkin says: “your Majesty knows I think the Horn--and that bit of broken stone over there and your great King Peter--and your Lion Aslan--are all eggs in moonshine.”

There is another possible instance of the dish being referenced in William Shakespeare’s King Lear. The Earl of Kent is a supporter of the King in the play and in one scene, he challenges Oswald, the chief steward of Goneril, the monarch’s antagonistic daughter. (Warning: some period insulting language incoming). In trying to instigate a duel, he yells: “Draw you rogue, for though it be night, yet the Moon shines, I 'll make a sop o' th' Moonshine of you, you whoreson Cullionly Barber-monger, draw.” A “cullion” is a vile person, coming from the Old French and Latin words for testicles; a “barber-monger” is a vacuous person, overly concern about their appearance and therefore, over-frequenting their barber. The rest should be self-explanatory. The threat from Kent is he will make Oswald a limp sop – bread or the like – used to mop up the culinary liquid of “moonshine.” Moonshine only seems to show up in cookery books in the context of eggs and/in moonshine, so as I said, this may be a reference to the dish I made.

Shakespeare was writing over fifty years before May’s 1660 book but a recipe for the dish shows up well before that. There is an anonymous collection of recipes from at least 1575 - but probably from the mid-sixteenth century - called A Proper newe Booke of Cokerye. An electronic version is hosted by the University of Giessen in Germany. One entry is instructions “To make egges in moneshyne.” With modern spellings, it reads: “Take a dish of rosewater and a dishful of sugar, and set them upon a chaffing dish, and let them boil, then take the yolks of 8 or 10 eggs new laid and put them thereto everyone from [an]other, and so let them harden a little, and so after this manner serve them forth and cast a little cinnamon and sugar upon them.” In the period, a chaffing dish was a dish on a tripod raised well above the coals, providing a lower level of heat than more direct methods.

Robert May, like he seems to do with most things, expounds and elaborates on this idea. As you can see from the images above, he provided five different versions of “Eggs in Moonshine.” The third one is a more expensive and elaborate version of the recipe from the earlier cookery book. He uses rosewater and sugar but adds wine to the syrup and adds opulent ambergris with the eggs. His first two versions don’t have a syrup but have a sauce of onions, nutmeg and, in one case, verjuice – the juice of unripe grapes or other sour fruit. The fourth uses eight or ten eggs as specified by the earlier recipe, cooked in butter with a sauce of orange and lemon juice. I based my effort on the last version which is a variation of the one that came before but combines the syrup and some rosemary with a tart sauce, as well as, sugar and cinnamon.

General Thoughts on My Adaption

Overall, I halved May’s and the earlier recipes’ proportions. I picked the last version in The Accomplisht Cook, again, in the pursuit of practicality and interest: I had rosemary not rosewater but that flavour also seemed an intriguing addition. The fourth and fifth version also had actual quantities listed for at least the eggs and the butter, which is always helpful. I did not have verjuice, so I added a splash of white wine vinegar to my finishing lemon juice. I had sippets/soldiers/strips of fried bread leftover from the omelette so I used them. May does not call for them in this dish, but I think they make an important addition.

My version of Eggs in Moonshine was really nice and was not far off from modern taste profiles. You can just get a bit of rosemary, which adds something different. It was certainly sweet but the vinegar and lemon and the savoury egg yolk cut through that. I found that as the yolk cooled, it felt and maybe therefore tasted more like custard.

Next week, something sweet again, not sure what - but probably from The Perfect Cook ie. Le Pâtissier françois. 

Robert May's (sort of) 1660 Turkish Omelette

Robert May produced one of the most extensive and certainly most elaborate cookery books of the seventeenth century in The Accomplisht Cook (1660). He manages to even make some of his egg dishes quite opulent with the use of expensive ingredients like ambergris. This would have been rare but not surprising in upper class circles, at least. It is said that eggs and ambergris was Charles II’s favourite food, but not having the budget or access to the sperm whale secretion, we will skip that recipe for now. Instead, I have adapted for you a set of instructions May presents for an omelette, in this case “according to the Turkish mode,” as well as, one of his recipes for “Eggs in Moonshine.” 

I will start with the omelette as the Eggs in Moonshine is kind of desserty, at least according to our current tastes. Because of time and space, I will share that second recipe tomorrow. The modern recipe will be given, then the historic instructions and some explanation of my choices will follow. 

Recipe for An Omlet, the Sixteenth Way According to the Turkish Mode 

Ingredients 

• 50g of fatty bacon or pancetta, diced. (Unsmoked would be the most authentic) 
• A dinner roll or equivalent of bread, cut into short strips. 
• 100g finely minced venison, pre-cooked as you like. (The period recipe calls for hare or any venison, by which it means any game. Any leftover red meat would work.) 
• 50g of chestnuts, roasted, peeled and diced fine. (The recipe says you can also use pistachios, almonds, hazelnuts, pine nuts – called pine-apple-kernels or little pieces of bread roasted as you would chestnuts.) 
• Leaves from a sprig of thyme, minced. 
• A large sage leaf, minced. 
• A very small bunch of curly parsley, minced. 
• A grind of sea salt. 
• A grind of pepper. 
• 4 eggs, lightly beaten. 
• 50g of premade or leftover gravy, warmed. 
• A generous pinch of nutmeg 
• Butter for frying 
• A half a lemon cut into rounds. 

Instructions 

In a large frying pan, on medium heat, cook your bacon until crisp and then set aside in a medium bowl. 

In the same pan, adding a little butter if needed, fry your bread strips until coloured and crisp, then set aside. 

To the bowl with the cooked bacon, add your venison, chestnuts, parsley, thyme and sage. Season with a grind of salt and pepper each. Mix well and set aside. 

Wash your frying pan and return to the heat, turned down to medium low. 

Melt enough butter to cover the bottom of the pan. 

Pour your eggs into the pan and make an omelette: allow to cook until the bottom is just set and then push around the edges with a spatula. Move the pan around so the uncooked egg on top flows into the spaces you have made at the edges. 

Before everything is set, add your venison mixture to one half of your omelette. Fold the other half over but not completely, so as to allow some of the meat to be seen by the diner. Allow to cook a few more seconds to warm your filling. 

With a large spatula or turner, carefully move the omelette to a serving plate. 

Pour gravy over exposed meat. 

Sprinkle over your pinch of nutmeg. 

Squeeze out the end lemon slice and place the rest around the omelette. 

Place fried bread strips around as well. 

Serve. 

Historical and Critical Thoughts 

Robert May includes twenty-one omelette recipes in his section on eggs. The first thing that should be said about this one and most of them is that they are not his own. An omelette in “The Seventeenth manner, being an Omelet according to the Turkish mode” appears in The Perfect Cook which was published in 1656, four years before May’s book. Many of the instructions in this recipe are copied word for word. However, The Perfect Cook is actually a translation of Le Pâtissier françois (1653) by François Pierre La Varenne. The French book's version is called “Aumelette à la Turque.” La Varenne was a ground-breaking writer who first put to print some of the budding fundamentals of modern cookery in Le Cuisinier françois, a few years earlier. An English translation of his first book - called The French Cook, The Perfect Cook and May’s The Accomplisht Cook were all published by a Nathaniel Brooke at the sign of the Angel in Cornhill, London. 

A 1678 edition of The Accomplisht Cook

The frontispiece and titlepage of The Perfect Cook,
translation (uncredited) of Le Pâtissier françois (1653).
Courtesy of the Folger Library online collection.

The frontispiece of the  
Le Pâtissier françois
from the
Bibliothèque nationale de France 

The original French recipe text from 
Le Pâtissier françois

May does act as a bit of an editor for La Varenne’s recipes, both in the original French and as translated in The Perfect Cook. The translation has twenty-five recipes for “Omelets of Eggs, or Pancakes of Herbs,” and May omits and replaces some, sticking to just twenty-one omelettes. The English cook also pares down a number of recipes. 

For instance, as seen in the image above, May ends the recipe printed in his book with the somewhat terse: “Roast-meat is the best for this purpose.” He is referring to the option he puts forth in the middle of the instructions: to use raw meat, which you must fry first. The Perfect Cook explains this in more but somewhat redundant detail: “Moreover, if your Hares flesh, or other Venison be roasted, it is so much the better, and you shall then only need to mince and season it, as it hath been aforesaid, and so proceed to make your Omelet, which when it is half fried or baked, add your said minced meat unto it, and so make up your Omelet. And by default of Venison you may make your said Omelet of any other ordinary meat whatsoever.” 

That and another option May cuts from La Varenne’s translated instructions lead into the choices I made in my modern version. I had leftover venison cooked with a broth in a slow cooker, so I used that for the filling and I poured over the liquid, thickened to gravy, in the finishing stage. The recipe as seen in The Perfect Cook says: “after which pour some Mutton broth upon your said minced meat, or the gravy of some other roast meats,” while May just says “gravy.” My version was probably too thick - in the North American style – as compared to what they had in mind but I enjoy it that way. 

In my venison mixture, I used chestnuts, partially because I had some ready-peeled and roasted left over from Christmas. I chose them over pine nuts and others I had around because, venison and chestnuts are a trusted flavour combination; so, in the end it was both nice and easier. I went slightly off book with some of the rest of that mixture. I salted it as the recipe says but the only spice I used was pepper, the leftover venison had been seasoned before. The period instructions call for a little “fines herbes” in French and “sweet herbs” in English. Today “fine herbs” means chervil, chives, parsley and tarragon but that was not explicitly defined until the beginning of the twentieth century. I went with, again, what I had and what I thought would work: thyme, sage and parsley. 

Both the French and English versions of the recipe are explicit about presenting your omelette so the venison can be seen, which I did at least partially.

The eating of this was quite nice in the end, with the omelette itself fading into the background quite a bit. The venison with the sweetness of the chestnuts and the savoury herbs and gravy was the best and most prominent part. The lemon added brightness, the nutmeg smoothness and maybe the sippets or soldiers or strips of fried bread roll would have been more useful if the gravy was thinner. 

Tomorrow: "Eggs in Moonshine," which is probably not what you think but another that Robert May almost certainly took from somewhere else. 

A Peas-Soop for Fast Days - Hannah Glasse's 1747 Recipe

My intention this week was to make something a little different: maybe simpler and maybe healthier, probably without meat. I kind of got there; it wasn’t that simple as you can see. It is probably a bit healthier but the eighteenth century still likes its butter and it uses anchovies and spit peas for protein. To find this, I went to the go-to cookery writer of the 1700s – Hannah Glasse. She has a section in The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy (1747) entitled “For a Fast-Dinner, a Number of good Dishes, which you may make use of for a Table at any other Time.” She was not referring to the timing of these dinners, they were meant for Church of England fast days – days without meat, most often Fridays. Under that heading, she provides this recipe for “A Peas-Soop.” 

Modern Recipe Adaptation 

Ingredients 

• 454g/1lbs/2cups of dry split green peas, rinsed and picked through 
• About 4.5L of water, divided 
• 5 anchovy filets, drained, divided 
• 3g/1 tsp mixed peppercorns 
• 3g/1 scant tsp mace plus a small pinch 
• 2 whole cloves 
• A bundle of sprigs of mixed herbs (I used 1 sage, 1 oregano, 1 thyme and 1 bay leaf) 
• ½ large onion, the half cut into thirds 
• A good handful of celery leaves 
• 1 tbsp dried mint 
• 4 large celery stalks, chopped relatively small 
• 250g of fresh spinach, divided 
• 300g of French bread or rolls, you need at least some crust left whole for the presentation (I used three rolls I made - altered slightly - from this period recipe adaption - https://savoringthepast.net/2012/07/09/18th-century-no-knead-french-bread )  
• 25g/5 tsp of butter, divided 
• 1 egg, beaten 
• 15g/1 tbsp flour 
• A large pinch of nutmeg 
• Salt to taste

Some quick notes:

• If you want an easier modern version of things, you will need some cheesecloth for a bouquet garni and a blender, otherwise some food safe string for the bundle of herbs, a good sieve or chinois and your pots. 
• This version of the recipe takes about 3 hours, if you don't make your own bread. 
• I generally halved Glasse’s ingredients though I found, maybe because my split peas were drier and/or I am in a drier climate, I needed more water than that ratio. 
• I could not find sorrel for the bread balls and did not use extra spinach or mint for garnish. 

Instructions 

- Begin by adding your split peas to 2.5L of water in a large pot over high heat. Bring them to a full boil then reduce the heat to medium-low to keep at a low boil. Cook until somewhat soft - about 1 1/2 hours - adding water as needed to keep the peas well covered. 

I needed to add another 1L at various points.

- When peas are soft, add 4 of your anchovy filets, the peppercorns, 3g of mace, the cloves, herb bundle, onion, celery leaves and mint. Add another 500ml of water at this point to make sure everything is covered. 

Glasse's recipe calls for 2 anchovies, which I presume means whole fish, so my halving everything else in mind, I still went with 4 fillets to replace some of the flavour the rest of the fish would provide. Also, I did not salt anything until the end, partially because modern anchovy filets are salted. 

If you want to make things easier than what I attempted, make a kind of bouquet garni at this point. Put your peppercorns, cloves and herbs (they don’t need to be in a bundle) in a small square of cheese cloth, tie that up to make a little bag and add.) 

- Cover and boil this mixture until the peas are completely falling apart, about another hour. 

- While this cooks, put your chopped celery stalks and 2 handfuls of spinach in a medium pot over medium heat with 500ml of water. Stew until celery is tender, about 15 minutes. Drain and reserve. 

I did not, as Glasse says, cook this until the water was almost “wasted” or boiled away.

- Make your garnishes while these both cook. 

- Halve two French rolls, if using, and hollow them out carefully. If using bread, cut about 5 cm off each end and hollow those out. Reserving the crumb (inside) in both instances. 

As I mentioned, I used “18th Century No-Knead French Bread” by Kevin Carter at the link above. I, however, made it into 5 rolls and cooked them on a pizza stone, not in a Dutch oven, for 25 minutes.) 

- In a medium frying pan, fry these hollow crusts in 5g of butter until they take on a little more colour. Set aside. 

- In the same pan, cook 3 handfuls of spinach in 15g of butter. Season with salt to taste and fill the hollow crust of the bread or buns. Set aside. 

- In small bowl, mash up your last anchovy fillet and a handful of spinach with a wooden spoon. Add your beaten egg, your reserved bread crumb, a small pinch of mace, a large pinch of nutmeg and your flour. Mix all these together with your hands and form 5 or 6 small balls. 

- With another 5g of butter in your frying pan, fry these balls on medium-low. Turn occasionally until they are crisp and coloured on all sides. Set aside. 

- Cut or break up the last French roll or 125g of your bread. In another 5g of butter, make croutons by frying the pieces until just crisp. Set aside. 

- When the peas are falling apart, remove the soup from the heat and strain through a large sieve or chinois into a very large bowl or another pot. Grab your herb bundle and any large onion pieces or celery leaves and discard. When all the liquid is through the sieve, continue to press the peas against the side with a wooden spoon or similar. You are going to be pressing hard and doing a little work, so the sieve should be fairly solid. The more of the solid you can mash into the liquid in the bowl, the more body and flavour you are adding. When you have pushed most of the solids through, scrape the outside of the sieve into the bowl and return the soup from the bowl to the pot and place back on the heat. 

My grandmother passed on a heavy-duty chinois with a pestle for this, so it was slightly easier for me. Easier still would be using the cheesecloth bouquet garni I mentioned earlier, discarding it and then using a hand blender to puree everything while still in the pot. Alternatively, you could let it cool a little and puree it in batches in a traditional blender. 

- You should now have 5 components – the pea soup, celery and spinach, spinach-filled bread crusts, the bread-spinach balls and croutons. 

- Add the celery and spinach mixture to the soup and heat just long enough to bring them up to temperature. Taste and salt your finished soup. Ladle it into bowls, place a filled crust in the middle, add a ball or two and some croutons. Serve. 

Closing Thoughts 

This was an interesting and really decent dish. The prevailing background flavour in the soup was mint, which was nice and a bit different. The garnishes were welcomed and make it look like you made an effort, which you did. The balls with the tastes of spinach, anchovy, mace and nutmeg were the most unique part of it. 

Most cookery books over the centuries I have been covering make some mention of fast day meals like this one, often having dedicated bills of fare for such times. In an effort to not have meat all the time, I will probably delve into them again. 

Hannah Glasse, as I have mentioned in previous entries, is probably the most successful cookery writer of the eighteenth century, not personally maybe, but surely in terms of the influence - credited and otherwise -  that her published recipes had on English cuisine. You can see a lot of modern elements beginning to develop in her dishes and she will continue to be a regular source for my future adaptions. 

The frontispiece and titlepage from 1777 edition of
The Art of Cookery

Next week, we go back to the seventeenth century with Robert May and some egg recipes, including one for an omelette “according to the Turkish mode” that I will make with venison.