Pleyne Delit: Medieval Cookery for Modern Cooks ed. by Constance B. Hieatt, Brenda Hosington, Sharon Butler

Abstract

REVIEWS Constance B. Hieatt, Brenda Hosington, and Sharon Butler, eds., Pleyne Délit: Medieval Cookery for Modern Cooks. 2nd ed. and rev. (Toronto: Uni­ versity of Toronto Press, 1996). xxviii 172. $45.00 (U.S.) cloth, $17.95 paper. To produce some 140 medieval recipes in modern English with transcriptions from their sources might seem to be a straightforward if time-consuming scholarly task. But one soon discovers that the results are so unique that they are unlikely ever to be emulated. For the editors enjoyed a remarkable empirical approach. They tackled and tested the recipes hands-on, seemingly with as much zest as medieval cooks whose practical jokes in the kitchen included making a pot boil uncontrollably (by adding soap) and producing meat that appeared to be full of worms. Thus, despite the interest in the subject that was treated as far back as Apicus in Roman times, despite the numerous works that wholly or partially describe medieval cookery, no one has attempted to follow the example set in the first edition of Pleyn Délit edited and published by Constance B. Hieatt and the late Sharon Butler in 1976. A recent claim that culinary history has only become a serious field of study in the last few decades is obviously not true; nor can we agree that previously the study of food was regarded as “comic and trivial; rarely rising above the level of Charles Laughton, drumstick in hand, playing Henry vill.” In 1863 a fourteenth-century Tuscany collection with many recipes from earlier Latin manuscripts was published, and, in 1896, from France came the late fourteenth-century Le Ménagier de Paris. The Early English Text Society also published culinary works from earlier times, and some of these appear in a useful bibliography and index in the second edition of Pleyn Délit. Certainly the study of culinary manuscripts has become more extensive than it was, and two published in 1992 are of par­ ticular relevance to our study: Du manuscrit à table: Essais sur la cuisine à moyen âge ... , edited by Carole Lambert, and La Sociabilité à table, edited by Martin Aurell, Olivier Dumoulin, and Françoise Thélamon. Lambert’s work ranges over recipes from France, Italy, the Arab world, Holland, Spain, and Newfoundland, and also includes culinary items to be found everywhere English Studies in Canada, 23, 1 , March 1997 from Aberystwyth to Wolfenbiittel. Constance Hieatt herself contributes substantially to the first volume and throws light on some of the difficulties inherent in the study of various manuscripts compiled by writers who may know nothing about cooking or be able to cook but not to write. The first edition of Pleyn Délit depended on printed texts. Then a study of the manuscripts began, and Brenda Hosington published a French version on Pain, Vin et Veneison in 1977. Curye in Inglysch: English Culinary Manuscripts of the Fifteenth Century (including the ‘Forme of Curye’) by Hieatt and Butler appeared in 1985. After publishing a fifteenth-century collection of recipes, An Ordinance of Pottage, in 1988, Hieatt with her colleagues’ assistance produced this present volume. This new edition rep­ resents a fundamental revision and includes new recipes. It is the result of years of intensive study and practical application, and is a striking testimony to the scholarly integrity of all three participants, Constance Hieatt, Sharon Butler, and Brenda Hosington. In an age of “fast food,” when abominations such as pizza (which I once thought was modern American speech for “piece of” ) seem to be a weekly or even daily fare, when the custom of shamelessly “grazing” from the fridge is common, one admires the editors’ faith in the existence of keen and enter­ prising cooks. One must hope that the recent Cooking with Three Ingredients which aims “to make gourmet cooks of just about any kitchen klutz” does not fairly indicate the limitations of most people’s current culinary aspirations. For the imaginative and determined cook all the recipes seem possible, and the results should taste delicious. For the wistful browser a close read­ ing is also to be recommended both for the intriguing descriptions of the ingredients of the dishes, and for details that give a brief but...