Apicius 6.2.14 & 6.8.14: Stuffed Chicken With A Cumin Raisin Sauce

I had tried the stuffed chicken part of this recipe a couple weeks ago, but didn't like the balance of seasonings (it was far too mild); tonight I tried it again and liked it a lot better. It also seemed to need a sauce of some kind, as it was a bit dry without the stuffing, so I went with 6.2.14, Sauce for various birds.

The chicken recipe:

[6.8.14] pullus farsilis: pullum sicut in iure cuminato. a ceruice expedies. teres piper ligusticum gengiber pulpam cesam aliquam elixam, teres cerebellum ex iure coctum. oua confringis et commiscis ut unum corpus efficias. liquamine temperas et oleum modice; mittis piper integrum, nucleos abundantes. fac inpensam et imples pullum uel porcellum ita ut laxamentum habeat. similiter in capo facies. ossibus eiectis coques.

6.8.14: Stuffed chicken: the chicken (is prepared) as if (served) with a cumin sauce. Draw the chicken from the neck, pound pepper, lovage, ginger, chopped meat, boiled alica, pounded brains cooked in stock; break eggs and stir them all to make a smooth mixture. Flavour with liquamen and a little oil, add whole peppercorns and plenty of pine nuts. Make the stuffing and fill the chicken or piglet in such a way that some space remains. You can do the same with a capon. Cook with the bones taken out.

Now. Once again, I'm an American, and a New Englander at that. So, besides the fact that I'm not sure even where I would find brains for eatin', I'm really not inclined to try them. You can call me a wimp; I'm perfectly good with that. It does look like that in a lot of the recipes that call for brains they're used as a binder. I made do with just the egg.

I liked the look of this recipe (brains notwithstanding) because it was one of the few that called for ginger, and that sounded interesting. I don't know, now, if I got the proportions of alica (semolina) to meat right; I was (of course) thinking of bread stuffing, like made at Thanksgiving, but it occurs to me now that they might have wanted it more meat than 'filler'. The stuffing did have a lot in common with some of the sausage filling recipes earlier in the book; those I'd think should be mostly meat. Well, it came out nice anyway. I did go for the whole peppercorns as the recipe called for, so I may not be that much of a wimp, though I have to say I did rather regret it. I think I'd grind it next time, personally. But here's what I tried. It made rather a lot of stuffing, probably enough for four pieces of chicken, actually; since I was testing this I only used one piece, and put the rest of the stuffing to the side of the baking dish to cook with the chicken.

Oh, and the leftover pork was from the pork roast recipe a few posts down (linked in just below in the recipe here). I've found my favorite mix for the honey glaze is a few ground peppercorns, a tablespoon of honey to a teaspoon of fish sauce, and a decent pinch of asafoetida.

1 boneless chicken breast (or half a chicken breast, if they're large)
1/4 teaspoon lovage or celery seed
1 tablespoon fresh minced ginger
1/2 cup diced cooked pork (preferably from a roast per 7.5.5)
1/4 cup semolina flour
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 teaspoon whole peppercorns
3 tablespoons pine nuts

Bring 1/2 cup of water to a boil in a saucepan; add the semolina and take off the heat, stirring until mostly smooth. Let cool a bit.

Grind the peppercorns and lovage or celery seed in a mortar; when a fine powder add the minced ginger and get as smooth as you can manage. Add the contents of the mortar, chopped meat, egg, liquamen, and oil to the semolina and mix till quite smooth. Toast the pine nuts and peppercorns in a dry pan until the pine nuts are lightly browned and fragrant; mix in with the semolina/meat mixture.

Butterfly the chicken breast and flatten it out a bit (I always whack it with the back of a knife); put about a 1/4 cup of the stuffing mix on one side then close it up like a book. Put in an oiled baking pan; you can smooth a little olive oil over the top too if you like. (Extra stuffing can be put in the pan with the chicken, or probably you should use like 4 or so pieces of chicken). Bake in a 350° F oven for 30-40 minutes, covering for the first 20 minutes or so, then uncovering it to crisp up a bit. Serve with the sauce below.

The sauce:

[6.2.14] ius in diuersis auibus: piper cuminum frictum ligusticum mentam uuam passam enucleatam aut damascena; mel modice. uino myrto temperabis, aceto liquamine et oleo. calefacies et agitabis apio et satureia.

6.2.14: Sauce for various birds: pepper, roasted cumin, lovage, mint, de-seeded raisins or damsons, a little honey. Flavour with myrtle wine, vinegar, liquamen and oil. Bring it to heat and stir it with a stick of celery and savory.

I went through the fowl chapter looking for a cumin sauce (since the stuffed chicken recipe mentioned one) and of several chose this one, as it looked like it would harmonize and seemed interesting. I used raisins, because I had a bunch soaking in port in the fridge for another batch of (faux) passum, and pre-soaked ones seemed like they'd be easiest to grind up. Damsons are a type of plum; I would guess that because the recipe says to use either them or raisins, that dried damsons are what it's calling for, i.e. prunes. I do have some on hand, but again went with the raisins because it was easiest for me, but you could certainly try it with prunes if that appeals.

I used to have some savory out in the herb garden; I can't remember now if it was summer (annual) savory or winter (perennial) savory; at any rate there's nothing growing out there now, so I added some dried savory in with the ground spices instead of stirring it with a twig. Also, I didn't have any celery in the house so didn't use it to stir. It didn't cook very long anyway, and I'm not sure quite how much flavor it would have imparted in the first place.

I did not have myrtle wine, and have no idea where I would even find any or how I might make some (since I'm guessing it's made with myrtle berries?), so used some of the raisin-soaked port, assuming it was a sweet sort of interesting wine being called for.

a few peppercorns
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin or cumin seeds
1/2 teaspoon lovage or celery seed
1/2 teaspoon savory
1 teaspoon dried mint
1 tablespoon raisins, soaked either in water or wine until soft
1 teaspoon honey
1 tablespoon sweet wine or passum
1 teaspoon vinegar
1/2 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1 teaspoon olive oil

Dry roast the cumin seeds, if using; grind the peppercorns and the cumin to a powder in a mortar, then add the savory and mint and grind them as well. Add the raisins and mash to a paste as smooth as you can manage. Add the honey, wine, vinegar, liquamen and olive oil and mix, then turn into a small saucepan and heat for a bit, then pour over the stuffed chicken above and serve.

This was good, if a little odd. We don't usually stuff one kind of meat with a different kind of meat, although it really is very Roman. Ginger does have an affinity with sweetened pork, so it worked, though as I was using the ubiquitous de-boned, de-skinned bland chicken breast the chicken part anyway wasn't exactly exciting. It would have been much better with the skin left on I think. The original recipe does say you can use a piglet instead of the chicken, so pork stuffed with pork might be more to modern tastes and one could use a thick pork chop butterflied to hold the stuffing. I think it came out pretty good, though; the second time around I did get enough ginger in there, though really personally I would skip the peppercorns and use ground. They were a bit much for me.

The sauce was quite good, very dark and very rich, just a little sweet and sour; there wasn't a whole lot of it, though, so if you make more than one piece of chicken you may wish to double (or even triple) the recipe. I suppose you could add a bit more wine to it too, without doing any harm.

Overall, I'd give it a B or so, so I'll consider it a keeper.

Apicius 5.6.3 Redux: Fava Beans in Pine Nut Mustard Sauce

So I gave this one a try again, having found some frozen fresh fava beans (i.e. not canned or dried). It came out quite nicely this time, and I think the frozen beans made all the difference. The Latin and the English, from Grocock and Grainger, once again:

[5.6.3] aliter: fabaciae ex sinapi trito melle nucleis ruta cumino; ex aceto inferuntur.

5.6.3. Alternatively: serve the beans (cooked) in some pounded mustard, honey, pine nuts, rue, cumin; serve with vinegar.

1 cup fresh frozen fava beans
1 teaspoon ground mustard
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon pine nuts
1/2 teaspoon cumin
sprig or two of rue, minced, to make about 1/2 teaspoon
vinegar to serve

Cook beans according to directions on the package (it took about a half hour of boiling for me).

Grind the cumin seeds (if you're not using ground) with the rue (if you can get it) in a mortar. Toast the pine nuts in a dry frying pan until golden brown and fragrant; transfer to the mortar and grind, adding the mustard to make a smooth dryish paste. Add the honey and mix; it should form a thick sticky mess.

When the beans are finished cooking, drain well and then toss with the sauce; the heat from the beans will thin it a bit. Sprinkle a little vinegar over and serve.

This definitely worked better this time, and was quite simple, especially given I didn't have any cumin seed so went with pre-ground. I did not, however have any rue, since it's still winter out there, but as I used it the last time I tried this recipe I think that amount should be fine. It was quite rich, and well balanced, and definitely had a nice kick with the ground raw mustard. It could be described as a hot mustard honey sweet and sour sauce.

I found I rather liked the fava beans, unlike last time when the choices I had were dried or canned; the frozen ones really did taste much, much, better. They don't seem that far off from lima beans, actually, mild and a little sweet, so if you can't find frozen fava beans frozen lima beans would work just as well.

So now I finally get to put this one with the keepers, yay!

Apicius 7.11.4 Redux: Peppered Sweets

So I gave this one another try tonight, after finally figuring out how to make really thick semolina without burning it. I was able, then, to roll them up like little truffles, the 'sweets' of the recipe title. Here, again, are the Latin and English, to refresh your memory:

[7.11.4] dulcia piperata: teres piper, mittis mel merum passum rutam. eo mittis nucleos nuces alicam elixatam. concisas nuces auellanas tostas adicies et inferes.

7.11.4 Peppered sweets: pound pepper; add honey, wine, passum, and rue. Add to the mixture pine nuts, nuts and boiled alica. Add chopped roasted hazelnuts and serve.

Alica, you will remember, is a type of groat, or smashed up grain (in this case emmer wheat) which came in several grades, the finest (according to Grocock and Grainger) about the texture of semolina, though that is made from a different variety of wheat (durum, which, according to Wikipedia, was bred from emmer wheat originally anyway). I suppose something like bulgur wheat (though a bit more coarse) like you'd use for making tabbouleh would also work. (And, looking it up, emmer wheat is still used in Italy, where it's called farro, and is apparently available in health food stores, so I'll keep an eye out.) At any rate, I used semolina flour.

And again, I didn't have any rue, as it's the middle of winter and it has all died down in my herb garden (I checked). Rue, while bitter, gives a distinct flowery note, which makes me wonder if a little rose water (not that that's period) would give a similar effect. I did use wildflower honey, so hopefully that helped.

When I'd made this recipe in the past I didn't get the semolina very thick, and so the whole thing came out like a pudding, which, while perfectly tasty, wasn't what I'd guess the original recipe had in mind. Though who can tell, really; Apicius is more about what's between the lines than the actual lines sometimes.

So here's my third attempt:

a dollop of cream plus whole milk to equal 1 cup
1/2 cup semolina flour
15 peppercorns (or more, to taste)
3 tablespoons honey
1 teaspoon wine
1 teaspoon passum
2 tablespoons pine nuts
2 tablespoons chopped walnuts
1/2 cup chopped hazelnuts

Heat the milk + cream up as hot as you dare without scalding it (I got it to just starting to simmer), then throw in the semolina, stirring constantly. Take off the heat pretty much immediately and continue stirring till more or less smooth and about as thick as cookie dough, then set aside.

Grind up the peppercorns in a mortar, then add the honey, the wine, and the passum. Stir to mix.

Toast the pine nuts and walnuts in a dry frying pan on medium heat until lightly browned and fragrant. Tip out onto a cutting board and cut them up as finely as you can manage, then put in the mortar with the honey/wine/pepper mixture and get as smooth as possible. When you're tired of that, throw it all in with the cooked semolina, then mix it as smoothly as you can with a spatula or potato masher.

Toast the hazelnuts in the pan you used for the other nuts until again lightly browned and fragrant, then empty them onto the cutting board and chop as finely as you can.

Take small lumps of the semolina mixture and roll into one inch balls (you may wish to give your hands a light coating of oil so it doesn't stick, and if you're being strictly authentic it probably ought to be olive), then roll in the hazelnuts till you get these lovely little truffle-looking things. Makes about two dozen.

These were really really really really good, and very rich. And even with the uncooked wine and the passum they didn't taste alcoholic at all (and I'm pretty sensitive to that). I kept nibbling on the semolina mixture (like one does with cookie dough, because one can't resist) as I was getting the hazelnuts ready and kept thinking it was a little on the bland side, but once the hazelnuts were on there they made the whole thing work quite well. I would have said that maybe the mix could have used a little salt, just like a cake has a little just to bring the other flavors out, but now I don't think it needed even that. The walnuts (what Apicius generally means when it just calls for 'nuts') and the pine nuts gave it a richness, along with the semolina itself and the milk (plus the cream I added). The peppercorns this time were fine, and gave it a little bite without being obnoxious.

So, yeah, this one is definitely going in the keeper pile. Third time pays for all, as they say.

Oh Well

Oh, and I found out tonight while attempting to make another batch of caroenum that it is indeed possible to burn grape juice. I neglected to pay attention to it long enough that I found it was suddenly doing that bubbly sugary candy thing; I think actually it might have gotten a little past the caramel stage, though when I tasted it it was definitely over into burnt and so useless. Too bad; it could have been interesting, as far as candy-making goes. And I imagine some fellow idiot in Roman times managed the same inattention. But I suppose we'll never know.

Apicius 3.13.1: Sweet Cumin Turnips

(Okay, my photography skills are pretty much crap, which is especially embarrassing because I actually have a degree in fine arts, though obviously photography was not my major.)

So, when I was a kid I hated turnips. But then there was this recipe in Apicius that sounded interesting, and well, I am a grown-up now. And since I hated them as a kid I pretty much hadn't had them since I was a kid, and tastes change...

Alas, not really. Even with the honey and the defrutum sweetening it up, I didn't really care for it. But maybe other people like turnips, so I'll publish this anyway. And this recipe might work with butternut squash, so. Not that that's Old World.

[3.13.1] rapas siue napos elixatos exprimes. deinde teres cuminum plurimum rutam minus laser Particum mel acetum liquamen defritum et oleum modice; feruere facies et inferes.

3.13.1. Squeeze the water out of boiled turnips or swedes. Then pound plenty of cumin, a little rue, Parthian laser, honey, vinegar, liquamen, defrutum and a little oil. Bring to a simmer and serve.

The local supermarket didn't have any turnips, so I got a rutabaga, thinking it was the same thing. Apparently it isn't, being a cross between a turnip proper and maybe cabbage; though as they are also called swedes I guess that works with the recipe too.

Here's the recipe; as it's still winter out there, I didn't have any rue available and left it out.

1 rutabaga
2 teaspoons cumin (I used ground, because that's what I had)
1/2 teaspoon asafoetida
4 tablespoons honey
4 teaspoons vinegar
1 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1/2 cup defrutum
2 teaspoons olive oil

Peel and cube the rutabaga and then boil forever until it's reasonably softened up. When it's done, drain and mash it a little to get the extra liquid out (though I found it didn't really need it). Throw the rest of the ingredients in the saucepan, and heat to a simmer; mix the rutabaga back into the pan and heat it through.

The sauce to this was perfectly nice and quite sweet, but no, I think I just don't care for turnips (or rutabagas). So now I don't know if this should go in the keepers or not; someone who likes turnips might think it's a great thing to do with them. Anyone care to give it a try and let me know?

Apicius 3.15.3: Lettuce Mash

Well, this recipe wasn't nearly as horrible as I'd feared it would be. (Hey, they can't all be keepers.)

I picked this one to try because it was unusual, and because the ingredients were easy to come by. Plus it was just weird, and it's good to widen one's horizons, yes? Here's the Latin, with the English translation:

[3.15.3] aliter holus molle ex foliis lactucarum: cum cepis quoques ex aqua nitrata; expressum concides minutatim; in mortario teres piper ligusticum apii semen mentam siccam cepam liquamen oleum et uinum.

3.15.3 Another vegetable mash recipe made with lettuce leaves: cook them with onions in water with soda. Squeeze the water out and chop finely. In a mortar pound pepper, lovage, celery seed, dry mint, onion, liquamen, oil, and wine.

That's right, this recipe is for boiled lettuce. Which, yes, sounds absolutely horrifying to modern ears, because you just don't do that with lettuce. But then I considered that we eat boiled cabbage, and boiled spinach with no problems, so it's not like it was that far out there. And I wanted to see. Morbid curiosity, I suppose. So this is what I did:

1 small head romaine (cos) lettuce
1 medium onion
baking soda
a few peppercorns
1/2 teaspoon celery seed
1 teaspoon dry mint
1 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/4 cup wine

Chop lettuce roughly, removing any discolored leaves. Chop half the onion, and put it and the lettuce in a pan with a pinch of baking soda and enough water to cover. Bring to a boil, then simmer until the onions are cooked and translucent. Strain in a colander and rinse under running water, then get as much of the water out of it as you can (I patted it with a paper towel). Turn out onto a cutting board and chop quite finely.

Grind the peppercorns, celery seed, and mint in the mortar; mince another teaspoon of the onion and mash that up in the mortar with the spices until smooth, or as smooth as you can make it. (Save the remaining onion to use in another recipe, or save yourself the horror of finding it in the back of the fridge in three weeks' time and throw it out now.) Add the contents of the mortar plus the remaining ingredients and bring to a simmer to cook the onion a bit and flash off the alcohol, then add the lettuce/onion mixture and heat through.

Eat, if you dare.

So, then. The first bite of this was definitely strange and confusing. So confusing that I found myself taking another bite. And then another, and another, and pretty soon I'd found I'd actually eaten all of it, though even after finishing it I wasn't sure if I liked it.

The cooked lettuce part wasn't actually that bad. I was afraid it would just turn to slime, but it didn't; it held its shape, and even some of its crispness fairly well. And as for the taste, it wasn't really all that far from bok choy, and that's fine. It was a little bitter, that was all, and I was curious as to why of all the recipes in Apicius, this one didn't have honey in it when it could definitely have used some. I would guess it was the celery seed; I don't know if it's normally bitter or if I just have an old batch (and again, I left out the lovage because I don't have any). Although I suppose romaine or cos lettuce is famous (or at least was in ancient times) for being rather bitter (it's one of the 'bitter herbs' eaten at Passover, if I'm remembering correctly). So I don't know.

It was certainly different, though.

Apicius 7.11.7 Variation

Oh my GOD.

Try this, for the cheese patina recipe a couple posts down:

1 cup total whole milk + cream in whatever proportion you like (I used rather more cream than milk)
3 eggs
1/3 cup honey
8 oz package (1 cup) mascarpone cheese
ground pepper (optional)

Follow the directions linked above. Eat it, and revel in the decadence that was the Roman Empire.

Happy Lupercalia!

Apicius 8.7.8 Flaccian Pork

Well, okay, originally it's 'Flaccian Piglet', but those being hard to come by around here I just used a pork chop. There are more than a few recipes for piglet in Apicius; it seems it was a fairly common food, not surprising I guess given how many young sows have in a litter. As to whom this dish is named for, there are more than a few Flaccuses or Flacianuses to choose from, ranging from consuls to freedmen. In Appendix 3, G&G name four individuals it might be connected to, but they can't pin it to one in particular. Anyhow, the text and translation:

[8.7.8] porcellum Flacianum: porcellum ornas in modum apri, sale asperges et in furnum mittes. dum coquitur adicies in mortarium piper ligusticum careum apii semen laseris radicem rutam uiridem, fricabis; suffundes liquamen, uino et passo temperabis. in caccabum; cum olei modicum ferueat; amulo obligas. porcellum coctum ab ossibus tanges, apii semen teres ita ut fiat puluis, asperges et inferes.

8.7.8. Flaccian piglet: dress the piglet in the manner of a boar. Sprinkle with salt and put in the oven. While it is cooking, put in a mortar pepper, lovage, caraway, celery seed, laser root, green rue; pound them. Pour on liquamen, flavour with wine and passum. In a pan, bring it to heat with a little oil. Thicken with starch. Smother the cooked piglet (thoroughly with the sauce) 'down to the bone'. Pound celery seed to a fine powder, sprinkle and serve.

I'm not sure what is meant by 'dress the piglet in the manner of a boar'; as I was just using a pork chop I suppose it doesn't much matter.

I had to leave a couple things out of this, alas. For one, though I have rue planted in my herb garden, it's February in New England. I could have, I suppose, checked to see if there's any out there hanging on, but while I was making this it was both a) dark out and b) pouring rain, so I opted to skip it, though I do like the unique flowery note rue gives to food. The other sad news, and it is very sad, is that my little lovage plant, the one I got back in the fall, has since died. I was planning on overwintering it in the house on the windowsill, as I bought it rather too late in the season I thought to plant it outside, but it didn't survive. Come spring I think I'm going to buy a bunch of lovage seed for planting (those, at least, aren't too hard to find on the internet), and broadcast ALL OF THEM in a specific patch in the flower garden. I'm not great with seeds, but I imagine some of them will have to come up, right? Anyway, argh.

Even with those changes (and the fact that I'm using faux passum, meaning port that has had raisins soaked in it, rather than raisin wine proper), I have to say it came out quite good, though it was basically just a roasted pork chop with sauce over it.

1 thick cut boneless pork chop
a few peppercorns (or more, to taste)
1/4 teaspoon caraway seed
1/2 teaspoon celery seed
1/4 teaspoon laser root (ground asafoetida)
1/2 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1/4 cup wine
1/4 cup passum
1 teaspoon olive oil
cornstarch (or wheat flour) for thickening
salt

Preheat oven to 350° F. Sprinkle the pork chop with salt and bake for about 30 minutes (or less, if you use a thinner cut of pork).

Grind 1/4 teaspoon of the celery seed to a fine powder; set aside in a little bowl.

Grind the peppercorns, caraway seed, asafoetida, and the remaining 1/4 teaspoon of the celery seed. (You may want to toast the caraway seeds first to make them easier to grind). Throw them in a small saucepan, then add the wine, passum, liquamen and oil. Let it heat up a bit then add the cornstarch mixed in with a little more wine and cook till thickened and bubbly. Pour over the pork, sprinkle with the reserved ground celery seed, and eat.

This sauce was quite good. It was a little bitter, but that was actually part of the flavor I think, especially given the celery seeds added at the end (which of course I forgot to add for the picture), never mind the rue I left out. It was quite rich but also a little piquant, and rather reminded me of steak sauce, almost, though the only thing I can think it might have had in common were the raisins in the passum. It was also very dark in color given the port/passum. I'd gone a little light on the caraway seeds, not wanting them to dominate; I might actually add a little more just to bring them out more, but still, I was surprised by how complicated and interesting this sauce actually was.

I did end up using the last of the passum, though, so I guess I'll be making another batch soon. And since it was the bottom of the bottle, there was a bit of raisiny sediment there that made the sauce all the richer and thicker. Oh and also, it was quite a bit of sauce and you could probably get away with this amount for two pork chops. As it was it was good enough I spooned it all up even after I'd finished the pork, so, you know, throw this one in the keeper pile too.

Defrutum

I made another batch of defrutum last night, the flavored grape syrup used in Roman cooking; though I've made it before I don't think I've given instructions for it here. It's pretty much the same as the instructions for caroenum, just boiled down a little more, and with some fruit added for richness. I made this batch with some figs, and started with purple grape juice this time as it has a richer flavor than white.

In Apicius 2.2.8 a couple types of defrutum are mentioned, including:

...defrutum made from quinces that has been left in full sun until it is as thick as honey. If you don't have any of this add a defrutum which has been made from dried figs, which the Romans call 'colouring' [colorem]...

Defrutum could also have spices added to it, according to G&G; they list 'sweet rush, iris, and fenugreek'. 'Sweet rush' is Acorus calamus, according to Wikipedia; it says the dried rhizome (root, more or less) could be ground up and used as a substitute for ginger, nutmeg, or cinnamon, so I'm assuming it has a similar sweet flavor. The roots are used in herbal medicine, so it is available, though the FDA hasn't approved its use in food, as they consider a chemical in it carcinogenic. I'm not sure what is meant by 'iris'; that could be anything, really, though sweet rush is also called sweet flag from what I gathered, and is iris-like, especially in the sword-shaped leaves. Fenugreek could be the seeds or the leaves, though the seeds are certainly easier to come by around here.

Anyway, here's the very simple instructions for fig defrutum:

1 64 oz bottle unsweetened purple grape juice (I used Welch's; the store brand being noticeably more watered-down to start with)
8 dried figs

Empty the grape juice into a large soup pan; then slice up the figs and throw them in. Heat to a boil and let it do that until it is reduced to about a third of its original volume. Let cool a bit, then strain out the figs; when pouring it into a bottle you may want to run it through a sieve as well, to get any of the tiny fig-seeds out. Store in the fridge.

Apicius 7.11.7: Sweet Cheese Patina

It's been a few months since I've done any Roman cooking; I think I got to a point where I just needed a damned tomato in my life (and peppers, and zucchini, and chocolate, and butter). Also, this is a hobby blog and I tend to do things in waves, so I at least am not surprised. But it seemed time to get back into this.

This recipe for a cheese patina sounded rather like a honey cheesecake without the crust. Strictly speaking a patina is a wide flat cooking dish or pan with sloping sides; the name was also applied to the kind of dish cooked within it. These generally used eggs as a binder, though not always, and seem to have ranged from something like a quiche or frittata to custards. They could be sweet or savory and contain pretty much any ingredient you could imagine. (Incidentally patella, 'little patina', the word for kneecap, comes from the same root, as does the Spanish paella, which also gave its name to a specific type of dish cooked in it.) This particular patina recipe is found under the Homemade Sweets and Curds section of Apicius.

I'll give the Latin followed by the English, as usual; and as usual, the translations and information about Roman cooking techniques are straight from Christopher Grocock and Sally Grainger's Apicius: A Critical Edition With an Introduction and English Translation, so, you know, don't go thinking I'm an actual expert on this stuff or anything.

[7.11.7] tiropatinam: accipies lac, aduersus quod patinam estimabis, temperabis lac cum melle quasi ad lactantia, oua quinque ad sextarium mittis, si ad eminam, oua tria. in lacte dissoluis ita ut unum corpus facias, in cumana colas et igni lento coques. cum duxerit ad se, piper adspargis et inferes.

7.11.7. Cheese patina: take some milk and choose a dish of sufficient size to hold it; flavour the milk with honey as though for milk pudding. Put in 5 eggs to a pint or 3 to a 1/2 pint. Dissolve them in the milk so that you have a smooth emulsion. Strain it into a Cumaean clay dish and cook over a slow fire; when it has set, sprinkle with pepper and serve.

Apparently this is one of the (all too common, alas) recipes in Apicius where a key ingredient is found only in the title; at first I thought well maybe 'cheese' referred to the consistency of the finished custard, but that didn't seem very likely really, especially given that part of the instructions are 'as though for milk pudding', implying that it is specifically not a milk pudding. But then I had to guess at the amount of cheese to put in. Not that that's anything new with Apicius.

I have to confess I'm not that handy with a custard; in fact I pulled out my Mastering the Art of French Cooking by the one and only Julia Child (and Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle) just for some tips. Those recipes turned out to be rather more complicated than I'd hoped, so instead I cribbed from an old Better Homes and Garden cookbook (yes, the one with the gingham/Italian restaurant tablecloth cover). The added texture of the cheese confused me too, as it was a bit grainy and hard to tell if the egg was separating, though I think I did all right in the end. So this is the recipe:

1 cup whole milk
3 eggs
5 tablespoons honey (=1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon, if that's easier)
1 cup ricotta cheese
ground pepper

Put the milk in a saucepan and mix in the honey with a whisk (you may wish to start warming the milk first to allow the honey to more easily dissolve). Add the cup of cheese and whisk till smooth. Beat the eggs in a separate bowl until quite smooth, then add to the milk and cheese mixture. Heat slowly over low to medium heat (you can use a double boiler if you've got one), stirring all the while. Keep stirring until the mix is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. It may look like it's not going to get there, especially with the cheese making it kind of grainy, but it will. I gave it a couple more minutes after that stage because I was following directions for creme brulée and I wanted it to be a little thicker, but you don't have to.

Take it off the heat and allow it to cool down; you can eat it then, sprinkled with some pepper, or put it in the fridge to firm up for later.

I don't know why the Romans were so taken with pepper, especially given that from what I could find the variety they used had both larger peppercorns and was rather spicier than the common round black peppercorns that are ubiquitous today; but they put the damned stuff on everything, including sweets. I guess that was one of the few sources of kick or heat they had for spices and a little bit of pain with their otherwise perfectly good food made them feel alive or something, like it does in Mexico or India. Me, I'm a wussy New Englander; our (sacred) recipe for clam chowder specifically says to use white pepper, if you must, because black pepper would just be too much. I put some on there for the photo (and I did eat it) but given my druthers I'd leave it off.

In spite of the pepper, this was quite good; I was a little confused though when I pulled it out of the fridge later to see a bit of water in with it. I thought that maybe I'd gotten it too hot after all and the egg had scrambled a bit; but actually I think it was just condensation, as I threw it in a bowl with some foil over it and stuck it in the fridge while it was still pretty hot, since it was getting late. I drained it off today and it certainly tasted fine, quite rich and custardy, with a bit of sweetness from the cheese.

I used ricotta because I was assuming a soft farmer's type cheese would be what they'd have. Mascarpone would certainly work, and now that I've thought of that I may just have to try this again because god damn, mascarpone cheese is amazing, especially with honey. And I suppose you could also add a little cream to the milk if you wanted, as I don't know that they separated that out. Though for that matter I don't know that they used cow's milk, either; goat's or ewe's milk would I'd guess be more common, but who knows.

It was as I said, quite rich and custardy; the only thing I might tweak is to add a little more honey, as it was a bit on the mildly sweet side for my tastes. But then I definitely have a very sweet tooth. Overall, though, this is definitely going into the keeper pile.

ETA: I did indeed try it with mascarpone cheese and some cream and it was absolutely heavenly. Here are the proportions for that version of this recipe.

Apicius 7.5.5: Pork Roast

Oh. My. GODS. This recipe looks like nothing at all, but WOW.

This is it:

[7.5.5] assaturas in collare: elixatur et infunditur in fretali piper condimentum mel liquamen, et attorretur in clibano quousque coquatur. elixum uero collare, si uoles, sine conditura assas, et siccum calidum perfundis.

7.5.5. Roasted neck joint: the joint is boiled, placed in a roasting dish with pepper, spices, honey, liquamen, and roasted in a clibanus until it is cooked. If you wish you may roast the boiled neck joint without the sauce and pour it on while it is hot and dry.

A clibanus, in case you're wondering, is a sort of small portable oven the Romans usually used for baking bread, which could be nestled down in the embers. A modern oven will do.

Now, when Apicius talks about 'meat' without saying what kind exactly, I'm going to guess pork will work. While out shopping last night, the local supermarket had pork loin on special, so I grabbed one, figuring I'd make something Roman with it. It's not a neck joint like the recipe calls for, but those are hard to come by. From what I understand they are best cooked slowly, but are quite good. Which is probably why the Apicius recipe calls for both boiling and roasting. A pork loin probably doesn't need both, but I did it anyway, just to be (somewhat) authentic and to see if there was a reason for it. Oh, there WAS. It was AMAZING.

So here's what I did:

I threw the pork loin in a large stewpot and simmered it for about two hours. The reason I left it that long was because it was kind of a big one (like five pounds) and I wasn't sure how long it would take. I wanted to put something in there to flavor it, but none of the recipes really had any instructions for that (though there are three ham recipes that call for boiling the ham with figs). In the end I did drizzle a bit of the fig defrutum I made a while back over it while it simmered, which made it smell very wonderful.

I had meant to only sort of half-cook it and finish it off in the oven, but when I took it out of the pot and cut into it to test it was already done; in fact it was starting to fall apart a bit it was so tender. Okay, I'm getting ahead of myself in my enthusiasm; let's put this in recipe form:

1 4-5 pound pork loin
couple tablespoons defrutum or caroenum (optional)
about a dozen peppercorns (or more or fewer to taste)
1/2 teaspoon celery seed
1/2 teaspoon fennel seed
1 teaspoon dried mint
2 tablespoons honey
1/2 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)

Put the pork in a large soup pan with water to cover. Drizzle with caroenum or defrutum if you like, then bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer, then let it cook for something like two hours, skimming as necessary, or until the pork is very tender. Transfer to a baking dish with a few tablespoons of the simmering liquid.

Preheat oven to 325° Fahrenheit (160° Celsius, if I've got that right). Grind the peppercorns and the other spices, then mix with the honey and liquamen to a paste. Spread over the top of the pork, then bake for half an hour to crisp up.

I made this basically to have some leftovers for other recipes from Apicius; there are plenty of sauces in there for copadia, probably leftover tidbits of meat, which I would like to try. The original recipe just says 'spices'; I picked ones that would work with the recipe I had my eye on, but you can substitute out whatever you like. Those three did work though, quite nicely.

Oh my god, really, this was amazing. The long simmering meant it was tender as could be, while the bit of roasting at the end dried it out a little and gave it a nice crunchy sweet crust which was pure heaven. It was so perfectly balanced and absolutely delicious. Oh I'll be making this again!

Apicius 8.5.2: Beef With Quince

This time, the lone beef recipe.

The Romans don't seem to have eaten beef like we do; I have it in my head it's because cattle were mostly used as work animals, and so not really fit for eating. On the other hand, I know in ancient Greece it was appropriate to sacrifice a cow or bull to certain Gods; as the animal thus killed was then generally cooked and shared in a ritual feast, they at least must have eaten it here and there. But here it is.

The seasoning is actually exactly the same as the lamb recipe just below—liquamen, pepper, and laser/asafoetida—but the other ingredients make it a very different dish.

Quince is a little hard to come by, though worth seeking out (it's generally seasonal, in the autumn); if you can't find it pears will do. Sort of.

[8.5.2] uitulinam siue bubulam cum porris [uel] cidoneis uel cepis uel colocaseis: liquamen piper laser et olei modicum.

8.5.2. Veal or beef with leek or quince, or onion, or taro: liquamen, pepper, laser, and a little oil.

Actually I suppose given the options in this recipe it could count for more than one. The first uel, which I assume means 'or', is in brackets, meaning it's not found in all manuscript editions; I took that to mean it could be leeks and quinces. There is another quince with leeks recipe elsewhere in Apicius, so the two were known to be paired together.

1/2 pound or so of beef, cut into cubes
1 leek, white and light green parts only, sliced into half moons and thoroughly washed
1 peeled, cored, and chopped quince (or large pear)
1 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
several peppercorns, ground (or more to taste)
1/2 teaspoon asafoetida
1 tablespoon olive oil

Put all the ingredients (unless you are using pear instead of quince) in the pan with water to cover. Bring to the boil, then reduce heat and simmer until the beef is tender (how long will depend on the cut of beef), adding water if necessary as it cooks. Once the beef is tender let the liquid reduce to the consistency of a thickish sauce or gravy. If you're using pears rather than quince, add them just at the end and cook until the pieces are soft but still holding their shape.

Don't be afraid to cook the quinces for a good long while; even if you use stew meat and end up simmering this for a couple hours they won't fall apart. They're better the longer you cook them, actually. Oh, and watch out when you cut the beef up; you may find, like me, that you have some extra 'help':

(That's Rory. Yes, his poor ears are a bit mangled from a pair of hematomas a few years back, but he's otherwise fine. And yes, when he's bad I call him Roranicus Pondicus!! How appropriately Roman.)

This dish was really quite good. The quince paired well with the leek, and gave the whole dish a nice sweetness. And even though the spices were the same as the last lamb recipe, it was definitely different. The cut of beef I used (it was the one on sale) was a shoulder steak; it turned out to be fairly tender, so I didn't cook it all that long. I would like to try it in a proper stew, to see just how mellow the quinces could get.

It doesn't seem like the Romans usually browned their meat first, though I suppose that might simply be a detail left out of Apicius, with its terminal case of shorthand. You could if you wanted to. Even so this was quite good, and is going straight with the keepers.

Apicius 8.6.1: Lamb With Black-eyed Peas

Another lamb recipe. This one sounded like a good hearty dish for a chilly night.

[8.6.1] copadia hedina siue agnina: pipere liquamine coques, cum faseolis faratariis liquamine pipere laser, cum inbracto bocellas panis et oleo modico.

8.6.1. Kid or lamb pieces: cook with pepper and liquamen, (or) with cow peas, liquamen, pepper, laser, (or) as a relish on pieces of bread with a little oil.

The translation has a bit of guesswork to it; in a footnote, G&G state "[t]he term faseoli faratariis seems to imply a 'starchy' pea, or perhaps pea flour is intended. Lit. 'with flour-filled beans'". So 'cow peas' (which Wikipedia tells me is the same as black-eyed peas) is a guess. They are an Old World plant, native (probably) to Africa, and it seems likely the Romans knew of them. I liked the idea of a lamb and bean dish with a thick sauce; again I was thinking of the Moroccan tagine, which is a slowly simmered meat dish that is a little thicker than a stew, so that's what I aimed for.

1 pound lamb, cut into cubes
1/2 cup dried black-eyed peas (cowpeas)
1 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
several peppercorns, ground (or more to taste)
1/2 teaspoon asafoetida

Put all the ingredients in a wide frying-pan with water to cover. Bring to the boil then reduce to a simmer, skimming off the foam. Simmer until the beans are soft and the lamb is tender, about an hour and a half, adding more water as necessary. At the end let the cooking liquid reduce down to a stew or gravy consistency, then serve.

This was just as hearty as I'd predicted—even with so few ingredients it had quite a full and rich flavor. Though originally I used a full tablespoon of fish sauce, thinking it needed a bit of broth to it, with the reduction at the end it came out a bit too salty for my tastes (though not inedible in the least); I reduced the liquamen to a teaspoon above to account for that.

It was pretty good, and very rich (I could only finish half the bowl), but I'm not entirely sure I like black-eyed peas. It was the first time I'd had them, and there was something about the taste I didn't really care for. Still, their earthy flavor was strong enough to hold its own with the lamb, and was a good match. I suppose one could substitute navy beans or the like, though those are technically New World ingredients; anyway the original recipe is a little vague on that ingredient so there's a bit of wiggle room.

I think it's probably just me; someone who liked black-eyed peas might just love this, so I'll put it with the keepers, as otherwise it did work quite well and made a rich hearty dish. I'd call it good simple plebeian/peasant food, if old gourmet Apicius wouldn't be insulted.

Apicius 6.2.16: Almond Chicken

Yeah, I'm catching up. I made this one a couple weeks ago now.

[6.2.16] ius candidum in auem elixam: piper ligusticum cuminum apii semen ponticam uel amigdalam tostam uel nuces depilatas, mel modicum, liquamen acetum et oleum.

6.2.16. White sauce for boiled bird: pepper, lovage, cumin, celery seed, roasted hazelnuts or almonds or (any) skinned nut, a little honey, liquamen, vinegar and oil.

For 'boiled bird' I used chicken, because that's what's available here; my little lovage plant is still pretty small, so I left that out instead of bothering the poor thing (I think I may try to root some cuttings over the winter). For the nuts I chose almonds, though they weren't skinned and the sauce wasn't 'white'. It still tasted really good.

1 split chicken breast, with bones and skin
several peppercorns (or more to taste)
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon celery seeds
1/3 cup almonds
1 teaspoon honey
1/2 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
2 teaspoons vinegar
1 tablespoon oil

Boil the chicken in water to cover for 30 minutes or until done. Grind the pepper and seeds to a fine paste in a mortar. Dry roast the almonds in a pan until toasted and fragrant, then grind as finely as you can in a mortar or food processor. Throw the pepper, seeds and ground almonds in a pan and add the rest of the ingredients and heat. Pour over the chicken and serve.

Like the tuna with hazelnut mustard sauce, this 'sauce' was very thick; even with a bit of the liquid from cooking the chicken added it was pretty much a paste, which leads me to suspect that the Romans were using liquamen a lot more liberally, almost as a broth at times. Given I'm using Thai fish sauce, which, though it is made using a very similar process, is a lot saltier than proper liquamen, I'm not sure what to do about that. (Liquamen, according to Grocock and Grainger, was made with about seven parts fish to one part salt; modern Thai fish sauce uses three parts fish to one part salt, or even just one to one.) Also, I kind of don't really like the stuff, though I suppose once it's cooked the wet dog smell goes away. Some added chicken broth could work for some extra liquid I suppose.

At any rate, this dish was really very good, though I didn't realize how similar it was to the earlier tuna recipe until I was eating it. It was quite rich given the ground nuts; I think if I tried it again I'd use a food processor for the nuts to see if I could get them a bit smoother. I'd also add a good deal of chicken broth (or more of the water the chicken cooked in) just to thin it down a bit. But overall, it was very good and is going straight with the keepers.

Apicius 3.2.1: Beets with Leeks

I had been wanting to try this one for a while as a sort of appetizer; it kind of reminded me of the red onion chutney stuff you get at Indian restaurants (and which upon googling seems to just be called 'red onion chutney'), though the leeks are cooked and not raw. It's in a section of Apicius for easily digested food, and is a relish to be eaten with bread, but I thought it might work well as a side dish, too.

II. [3.2.1] PVLMENTARIVM AD VENTRUM. betas minutas et porros requietos elixabis; in patina conpones. teres piper cuminum, suffundes liquamen passum up quaedum dulcedo sit. facias ut ferueat; cum ferbuerit, inferes. similiter polipodium in tepidam mittes. ubi mollierit rades et minutum cum pipere et cuminum tritum in patenam feruentem mittes et uteris.

3.2.1 You boil chopped beets and stored leeks, and arrange them in a dish. Pound pepper and cumin and pour on liquamen and passum so that there is a certain sweetness. Bring to the boil, and when it has boiled, serve it.

In the same way you put polypody into warm water (to cook). When it has gone soft, peel it and put it, cut up, into a hot dish with ground cumin and pepper, and use.

Polypody, incidentally, is not some kind of octopus, like you might think; it's the root of the tree or oak fern, according to Grocock and Grainger. Wikipedia says it's Polypodium vulgare, and apparently it's pretty common here in New England, though I'm not sure I want to go foraging especially given it looks like a lot of other ferns out there. It's known for being a gentle laxative, so that's why it's in that section of Apicius I assume. Anyway.

It occurs to me now that 'beet' might mean either the leaves or the roots; when I made it I assumed this recipe meant the roots, but I don't really know. And again, I'm doing these recipes experimentally, so usually only making a small amount, in this case a single beet root.

1 medium beet root, trimmed, peeled, and diced
1 leek, white and light green parts only, chopped and thoroughly washed
a few grains of pepper, or more to taste
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1/4 cup passum (raisin wine)

Boil the beets and leeks separately, or, if you don't care that the leeks will stain bright red, boil the beets and when they're getting towards done throw the leeks in with them (they won't take as long). Grind up the peppercorns and cumin seeds, and add the liquamen and passum and mix. When the leeks and beets are done, drain and put them together in a pan along with the passum-liquamen-spice mixture; bring to a boil for a moment then serve.

This was perfectly nice; innocuous might be the best word, though I suppose this recipe is meant to be something mild and good for the digestion. I did find I wanted to put some butter on them, but they were otherwise pleasant enough, given the passum which did make them a little sweet. I didn't try them with bread as a relish proper, though.

While it wasn't all that exciting, it wasn't a failure either, so I'll put it with the keepers as a perfectly acceptable side dish.

Apicius 8.6.6: Lamb in Caroenum Sauce

I figured it was time to try some lamb (it was on sale). Poking around in my copy of Apicius this one looked interesting:

[8.6.6] hedus siue agnus syringiatus (id est mammotestis): exossatur diligenter a gula sic ut uter fiat et intestina eius integra exinaniantur ita ut in caput intestina sufflentur et per nouissimam partem stercus exinanibitur. aqua lauantur diligenter et sic inplentur admixto liquamine et ab humeris consuitur et mittitur in clibanum. cum coctus fuerit, perfunditur ius bulliens: lacte piper tritum liquamen carenum defritum modice sic et oleum, et iam bullienti mittis amulum. uel certe mittitur in retiaculo uel in sportella et diligenter constringitur et bullienti zemae cum modico salis summittitur. cum bene illic tres undas bullierit, leuatur et denuo bullit cum humore supra scripto. bulliente conditura perfunditur.

8.6.6. Hollowed-out kid or lamb (that is, swollen-skinned): carefully bone the carcass from the neck end so that it is like a bag. The entire intestinal tract should be emptied out in this way: blow into the intestines at the top end so that that excrement is expelled from the very bottom. It is washed carefully with water and filled with liquamen, the lamb is sewn up at the shoulder and put in the oven. When it is cooked this boiling sauce is poured on: milk, ground pepper, liquamen, caroenum, a little defrutum, a little oil too, and when it is boiling add starch. Or alternatively it is tied up carefully, put in a net or basket and lowered into a pan of boiling water with a little salt. When it has come to the boil well and truly three times, it is taken out and boiled once more in the sauce written above. Then pour the boiling sauce over it.

Since I was just making a single chop I was able to (thankfully) skip a lot of that; the "boiling" sauce sounded simple but interesting, and I had both the caroenum and defrutum on hand. Here's what I came up with:

1 lamb chop (I used a shoulder arm chop)
about a dozen peppercorns, ground (more or fewer to taste)
1/4 cup whole milk
1/4 cup caroenum
2 tablespoons defrutum
1 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1 teaspoon olive oil
corn starch or other thickener

Put a little olive oil in a pan and heat on medium high; put in the lamb chop and cook about three minutes per side or until done.

Mix all the other ingredients save the starch in a bowl. When the lamb is cooked drain the rendered fat if there's a lot, and pour the milk/caroenum mixture into the pan. Deglaze the pan and bring the sauce to a gentle boil, then thicken with a little starch. Serve with the sauce poured over the chop.

I opted to pan-fry the lamb both because it was a single chop rather than an entire freakin' lamb, and because boiling and lamb don't generally go together unless you're making a stew.

This was quite interesting; the caroenum was a bit tart but still quite sweet, and gave it a rich red color; as there were no spices in it save the ubiquitous pepper, the grapey flavor of the syrups was the main flavor, which was definitely a bit strange to my modern palate. Grapes don't get used much like that. Roman food reminds me a bit of Japanese food, where on the whole there's a little sweetness in everything, even the savory dishes.

It was good though, if unusual, and I'll put it with the keepers as the flavors were quite nicely balanced, though there was rather a lot of sauce to it. If you try it you might want to make two chops with the same amount of sauce instead of just the one.

In other news, I made another batch of the marinated mushrooms, this time with the caroenum made from the fresh grapes. It was a lot more interesting and rich than the versions I'd made with the caroenum from store-bought grape juice. That may be my favorite recipe so far, though it's one of the simplest ones.

Apicius 6.8.10: Chicken With Taro

I happened upon some taro root in my travels the other day; I'd been wanting to try this particular recipe for some time, so got some. Taro is the root of the colocasia plant, widely used in Caribbean cuisine; it's native to southern India and the Romans did know it, though they don't seem to have made extensive use of it. It has a slightly sweet taste to it, sort of like a combination of potato and chestnut. It goes by a lot of names depending on the culture, which is probably why I'd had a hard time finding it before; this time though it was nicely labelled 'taro' so I grabbed some. They look like this, incidentally:

(Picture from Wikipedia)

You don't want to eat them raw, as they'll do nasty things to you, but they're fine once cooked. The ones I got were labelled both 'taro' and 'eddoe' which supposedly aren't quite the same thing, and now I'm a little confused; they're very closely related though and both types of colocasia (at least according to Wikipedia).

I'm going to give three recipes here, as the one I actually used refers back to the others.

[6.8.8] pullum elixum ex iure suo: teres piper cuminum timi modicum feniculi semen mentam rutam laseris radicem; suffundis acetum, adicies caroetam et teres. melle aceto liquamine et oleo temperabis. pullum refrigeratum et mittis siccatum, quem perfusum inferes.

[6.8.9] pullum elixum cum cucurbitis elixis: iure supra scripto, addito sinape, perfundis et inferes.

[6.8.10] pullum elixum cum cologasiis elixis: supra scripto iure perfundis et inferes. farcies inelixum etiam oliuis columbaribus, non ualde ita ut laxamentum habeat ne dissiliat dum quoquitur in ollam submissus in sportellam. cum bullierit, frequenter leuas et ponis ne dissiliat.

6.8.8. Chicken boiled in its own sauce: pound pepper, cumin, a little thyme, fennel seed, mint, rue, laser root; pour on vinegar, add date and pound. Flavour with honey, vinegar, liquamen and oil. Cool and dry the chicken and serve in the sauce.

6.8.9. Boiled chicken with boiled gourds: pour the sauce written above, with the addition of mustard, over the chicken and serve.

6.8.10. Boiled chicken with boiled taros: pour over the sauce written above and serve. You can also stuff the un-boiled bird with preserved olives, but not with too many, so that some space remains and it does not burst while it is cooking in the pot, lowered there in a basket. When it is boiling lift it out and replace it frequently so it does not burst.

The authors note that other translators have considered 6.8.10 to be two recipes, but they opted to give it as one; I don't think the olives part has much to do with the taro part, myself. But given I was just making a single chicken piece as a trial rather than a whole chicken, stuffing it with anything wasn't an option anyway.

My guess:

1 half split chicken breast, bone in and skin on
1 taro root (about the size of a medium potato)
a few peppercorns
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon thyme
1/2 teaspoon fennel seed
a few mint leaves, shredded
a few small sprigs of rue, chopped
1/2 teaspoon asafoetida
2 teaspoons vinegar
2 dates, chopped
2 tablespoons honey
1/2 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon powdered mustard

Put the chicken in a saucepan with enough water to cover (about three cups) and bring to the boil, then reduce heat to a simmer. Grind the seeds and spices in a morter, then add the leaves and grind to a paste; add a teaspoon of the vinegar to loosen it up and put in with the chicken. Grind the dates as best you can in the mortar, then add the honey to make a very sticky mess. Add the remaining vinegar to thin and the liquamen if also necessary; throw it all in with the chicken with the oil and the mustard and give it a good stir.

When the chicken is getting towards done (twenty minutes to a half hour depending on its size), peel the taro and cut it into chunks, then put in with the chicken; cook at least another fifteen minutes longer. When both the chicken and taro are cooked, fish them out and put them on a plate. Bring the sauce to a boil and let reduce till fairly thick, then pour over the chicken and taro and serve.

You could of course use whatever cut of chicken you prefer; I opted for a split breast because I figured the skin and bones would give it a bit more flavor (plain skinned breasts can be really very bland). I had to sort of do the grinding in stages given the small size of my mortar but it all worked and I actually did manage to get the dates to a genuine paste; when the sauce was cooked there were no little bits of date at all. Grocock and Grainger do mention that dried fruits were probably soaked before being ground, which does make a lot of sense.

So, this was really very good; the chicken was quite tasty even though it was boiled, and the taro was lovely and sweet and absorbed quite a bit of the flavor of the sauce. Strangely enough I couldn't taste half the herbs in it on their own—I would never have guessed there was mint in it, for example—but they all came together into something rich and a little sweet. I could taste the mustard (which I did want to), but even that wasn't overpowering.

The only problem I had with it was that there was a tiny bit of bitterness to it, though I couldn't figure out where it was coming from. It seemed to be in the sauce, but there should have been plenty of honey in there to counteract the rue; I wonder if it was the asafoetida, but I don't know. In researching taro for this, though, I learned that the eddoe variety is known to have a bit of an acrid taste, so I wonder if that was it, though it did seem to be in the sauce. Other than that, though (which might be cured by adding just a little more honey), it was very good, and I'm going to consider it a keeper.

Caroenum Redux

Remember when I said that my sister had a grape arbor, and that come fall she might be persuaded to give me some grapes (assuming she had them)? Well, she did have some grapes, and she did let me have them. So I went over there yesterday and we picked all these:

Those faux-tupperware things are about eight inches square and three inches deep. I don't really know how many pounds of grapes that was, but once I picked out the good ones this is what I got, a full-sized colander full:

Which I washed as well as I could to get rid of the ants, and then threw in a large pot to squish with a potato masher. (By the way, if you're going to try this at home, a word of advice: wear old clothes.) I can see why grapes are the wine making fruit—they sure do make a lot of juice.

Which, eventually, after a lot of squishing them through a strainer, then putting them in a tea-towel and wringing (which was a surprisingly visceral experience), I ended up with just shy of eight cups of juice:

Which I then boiled down to make another batch of caroenum, the syrup the ancient Romans made from must (fresh grape juice) to use as a sweetener. I'd made a batch before with store-bought unsweetened grape juice, but wanted to try it with fresh ones. If you don't have access to fresh grown grapes, I don't see why it wouldn't work with store-bought fresh ones, though I imagine eating grapes and wine-making grapes are probably different varieties.

It needed a lot of skimming, I'll say, as there was quite a bit of foam, but it eventually reduced down to about a third of its original volume, which I let cool down before funneling it into the same pretty bottle that had held the first batch. I ran it through a sieve first to get rid of any pulp and remove the last of the ants (I hope).

Given they were blue grapes (I have no idea what variety, and neither does my sister, as they came with the house when she bought it; probably the usual Concord) the color was a lot different, coming out a lovely ruby red rather than a brownish amber like with the white grape juice. It also tasted very different, with the unmistakable tang of fresh grape juice. It was quite sweet and did make a syrup, but it was still a little on the tart side. I'm not sure how it did that, but it's got a lot more personality than the kind I made from store-bought.

Just look at that color!

I can't wait to use it; I might try those marinated mushrooms again to see the difference.

Apicius 5.5.2: Barley Soup

This one sounded interesting, if a little weird. I liked the mix of grains and pulses, but I also couldn't figure out how it wouldn't be, well, licorice soup. I really did think it had the potential to be absolutely horrible. But I tried it anyway. Dried beans are cheap, and hey, one should live a little, right?

It should be noted that this recipe is almost word-for-word the same as an earlier one in Apicius, namely 4.4.2, where it is called tisanum barricam. Barricam being an otherwise unknown word, Grocock and Grainger tentatively translate it as 'thick'; maybe, maybe not. It did end up fairly thick, for the record.

[5.5.2] aliter tisanum: infundis cicer lenticulam pisam. defricas tisanam et cum leguminibus elixas. ubi bene bullierit, olei satis mittis et super uiridia concidis: porrum coriandrum anetum feniculum betam maluam coliculum mollem. haec uiridia minuta concisa in caccabum mittis; coliculos elixas et teres feniculi semen satis, origanum silfi ligusticum. postquam triueris, liquamine temperas et super legumina refundis. agitas. coliculorum minutas super concidis.

5.5.2. Another barley soup: soak chick peas, lentils and peas; crush barley and boil it with the vegetables. When they are well boiled, add sufficient oil and chop (these) greens into it: leek, coriander, dill, fennel, beet (leaves), mallow, tender cabbage; chop the greens finely and put them in the pan. Boil (more) cabbage and pound a good quantity of fennel seed, oregano, silphium and lovage. After you have ground them, flavour them with liquamen and pour back over the vegetables and stir. Chop the cabbage finely and sprinkle over.

I wasn't sure what 'mallow' was, being an American; given what I could find out about it online it looks like it was a plant I used to have in my garden as an ornamental, something that was being called a miniature hollyhock or malva. While it was very pretty, it was also hideously invasive and so I'd ripped it out a couple years ago. I had no idea the leaves were edible. Well, supposedly; I'm still not sure I got the right plant. Anyway I left it out.

In other news, I did actually find some lovage! A sort of local specialty herb place had it, so I took the trip over there and bought a plant (they didn't have it dry). This being the end of the season though I had to pick the least scraggly of the ones they had left, oh well. It does have a nice new shoot coming in from the middle, so I assume it will be fine (if it makes it through the winter, which it should, I think). But it's pretty small yet and I didn't want to start picking off its leaves, the poor thing. So I used celery seed, still. But I found some! (You don't know how proud of that I am.)

I also made a fairly small quantity (so I thought) because, like I said, I was half sure the thing was going to be completely inedible.

1/4 cup dried chick peas
1/4 cup dried lentils (I used the little ones)
1/4 cup split peas
1/4 cup pearl barley
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 leek (white and light green parts only), cut into half-moons and thoroughly washed
decent handful cilantro or parsley, chopped
4 large sprigs dill leaves, chopped
4 or 5 large sprigs fennel leaves, chopped
4 or 5 beet leaves, shredded
small wedge of cabbage, shredded
1 teaspoon fennel seed
1 teaspoon oregano
1/2 teaspoon asafoetida
1 teaspoon celery seed or lovage
1 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)

Put the chickpeas in some water and bring to a boil. Let them boil for a couple minutes, then turn off the heat and let them soak for an hour. Or, soak them overnight to use the next day.

Put the beans/grains in a pot with four cups of water. Bring to the boil then reduce the heat; let them simmer for something like an hour and a half, until the chickpeas are tender (by that time the peas and the lentils will be starting to dissolve), skimming the foam every so often and adding more water when needed to keep it the consistency of soup. Add the olive oil, then stir in the leeks and the chopped greens, and cook until tender.

Grind up the seeds in a mortar, then add them and the other spices to the soup. Stir in the liquamen and let it cook a few more minutes.

Boil some more shredded cabbage to use as a garnish, if desired.

So, by the time this was done I was really dubious, what with the fennel leaves and fennel seed both. But I was really quite pleasantly surprised—not only did the anise flavor not dominate, it actually gave the whole thing a refreshing sort of flavor, especially combined with the dill. It was actually really good. The lentils and the peas were starting to dissolve and become the body of the soup; I suppose I should have left it longer to really cook down, but I was getting a bit impatient.

I'm quite surprised by how well it turned out. The only thing I would change (or rather, add) would be to throw some chicken broth in there. It did make a decent broth on its own, but it could have used a bit of extra oomph (though I suspect the Romans would have used more liquamen than I did). Otherwise, though, it all worked quite well. I do think it was important to keep it fairly thin for quite a while, because the greens needed to be able to cook in something that was mostly water; I added probably another four cups of water as it simmered. But it thickened up pretty quickly at the end.

So, surprisingly enough this one is a keeper!

Apicius 2.1.1 & 4.3.1: Sea Food Minutal

We've had some cooler weather lately as summer fades, which has got me wanting soup. So this time I combined two recipes, a sea food minutal or thickened stew which called for little fish meatballs, the meatballs being the second recipe. First the minutal recipe proper, in the Latin and English as usual:

[4.3.1] minutal marinum: pisces in caccabum mittes, adicies liquamen oleum uinum cocturam. porros capitatos coriandrum minutatim concides, esiciola de pisce minuta facies et pulpas pisces cocti concarpis, urticas marinas bene lotas mittes. haec omnia cum cocta fuerint, teres piper ligusticum origanum; fricabis; liquamen suffundes, ius de suo sibi, exinanies in caccabum. cum ferbuerit tractam confringes, obligas, cum ferbuerit, agitas; piper aspargis et inferes.

4.3.1 Sea food minutal: put the fish in a pan, add liquamen, oil, wine, stock; chop leek and coriander finely, make finely ground fish forcement and flake the flesh of the cooked fish, and put in well-washed sea urchins. When all these are cooked, pound pepper, lovage, oregano, pound again, pour on liquamen and some of the cooking liquor and put it back into the pan. When it has come to the boil, crumble a tracta in, thicken it, and stir it when it comes to the boil (again); sprinkle with pepper and serve.

And the forcement or meatballs:

[2.1.1] isicia fiunt marina de cammaris et astacis de lolligine de sepia de lucusta. esicium condies pipere ligustico cumino laseris radice.

2.1.1 Seafood forcemeat is made from prawns and lobster, from squid, cuttlefish, and spiny lobster. You will season the forcemeat with pepper, lovage, cumin, and laser root.

First, a word on sea-urchins. There was pretty much no way I was going to get my hands on any of them, even though I understand (after a bit of research) that they are a trendy 'new' food in places like Los Angeles and New York City. From what I hear one only eats the coral, which is actually the ovaries of the thing, and it is a taste all its own that isn't like anything else, so there really isn't a substitute. I just left them out.

I also pretty much used whatever the supermarket had that looked interesting, so shrimp and something called langostino lobster tails went into the meatballs. I had no idea what 'langostino lobster' was, though looking at the prepared tail meat I figured it was some kind of crustacean, a small crayfish maybe. When I looked it up at home I found they aren't lobster, or shrimp either, but something else entirely sort of related to a hermit crab; however it does taste a lot like lobster, so they say. I also picked flounder for the generic 'fish' of the recipe. I don't really know the differences between all the white fish out there, if there are any.

One further note: I'd had leeks years ago and been kind of underwhelmed by them, but decided to give them another try. And again, I substituted parsley for the hated cilantro, but if you like cilantro go for it. And, alas, I substituted celery seed for the lovage again. I really wish I could find some of the stuff; lovage is really good.

So, this is what I came up with:

Seafood Meatballs

2 cups total your choice of seafood such as shrimp, lobster, squid, &c. peeled and deveined if necessary. (If frozen, thaw before measuring.)
1/2 teaspoon peppercorns
1/2 teaspoon celery seed (or lovage if you can find the stuff)
1/4 teaspoon cumin seed
1/4 teaspoon asafoetida

Grind the seeds in a mortar to a fine powder. Put the seafood in a food processor and whizz to a paste, then empty into a mixing bowl and add the spices. Mix thoroughly, then set aside to use in the next recipe.

Seafood Minutal

1/4 pound fish fillet
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1/2 cup wine
1 1/2 cups stock (I used vegetable stock)
one leek (white/light green part only), chopped in half moon sections and thoroughly washed
decent handful fresh parsley or cilantro, chopped (came to about 1/4 cup)
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon lovage or celery seed
1 teaspoon fresh oregano
corn starch to thicken

Put the fish fillet in a large, fairly deep skillet; add the oil, liquamen, wine, and stock, then the leeks and parsley or cilantro. Bring to the boil then reduce the heat to a simmer. As it simmers, form the shrimp forcemeat balls (I made them about an inch big) and drop them into the stock mixture. Grind up the pepper, celery seed/lovage and oregano (or you can just chop the oregano and throw it in rather than attempting to mash it to a paste) and add them to the soup. When it's all cooked through (the leeks will probably take the longest) flake the fish if it hasn't managed that on its own and add a bit of cornstarch mixed with a little of the broth to thicken. Serve with more pepper sprinkled over it.

This came out pretty good, though the first thing I noticed was just how peppery the shrimp/lobster meatballs were. If you're into that sort of thing you'd probably love it, but it was a little much for me, and cutting back on the pepper probably would have allowed the taste of the 'lobster' to be more apparent. Though I could taste it still, and yes, it did have the sweetness of real honest-to-gods lobster. Otherwise though the spices were about right.

I'd been worried the forcemeat wasn't going to stick together, and was all set to cheat and add an egg to the mixture, but it was actually quite sticky and had no problem at all staying in ball shape. I suppose I should note that the shrimp was raw but the 'lobster' was already cooked; the raw shrimp was still plenty sticky to hold it all together.

I used flounder for the fish and it pretty much just disintegrated into the soup; there wasn't much question of 'flaking' it, and I guess I'd try to find a fish that holds together a little better. But it tasted fine.

I'm still kind of ambivalent on the leeks, I guess. Though that said the only thing I would change is to reduce the amount of pepper in the forcemeat balls; otherwise it was quite good even with the leeks. I'm going to put this in with the keepers, with that reservation then, though again, pepper really is one of those individual taste things and someone else might think the amount just right. It was quite well balanced as far as the rest of the spices went otherwise, and the meatballs themselves were quite tasty. So overall: pretty good.

Apicius 1.33 & 4.1.3: Cheese Spreads

In the back: the sweet Apicius 1.33; the front, savory 4.1.3

There are a few cheese mixtures in Apicius, to be eaten, I assume, with bread; two of them caught my eye because of the contrast in flavors. Also they looked pretty simple to put together, always a plus. The first one was a sweet mix, with raisins and dates in it; the second a savory one including garlic, surprisingly rare in Apicius as it was considered a food of the lower classes. The first recipe:

XXXIII YPOTRIMA: piper ligusticum mentam aridam nucleos pineos uuam passam cariotam caseum dulcem mel acetum liquamen oleum uinum defritum aut caroenum.

1.33. Hypotrimma: pepper, lovage, dried mint, pine nuts, raisins, dates, sweet cheese, honey, vinegar, liquamen, oil, wine, defrutum or caroenum.

According to Grocock and Grainger hypotrimma means 'something ground up', i.e. a paste made in a mortar; it looks to be the Greek equivalent of the Latin mortarium. (There is in fact a recipe titled Mortaria just down the page.)

The second recipe was strictly speaking a salad, with I think bread crumbs mixed into it; it's a little vague, though, and so I opted to try just the cheese mixture on its own.

[4.1.3] aliter sala cattabia: panem Alexandrinum excauabis; in posca macerabis. adicies in mortarium piper mel mentam alium coriandrum uiridem caseum bubulum sale conditum aquam oleum; insuper niuem et inferes.

4.1.3. Another sala cattabia: hollow out an Alexandrian loaf. Soak (the crumb) in posca. Put in a mortar pepper, honey, mint, garlic, green coriander, cows' cheese, salt, spiced wine, water and oil. Stand (the pot) in snow and serve.

There are three recipes labelled sala cattabia; I assume sala is 'salad' but I don't know what the cattabia part means, and G&G (they are officially G&G now) don't explain it. They do all use bread, or bread crumbs in the recipe, so maybe that's just what that type of salad was called. Posca is a kind of drink made from wine that's gone sour and turned to vinegar; that doesn't sound all that appetizing to modern western tastes, but there are known drinks made with vinegar, such as the old Persian sekanjabin. At any rate though since I left the bread part out I didn't use it.

I have to admit that 'cows' cheese' did confuse me at first; but then I realized that cheese was probably more commonly made with goats' or ewe's milk than cows' at the time, so the distinction was necessary. I used ricotta for both, assuming it was something like simple homemade farmer's cheese. The Romans did have a variety of cheeses available, both hard and soft, but I have no idea how any of that corresponds to modern cheeses, so I went with what seemed simple. And again, I don't have any lovage, so substituted celery seed.

Oh, and I'm one of those people who cannot stand cilantro (which is what is meant by 'green coriander'). Since it's a genetic thing, I'm going to assume there were plenty of ancient Romans who hated the stuff too, and so would have had to find something else to use. I substituted parsley; alas, the local supermarket had had a run on the fresh stuff (there was a bin for it which was empty save for a few stray leaves), so I used dry, which is kind of a crime, I know. I also didn't have spiced wine, so just used regular wine.

The recipes:

Sweet Cheese Spread (Apicius 1.33)

1 cup ricotta cheese
a few peppercorns (or more, to taste)
1/2 teaspoon celery seed
4 or 5 fresh mint leaves
1 tablespoon pine nuts
2 teaspoons raisins
3 dates
1 teaspoon honey
1 teaspoon vinegar
1/4 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 teaspoon sweet wine
1 tablespoon caroenum

Grind the peppercorns in a mortar with the celery seed; add the mint and mash to a paste, then the pine nuts. Add the raisins and dates (you may need to empty the mortar first if there isn't room) and do your best to get them to a sticky paste too (or use a food processor). Add the honey, then the rest of the ingredients to thin it out, then mix it into the ricotta in a bowl. Serve as a spread on bread.

Savory Cheese Spread (Apicius 4.1.3)

1 cup ricotta cheese
a few peppercorns (or more, to taste)
1 teaspoon honey
8-10 fresh mint leaves
1 clove garlic, peeled
1 teaspoon chopped cilantro or parsley
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon wine
1 teaspoon olive oil

Grind the peppercorns first; add the mint, garlic, parsley and salt and make as fine a paste as you can (you probably don't want chunks of raw garlic in there). Add the honey and mix, then the wine and olive oil to thin. Mix into the ricotta, and serve on bread.

These were both quite nice, though I didn't get the dates nearly as mushed up as I thought I had, so the sweet version still had a few chunks in it. I think I'd prefer it smoother, personally, and would use a food processor next time. It was quite well balanced though and had a lovely richness to it, so I'm calling that a keeper.

I was really leery of getting the second one too garlicky (and in fact made sure to mix it second, because I figured the garlic would linger in the mortar no matter how well I scrubbed it out), but I think I under spiced it. It was pretty good, and the mint and garlic were balanced against each other, but a bit too mild; I'd redo it with twice the amount of each, as well as a good deal of fresh parsley to complement the mint. It was a good start though. I left it in the fridge overnight (rather than standing the pot in snow!) thinking it might get a little stronger as the flavors came together, but no. So that one will need a little tweaking before I call it final. Still though, it was definitely on the right track.

So one keeper, and one that needs tweaking. Not bad!