Apicius 9.10.1: Stuffed Bonito

I know it's been a while; I tend to cycle through hobbies, doing one for a while, then dropping it to move on to (or get back to) another. But I've got lovage growing out there in the garden, and wanted to try something from old Apicius again. Though as Fate would have it, there's no lovage in this recipe.

This one is a recipe for stuffed bonito, a type of fish whose name means 'beautiful'. They do fit the name, being sort of a silvery-blue-green with darker tabby stripes. They're related to both mackerel and tuna, and like them have a dense, somewhat oily flesh. Dried bonito flakes are familiar as an ingredient (with seaweed) in dashi stock, used as a base for miso soup and the like in Japanese cooking (and the flakes make great cat treats, so I hear).

But of course I couldn't find any bonito locally, neither frozen nor fresh, and so I went with a tuna steak, since it is related. I would definitely like to try this again with proper bonito.

The Latin (again, I am using Sally Grainger and Christopher Grocock's quite excellent annotated version of Apicius:

[9.10.1] in sardis: sardam farsilem sic facere oportet: sarda exossatur et teritur puleium cum piperis grana, mentam nuces mel; impletur et consuitur. inuoluitur in carta et sic supra uaporem ignis in operculo conponitur. conditur ex oleo careno allece.

9.10.1 Sauce for bonito: stuffed bonito should be made like this: the bonito are boned and pennyroyal is pounded with grains of pepper, mint, hazelnuts, honey. They are stuffed and sewn up. They are wrapped in papyrus and placed in a covered pan above the heat of the fire. They are flavoured with oil, caroenum and allec.

This one looked interesting, as it wasn't just the usual list of ingredients for sauce; it's also on the simple side, using only a few ingredients. And wrapping up fish while baking to seal in the flavor is a technique still used today, though we use kitchen parchment or aluminum foil rather than papyrus. I went with aluminum foil, even though I do actually have some papyrus, up in my art supplies.

As usual I skipped the pennyroyal (though I would like to try it sometime); it's got some toxicity issues, especially for children and pregnant women. Again, I used a tuna steak; as it was thick and not going to fold or roll up I split it in half thickness-wise to get two thinner steaks. I kind of stumbled on a good technique due to laziness: the cutting board was dirty so I just cut it on a saucer with a large knife. But the knife was long enough to rest on the edges of the saucer, which were raised just about half of the thickness of the steak. They came out pretty even, actually. I did then pound them a little to flatten them some more, but not very much as they were a bit fragile and I was worried they'd fall apart.

Allec was a type of fish paste that was leftover from making garum; it was also used as a condiment in its own right. The closest modern equivalent is anchovy paste; though it's quite salty, so was garum, so it's probably pretty close (though of course it hasn't been fermented).

The recipe:

3/4 pound tuna steak (or the same sized bonito fillet)
1/4 teaspoon peppercorns (I used 15)
24 fresh mint leaves, minced (comes to 2 tablespoons)
1/2 cup hazelnuts
1 tablespoon honey

The sauce:

1 teaspoon anchovy paste
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 teaspoon caroenum

Preheat oven to 350° F. Cut the tuna steak in half horizontally to get two thinner steaks; put each on a square of aluminum foil in a baking pan and set aside.

Toast the hazelnuts in a dry pan until fragrant; take off the heat. Grind the peppercorns in a mortar, then add the mint and grind to a fragrant paste. Add the hazelnuts in batches and grind by hand, or lose patience and throw them all in a food processor like I did and grind as finely as you can with the mint and pepper. Transfer to a bowl and mix in the honey; it should form a sticky, almost dry paste. Spread this on the tuna (or bonito) pieces, fold them in half, then seal up with the foil. Bake for 25-30 minutes until cooked through.

For the sauce, mix the three ingredients together till smooth. Pour over the cooked fish, or put on the side and dip the pieces in as you eat. Makes two servings.

I wasn't sure I was going to like the sauce (never having had anchovy paste, a.k.a. toothpaste for cats) so I only made a small amount. Probably it should be doubled so there's enough for each piece. I drizzled mine over the top in an attempt to look picturesquely nouvelle cuisine; alas, nothing can camouflage my crappy photography skills.

This was very good, though I may have overcooked the tuna a little (I was afraid that given the thickness it would be raw in the middle). It was, as you can imagine, also quite rich. Luckily I could taste the filling as I went, as there wasn't anything I couldn't eat raw in it (e.g. eggs). I started out with six mint leaves but kept adding them until they balanced out with the hazelnuts. The pepper, I think, was just right too, adding a bit of kick but not too much (you can certainly add more if you are not, like me, a wimp). It did look a little anemic coming out of the foil, since it didn't crisp on the outside; maybe brushing the top with a little olive oil, or opening the foil up halfway through would have helped. But it tasted quite good, and is going straight to the keepers pile. If I ever find some actual bonito, I'll definitely give it another try.

Apicius 3.7: Melon Salad Redux

I thought I'd give this one another try, as it's a simple summery dish, and 'tis the season. I tweaked the proportions a bit and like this version much better, though it's probably still a bit of an acquired taste. The Latin and English, as refresher:

VII. PEPONES ET MELONES. piper puleium mel uel passum liquamen acetum. interdum et silfi accedit.

3.7. LONG AND ROUND SWEET MELONS: pepper, pennyroyal, honey or passum, liquamen, vinegar. Sometimes silphium is added.

Again, watermelons are in fact Old World, being native to southern Africa.

These are the proportions I used this time, though I bent the rules a bit by using both honey and passum, as I had it. And again, I substituted peppermint for the pennyroyal, as pennyroyal's a little dicey, toxicity-wise (and I had plenty of mint).

2 cups diced watermelon
A few peppercorns (I used exactly 5)
1 teaspoon chopped fresh peppermint
1 teaspoon honey
1 teaspoon passum (raisin wine)
1/4 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
2 teaspoons cider vinegar
A very tiny pinch of ground asafoetida

Grind the peppercorns in a mortar; add the chopped mint and the pinch of asafoetida and grind to a paste. Add the honey and mix, then the passum, liquamen and vinegar and mix/grind until smooth. Pour over the watermelon and garnish with a sprig of mint if you're feeling extra fancy (I was).

This was much more balanced than the last version. It was a strange and complicated mix of contrasting flavors, being all at once sweet and sour, sweet and salty, and spicy hot and cool; but I think it worked. If I were to tweak anything it would be to use even less of the liquamen. It wasn't overly salty, mind you, but I think I just wasn't expecting there to be salt in it at all; like I said, this recipe is perhaps an acquired taste. Still, I'll put it in with the keepers, though under the salad heading as it's not something I'd quite call a dessert. It was certainly interesting.

Apicius 4.1.2: Sala Cattabia

This one looked fairly approachable to modern eyes; more or less a chicken salad with a ginger-raisin vinaigrette. A while back I tried the recipe immediately after it, also a sala cattabia, though it didn't make it into the keepers pile. (I still don't know what 'cattabia' refers to; for a while there I thought maybe it was a type of cooking pot, but no, I was thinking of a caccabus.) This one is said to be 'in the style of Apicius', so extra fancy, I suppose. It would work quite well as a lunch dish, though I had it for supper. It was very yummy, let me say.

The Latin, followed by the English:

[4.1.2] aliter sala cattabia Apiciana: adicies in mortario apii semen puleio aridum mentam aridam gengiber coriandro uiridem uuam passam enucleatam mel acetum oleum et uinum. conteres. adicies in caccabolo panis Picentini frustra, interpones pulpas pulli glandulas edinas caseum Vestinum nucleos pineos cucumeres cepas aridas minute concisas; ius supra perfundes; insuper niuem sub ora, [piper] asparges et inferes.

4.1.2. Another sala cattabia in the style of Apicius: put in a mortar celery seed, dry pennyroyal, dry mint, ginger, green coriander, de-seeded raisins, honey, vinegar, oil and wine. Pound together. Put in a small pot pieces of Picentine bread interlayered with chicken meat, goats' sweetbreads, Vestine cheese, pine nuts, cucumber, finely chopped dried onions. Pour the sauce over (the ingredients); stand (the pot) in snow for an hour, sprinkle with pepper and serve.

According to Grocock and Grainger, Picentine bread is made from alica, a fairly finely milled wheat groat similar in texture to semolina. The alica is left to soak for nine days, probably in must (fresh grape juice, which was usually made into wine). As the must started to ferment, the naturally occurring yeasts acted as a leavening agent. Nowadays we just buy yeast to make bread; of course the Romans had to get it another way. After the nine days more flour was mixed in to make a proper dough, then it was baked. The resulting bread was famous for being quite light and spongy, and I imagine it was a bit sweet too since it started with grape juice rather than just water. I don't know if nine days is long enough to get it to something like sourdough; at any rate it does seem a very interesting way to make bread. Maybe I'll try it someday, though I have to admit my bread-making skills are pretty substandard. I'm going to go ahead and blame my kitchen, which is basically in the cellar, and always a bit on the cool side. I'm sure that's it.

I was able to find a bread made with semolina, crazy enough, though it was this weird sort in Local Supermarket's bakery department that was only lightly baked (as the Gwragedd Annwn prefer, so I hear) that I put in the oven for another ten minutes. Not sure that did anything but warm it up, but it was certainly tasty. A French (or Italian) bread would work, too.

G&G don't give an explanation for 'Vestine cheese', but luckily the internet does, because there totally are people out there who did their PhD's on the History of Cheese. Vestine cheese was made by the Vestini of central Italy, and was a smoked goats' cheese which was quite popular for breakfast. Smoked goats' cheese does exist out there, again according to the internet, but Local Supermarket only had the plain kind, so that's what I used.

I skipped the pennyroyal, since it's on the questionable side; there's mint in it anyway, which is closely related, so I just used plenty of that.

And I left the sweetbreads out entirely, because no. Just no. I mean, you can if you want, but I'm not gonna and you can't make me.

For the dressing:

1/2 teaspoon celery seed
1 teaspoon dried mint
2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger
1 teaspoon minced fresh cilantro (or parsley, if like me you hate cilantro)
1 tablespoon raisins
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon vinegar
2 teaspoons olive oil
1 tablespoon wine

Soak the raisins in the wine for a bit to soften; meanwhile grind the other dry(ish) ingredients to a fine paste in a mortar, then add the raisins when they've softened a bit. (I found cutting them up into several tiny pieces first made grinding them easier). Add the wine the raisins soaked in, the vinegar, honey, and oil and mix to a slurry. Set aside.

For the salad:

1 cup bread cubes
1 cup diced cooked chicken
2 oz smoked or plain goats' cheese, crumbled
1 generous tablespoon pine nuts
1/2 cucumber, peeled and diced
1 tablespoon minced onion
pepper

Toast the pine nuts in a dry pan until lightly browned and fragrant. Put all the bread cubes in the bowl, then layer half each of the chicken, goats' cheese, cucumber, onions, and pine nuts, followed by another layer of chicken, cheese, cucumber, and onions. Pour the dressing over, sprinkle with the remaining pine nuts and pepper to taste. Put in the fridge to chill for an hour, or eat right away (which is what I did).

This was really very good, though it has no salt (and no liquamen, either), so I was worried it would be bland. It wasn't, because the goats' cheese was a little salty, but you could add salt if you like with the pepper at the end. The flavors all worked quite well together, and surprisingly the bread was a very important part of it and gave it a good solid base. It was over all quite nicely balanced, though it was a little light on the dressing. Ideally I wanted enough to soak down through the layers and into the bread at the bottom, but it didn't get that far, being fairly thick. It tasted good, though, so I think the proportions of the dressing are about right. Maybe half again as much would work for the amount of salad? That's very much to personal taste, though, of course.

The dressing wasn't all that gingery, oddly enough; I wonder if it's the ginger I've been getting lately. The last time I got some I made ginger tea out of it, using rather a lot of ginger, but it had barely any kick. So maybe you'll want to use less, ha. Still though, the dressing was rich, complex, and densely flavored, and very Roman.

You can play with the proportions of the salad a bit too, of course. I don't really care too much for raw onion, so only used a little. It did work well and gave it just the right amount of bite, I thought. You could also use rather more pine nuts; the measurement I gave above was just what I had left in the container!

Overall, though, definitely a keeper, and I'll be making it again!

Apicius 4.3.4: Matian Minutal

And now the minutal, which I made the meatballs for below. It's another pork and fruit stew, this time with apples.

[4.3.4] minutal Matianum: adicies in caccabum oleum liquamen cocturam; concides porrum coriandrum, esicia minuta; spatulam porcinam coctam tessellatim concides cum sua sibi tergilla. facies ut simul quoquantur; media coctura mala Maziana purgata intrinsecus concisa tessellatim mittes; dum coquitur teres piper cuminum coriandrum uiridem uel semen mentam laseris radicem; suffundis acetum mel liquamen defritum modice et ius de suo sibi; aceto modico temperabis, facies ut ferueat; cum ferbuerit, tractam confringes et ex ea obligas; piper asparges et inferes.

[4.3.4] Matian minutal: put in a pan oil, liquamen, stock; chop in leek and coriander, ground forcemeat, diced cooked shoulder of pork with its crackling. Allow all this to cook together. In the middle of the cooking put in cored and diced Matian apples. While it is cooking pound pepper, cumin, green coriander or seed, mint, laser root; pour on vinegar, honey, liquamen, a little defrutum, and some of the cooking liquor; flavour with a little vinegar, bring it to heat; when it is simmering, crumble a tracta and thicken with some of it, sprinkle with pepper and serve.

According to G&G, Matian apples were a variety developed by one Gaius Matius or his son, the elder a friend of Julius Caesar, the younger a friend to Augustus Caesar, though they don't say what kind of apples they might be. I used some sweet crisp eating apples (Galas) as I thought they'd hold up better than the softer cooking apples like you'd use to make pie. And again, I hate cilantro ('green coriander') and so used parsley.

olive oil
1 1/2 teaspoons liquamen (Thai fish sauce), divided
2 cups chicken broth
1 leek, white and green parts only, chopped into half-moons and thoroughly washed
1/2 cup fresh cilantro or parsley, chopped
about a dozen meatballs from the isicia recipe below
1 cup leftover roast pork, cubed (such as from Apicius 7.5.5)
1-2 crisp sweet apples, peeled, cored, and roughly chopped
a few peppercorns, or more, to taste
1/2 teaspoon cumin (I used ground)
1/2 teaspoon coriander seed
1/2 teaspoon dried peppermint
pinch asafoetida
1-3 teaspoons vinegar or more, divided
2 teaspoons honey
2 teaspoons defrutum
cornstarch or wheat flour to thicken

Put a bit of olive oil in a large saucepan or deep skillet (I didn't use too much as the isicia already had a fair amount), then add a teaspoon of liquamen and the chicken stock. Add the leek, cilantro or parsley, the isicia/meatballs and the leftover pork. Bring to a gentle simmer and cook until the leeks are beginning to soften. Add the apples and cook until they are soft but not falling apart and the leeks are done. Grind the spices as finely as you can, then mix into a paste with a teaspoon of vinegar, the honey, the remaining 1/2 teaspoon of the liquamen and the defrutum. Add to the pork, meatball and apple mix, then taste for balance, and add more vinegar if necessary (I added another 2 teaspoons). Bring it back up to a simmer then thicken with a bit of starch. Sprinkle with pepper and serve.

This worked quite well as a filling stew or soup and was nicely balanced between sweet, sour, and savory, and was plenty rich as well. Given that the pork shoulder and the meatballs were already cooked, it didn't take all that long to simmer but tasted like it'd been stewing forever. It's probably not actually necessary to grind the spices then mix them with all the liquids; one could certainly just grind the spices by themselves then throw everything in with the stew, but I've given the more complicated instructions here as that's what the original recipe called for.

Apicius 2.1.7: Isicia With Caroenum

(Ignore the sauce; the recipe below is just for the meatballs.)

I originally made these to go in another recipe, a pork and apple minutal, but these were so good I have made them just on their own several times since. Really, these are absolutely wonderful.

Isicia refers to finely chopped meat; it seems to get used in Apicius in a variety of ways, but in this particular recipe likely refers to something meatball-like (according to Grainger and Grocock, anyway).

[2.1.7] esicia omentata: pulpam concisam teres cum medulla siliginei in uino infusa; piper, liquamen; si uelis, et bacam mirta extenteratam simul conteres. pusilla esicia formabis intus nucleis et pipere positis; inuoluta omento subassabis cum caroeno.

2.1.7. Forcemeat faggots: you pound chopped meat with fresh white breadcrumbs soaked in wine, with pepper and liquamen; if you wish, you pound crushed myrtle berries with them. You shape the faggots with pine nuts and pepper placed inside. Wrap them in caul fat and roast them with caroenum.

I did alter this recipe a little, mostly because I'm not sure where I'd find caul fat; also the idea of finding whole surprise peppercorns in the middle of a perfectly innocent-looking meatball didn't appeal, so I mixed the (ground) pepper and pine nuts in with the meat instead (though you could, of course, follow the original method, which does sound interesting). So instead of the caul fat, which I'm assuming was there to give some rich flavor and to keep the meatballs from drying out, I rolled them in a bit of olive oil. It seemed to work quite well. For the myrtle berries (which are not available here, and which don't grow around here as it's too far north), I substituted juniper berries plus a pinch of allspice (though allspice is New World), as according to The Internet, that was the closest approximation to the taste. Plus I had both of them. If you can't find either, the berries are optional; it'll be a bit blander but still pretty rich and sweet. And as for bread crumbs, I just used the plain white kind from a canister. I suppose I could have made my own, but I'm lazy. And I used ground pork because I thought with the sweet caroenum over it it wanted a mild meat. Ground chicken or turkey (or veal) would probably also work just as well. The recipe:

1 pound ground pork
1/2 cup plain white bread crumbs
1/4 cup sweet white wine
1/2 teaspoon peppercorns
1 tablespoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
6 juniper berries
pinch ground allspice
1/4 cup pine nuts
olive oil
caroenum

Preheat the oven to 325° Fahrenheit. Drizzle a bit of olive oil in a 9 by 13 inch baking dish and set aside.

Put the bread crumbs in a bowl; pour the wine over and mix. Grind the peppercorns to a fine powder, then add the juniper berries and allspice and grind them as well. Toast the pine nuts in a dry pan until a little browned and fragrant, then tip into a mortar and grind to a paste. Add the spices, pine nuts, liquamen, and the soaked bread crumbs to the ground pork and mix thoroughly. Form into meatballs about an inch and half in diameter. Roll them in the olive oil in the baking pan to coat (add more if necessary). When they're all in there drizzle a decent amount of caroenum over each one, though not enough that they're swimming in the stuff (probably about 1/4 cup altogether).

Bake for 40-45 minutes, or until the meatballs are cooked through and have begun to brown, and the caroenum has started to caramelize a bit. Makes about two dozen.

These were absolutely lovely. The olive oil kept them tender and moist, even though they cooked for quite a while, and the caroenum formed a delicious sticky sugary crust on them. Really seriously, try these.

Apicius 5.2.1: Lentils With Mussels

(To be fair, I don't think even Martha Stewart's people can get an appetizing photo of lentils. They're just the color of mud, and there's nothing for it.)

This was an odd one I'd been wanting to try. Now, granted spondyli (according to Grocock and Grainger) can mean both 'mussel' and 'artichoke' in Latin and Greek, through some logic I'm not quite following likening both mussels and artichokes to vertebrae (which is what the word originally meant). So it's not outside the realm of possibility that this is supposed to be a lentil and artichoke recipe. Though I'm not sure that's any less weird.

[5.2.1] lenticula ex spondilis siue fondilis: accipies caccabum mundum, adicies in mortarium piper cuminum semen coriandri mentam rutam puleium, fricabis, suffundis acetum, adicies mel, liquamen et defritum, aceto temperabis, reexinanies in caccabo. spondilos elixatos teres et mittes ut ferueant. cum bene ferbuerint, obligas. adicies in boletari oleum uiridem.

5.2.1. Lentils with mussels: take a clean pan, (put the lentils in and cook them). Put in a mortar pepper, cumin, coriander seed, mint, rue, pennyroyal, and pound them. Pour on vinegar, add honey, liquamen, and defrutum, flavour with vinegar. Empty the mortar into the pan. Pound cooked mussels, put them in and bring to heat; when it is simmering well, thicken. Pour green oil over it in the serving dish.

I used frozen mussels, both because that's what the store had, and because I thought it would make it easier to measure the amount of them. I wanted the lentils and mussels to be roughly half each, and wasn't sure how much I'd be getting if I got them fresh in the shell. I could tell they'd been frozen, though, and I imagine fresh ones would have tasted a bit better. But frozen worked perfectly fine, if you can't get ahold of fresh ones yourself.

This is what I tried; as it was an experiment I only made a small amount, just enough for a serving. The rue is not yet up in my garden, so I had to leave it out, though I rather like it. And these days there is some concern about pennyroyal as I've mentioned here before, so I just went heavy on the mint which is related.

1/4 cup lentils (I had the small brown ones)
a few peppercorns
1/2 teaspoon cumin (I had ground)
1/2 teaspoon coriander seed
1 teaspoon dried mint
a dozen mussels
1 1/2 teaspoons cider vinegar
1 teaspoon honey
1/2 teaspoon liquamen (Thai fish sauce)
1 teaspoon defrutum
olive oil

Boil the lentils in plenty of water, adding more if necessary, until quite soft (about half an hour).

Grind the peppercorns and coriander seed, add the other spices and grind a bit more; then add the vinegar, honey, liquamen and defrutum and mix to a paste.

Boil or steam the mussels for about five minutes if using fresh ones; discard any that remain closed after that time. Remove from the shells and debeard. If using frozen pre-cooked mussels, throw in some water and bring to a boil, then take off the heat (just to thaw and warm them up).

Drain the lentils, then put the spice/vinegar mixture in; put the mussels in the mortar and smash to a paste as best you can (or you can use a food processor). Put in with the lentils and stir it all together.

Drizzle with a bit of olive oil (or mix a bit in), and serve.

These were surprisingly good; the earthy lentils and briny mussels were both strong enough to work well together, and the pepper and vinegar gave it a nice bit of kick. The olive oil was also surprisingly necessary and gave it a bit of a flowery taste (the rue would do so as well). It worked out much better than I'd feared, and I ate the whole thing right up, though I could tell the mussels were frozen as the texture was a bit grainy. It would be better with fresh, I'm quite sure. Still, though, for something that I'd worried would just be weird, it totally worked, and I'll call it a keeper.

Though I do wonder how it would work with artichokes.

Apicius 8.6.8: Coriander Lamb

I got some lamb shoulder chops the other day, figuring I could try something Roman with them, though I wasn't sure what. But browsing through Apicius tonight I found I was missing ingredients for most of the lamb recipes. So I opted for the simplest one, though I know others have done it. It's a quite modern-looking recipe, no elaborate sauces or boiling involved, just lamb rubbed with oil and spices and roasted in the oven. I'll admit it actually felt like kind of a cop-out as it was so simple. But, holy moly, am I glad I tried it.

[8.6.8] hedus siue agnus crudus: oleo piper fricabis et asparges fores salem purum multo cum coriandri semen. in furnum mittis, assatum inferes.

8.6.8. Rare kid or lamb: rub with oil and pepper, and sprinkle plenty of pure salt and coriander seed all over the outside. Put in the oven. Serve roasted.

I assume the original recipe is for a whole lamb, or a roast or somesuch, but like I said I had chops. This is what I did:

2 lamb shoulder chops 3/4 inch thick (together they came to a little under a pound)
1/2 teaspoon peppercorns
1 teaspoon coriander seed
olive oil
salt

Grind the peppercorns and remove to a small bowl, then grind the coriander seed separately. Drizzle a bit of olive oil over the chops, sprinkle about half the pepper over them and rub in; repeat with more oil and the remaining pepper on the other side. Then sprinkle each chop with a generous amount of salt and the ground coriander seeds, getting both sides as well.

Broil 3 inches from the heat for 6 to 8 minutes; turn and broil for another 6 to 7 minutes.

Oh. My. God. Now, maybe, I just hadn't had a lamb chop broiled to perfection for a good long while, and maybe I hadn't had much to eat earlier in the day so was hungrier than usual, but there was no maybe about how unbelievably delicious these were. This was pure Roman hedonism at its most decadent, and I found myself inspired (nay, driven) to eat as the ancients:

Was I compelled to abandon my knife and fork? Did I need to get my face in there to get every last morsel of lamb? Did I then gnaw on the bones? Did I make little whimpering noises while doing so? Did I then go and eat the second chop (the one I'd planned to save for tomorrow) like the slavering sybarite I was? When that was gone, did I then use my fingers on the pan, picking up the littlest crumbs of the spice mix? Did I then lick every last molecule of the stuff off my fingers? Did I, at last, sit down in the chair with a contented sigh, close my eyes and say (out loud) That was a religious experience?

Yes, yes, and HELL YES to all of the above. These were crispy on the outside, and just pink enough on the inside, and the spices were absolutely wonderful. I'd been (as usual) wary about getting too much pepper in there but let myself go for once; once it's cooked it's a lot less spicy, so it was fine (in fact feel free to use more). And the coriander gave it a lovely lemony sort of taste, that, wow. The key, though, and the original recipe is quite clear, is to make sure to be generous with the salt. The salt is really what makes it.

OH MY GOD it was REALLY freakin' good. Honestly, that photo up there (which came out kinda nice for once) is making me all misty-eyed with longing and regret that it's All Gone. I simply must have more.

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.