Food fun!

Hello folks, today's recipe and cooking experiments is making homemade pasta and ravioli's from period recipes :) I am cooking with my own Baroness today in her lovely home, and playing with her brand new pasta machine in the effort of creation.

We are using two different book in our pasta creation today, The Art of Cooking; The First Modern Cookery Book (original text from The Eminent Maestro Martino of Como and translated and annotated/redacted by Jeremy Parzan) for our period recipe and Good Eats Volume 2 for our modern interpretation of the pasta by Alton Brown. The reason we are using Good Eats Vol.2 is because the period recipe for pasta is, well..not there. The cookbook assumes you know how to make and craft your own pasta from scratch and is thus teaching you a new method of cooking with it and fillings. Most cook books that have survived to the modern day are not so much instruction manuals as we would see them today, they're a listing of what each dish was and what went into it. It was assumed that if you could read you were already an intelligent man/woman, and by the time you were working in a royal or noble house you have already learned how to do the basics like making pasta or breads and baked goods or know ow to measure and cut without instruction. This can on occasion make cooking difficult for these medieval recipes, but its a challenge I always love to handle.

We are attempting to make Ravioli for Non-Lenton Times, and using the Sicilian Macaroni recipe of pasta for the ravioli's. The idea will be to make 3 batches, one directly from Good Eats step-by-step and one each for myself and my Baroness to do our best and mix the period ingredients with to make our own blend of pasta. The recipe for the Sicilian Macaroni Pasta that we are using is as follows:

Take some very white flour and make a dough using egg whites and rose water, common water if you wish can substitute as well. Make sure the pasta is very firm.

From there the recipe for Ravioli for non-lenten times follows as such:

To make 10 servings: take a half a libra of aged cheese, and a little fatty cheese and a libra of fatty pork belly or veal teat and boil until it comes apart easily; then chop well and take some good, well-chopped herbs, and pepper, cloves, and ginger; and it would be even better if you added some ground capon breast; incorporate all these things together.Then make a thing sheet of pasta and encase the mixture in the pasta, a for other ravioli. These ravioli should not be any larger than half a chestnut, cook them in a capon broth or good meat broth that you have made yellow with saffron when it boils. Let the Ravioli simmer for the time it takes you to say the Lord's Prayer twice.
Serve in bowls, topped with grated cheese and sweet spices mixed together.

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OK, the first step is to make the good eats Pasta blend. We're simply following the instructions from Good eats Vol.2, page 12 for those following along at home :). The dough we make is pretty simple, our standard ravioli that I'm pretty happy with. We made two batches of that and have moved onto the rosewater based dough. 2 eggs, teaspoon of olive oil, 1/2 a teaspoon of salt and 3 tablespoons of water was the liquid blend, then 10 ounces of flour was the solid blend.

Oh man...this is very very naughty. The rosewater and egg white combo is an amazing flavor, and its very rich and silky on the tongue. Mmm...I think we're gonna make many more batches... 3 egg whites, 3 pinches of salt, eough rosewater to cover the eggwhites (just a couple teaspoons) were the liquids for this and 11.5 unces of flour (give or take) was our solid blend.

The pasta machine was actually super easy to work with, I was surprised at how well it all worked out. The pasta was rolled out and we added a chicken/bacon/basil/cheese/rosemary spice blend to make the filling for the Ravioli. A small amount was placed inside the center line, we then used an egg wash to bond the two sections of Ravioli out and cut them into squares (nothing fancy today, this is an extperiment day!). The boiling of the pasta was pretty borning actually, put alas. I boiled until the pasta floated to the top and I did in fact say the Lord's Prayer twice as my counting measure.

I'm afraid I don't have any photo's...because I ate them already. They tasted amazing, the ravioli's were spot on and the filling made it oh so yum. Makes me wanna buy a pasta maker now!

SCA Recipe of the day: Florentine Style Meat on Pasta

This is a bit more complex of a recipe than I have made before, Italian food tends to be heavy on the spice to change the flavor of the same ingredients, so we'll see how this one comes out when it's all done :)

•  1-2 lbs. beef sirloin roast, cut into fist size pieces
• 1/2- 3/4 onion
• 1/8 cup prunes
• 1/8 cup raisins
• 1/2 tsp. pepper
• 1/4 tsp. cinnamon
• 3 whole cloves
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp sugar
• pinch saffron
• 1/8 cup water

• 1/4 cup red wine
• 1/4 cup verjuice

Lay meat in a baking dish. Cover with fruit, salt, and liquids. The liquids should be no more than a finger's-width deep in the dish. Put in the oven at 350 degrees. When the meat is half cooked (about 20-30 minutes) flip the meat over and add spices and sugar. Cook another 20-30 minutes, or until completely cooked.

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First change to the recipe is the lack of verjuice. I replaced it with an extra helping of red wine so the finished product is going to come out sweeter than expected.  The meat is a bit more than the recipe called for (feeding 7 tonight) so I increased the recipe amount as far as spices went to compensate. I'm feeding a larger ground than I'm used to, so I admit I'm a bit nerous about screwing up dinner :p. The noodle water is started at the halfway point, because I remember how slow this pan boils water. I'm making an alfredo sauce to go on the side, incase anyone here does not want to have the red wine sauce.

At the halfway point I added the rest of spice with ease. It smelled wonderful so far, and I cannot wait for it to be finished!!

OK, this smells and looks amazing. The noodles are cooked al dente as is traditional italian pasta and the beef is thick and juciy. Because I'm eating with other people, I'm gonna have them give their opinion of the dish.

Simon - Ridiculously tasty. Goes perfectly with a Lindemans Merlot 2006

Kaoru - This came out excellently. I would have cooked the meat a little bit less as it was a little tough, but the clove scent was gorgeous without being overpowering in the flavor.

Troy - The beef had a very light and pleasant grape flavor that enhanced the flavor of the beef.  I don't like red wine and the red wine was only an aftertaste on the outside of the beef and didn't overpower the flavor at all. 

Char - Very good, would have liked a thicker sauce, even though it's not period :p

Dave - The meal overall was fantastic, the steak was cooked to a medium though still fork tender. The wine sauce could have been reduced down a little bit more to concentrate the flavors. A schnitzel would substitute perfectly too.

Lana - I would have liked a bit thicker sauce and thinner noodles for better coverage but the flavor was excellent for both the sauce and the beef.