COOKING
. Most cooking in medieval France was done in a pot over a fire, suspended by a hook or
held up by a trivet. Into this cauldron went such vegetables as cabbages, onions, peas or
beans, and/or cereal grains, with or without meat or fish—along with water. The result
could be a porridge, soup, or stew—or even, if the household was well provided,
something resembling what is still called pot au feu, yielding a substantial piece of meat
as well as soup. Herbs, especially parsley, frequently flavored the resulting pottages,
some of which might be spiced in a well-to-do household and/or thickened with bread or
eggs. A really well-equipped kitchen also had a spit, on which to roast meats and poultry,
and perhaps a grill for broiling and a low-sided pan for frying: fried dishes seem to have
been more common in France than in England and northern European countries, but they
were rarely to be found in peasant households and generally constituted special treats.
Only the largest households had their own ovens. Some baking could be done directly
on the hearth, but generally pastries—meat or fish pies being the most important type—
were taken out to a communal oven for baking or purchased from a bakeshop, as bread
often was in the towns. The food of the nobility and prosperous bourgeoisie was an
elaborated version of what everyone else ate, utilizing more fresh (as against salted or
dried) meat and fish and developing such elegant specialties as colored meat and fish
jellies and the various dishes based on ground meat in almond milk that found their way
to Europe from the Near East. Still, the early recipe collections originating in such
wealthy households invariably begin with directions for simpler pottages.
Constance B.Hieatt
[See also: BANQUETING; BEVERAGES; BREAD; DIET AND NUTRITION;
FOOD TRADES; MEALS]
Brereton, Georgine E., and Janet M.Ferrier, eds. Le menagier de Paris. Oxford: Clarendon, 1981.
Lambert, Carole, ed. Le recueil de Riom et la manière de henter soutillement: un livre de cuisine et
réceptaire sur les greffes du XVe siècle. Montreal: Ceres, 1987.
Scully, Terence, ed. The Viandier of Taillevent. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 1988.
Mennell, Stephen. All Manners of Food: Eating and Taste in England and France from the Middle
Ages to the Present. Oxford: Blackwell, 1985.
Gottschalk, Alfred. Histoire de l’alimentation et de la gastronomie depuis la préhistoire jusqu’à
nos jours. 2 vols. Paris: Hippocrate, 1948; Vol. 1, pp. 257–352.
Mulon, Marianne, ed. “Deux traités inédits d’art culinaire médiéval.” Bulletin philologique et
historique (1971 for 1968): 369–435.
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