Cocoa in the Country.

Today, January 8th …

The very first issue of Country Life, that most British of British magazines was launched on this day in 1897. It seems that every country sees its rural life as its real life, its essence, and perhaps it is – even if hardly anyone lives it any more. Country Life is now well-known for its cover pictures of aristocratic homes or aristocratic ‘girls in pearls’, but the first issue (which cost sixpence) had several display advertisements, including one for Cadbury’s Cocoa.

The history of chocolate contains every plot device known to fiction-writers – almost as many as does the history of coffee, and too many for one day. We will save the botanical, linguistic, economic, political, imperial, medicinal, mythological and scientific stories for other times, and today enjoy the religious experience of chocolate (as well as the rural), for a reason which will become clear.

Chocolate originated in Central America, and our words ‘chocolate’ and ‘cacao’ have their origins in the languages of the ancient people of that region, for whom it certainly played spiritual and celebratory role. Eventually, thanks to the Spanish invasion/colonisation of the region, cacao beans made their way to Europe.

The first ‘improvement’ made by the Europeans to the spicy, sometimes bitter beverage was the addition of sugar, and the credit for this idea is occasionally attributed to the Franciscan Bishop of Mexico, Juan de Zumarrogo, himself. The rich, sweet beverage became rapidly popular, and equally rapidly feared by the inevitable small number of ascetics, puritans, purists and kill-joys amongst the clergy. In fact, it spurred a vigorous debate within the Catholic Church, mainly on the issue of whether (as it was so rich and sustaining) it should be considered a beverage or a food, and therefore whether it was acceptable when fasting. A secondary issue was whether of not it incited lust (see the quotation below) - clearly also a topic of great concern to an institution that maintained celibate priests but wanted its flock to go forth and multiply (under the correct set of conditions of course).

Popes between Gregory XIII (1572-85) and Benedict XIV (1740-58) and many lesser clerics made edicts and pronouncements on the sanctity or otherwise of chocolate, but ultimately the Church lost the battle and gave up. The story of Popes and chocolate was still not quite over however, and rumour at the time had it that the death of Clement XIV in 1774 was facilitated by poisoned chocolate given by Jesuits (who have a long involvement in its history), who he had tried to suppress.

The religious connection comes full circle in our story today, as the other very useful thing about chocolate (the drink) is that it is universally liked, but not alcoholic. Developments in the chocolate industry went on apace in England in the nineteenth century thanks to two Quaker (and therefore temperance) families – the Cadburys and the Frys, who need no introduction.

As to the rural aspect to today’s story, it comes in the form of today’s recipe. From The Times in 1942, a wartime recipe for ersatz chocolate (the confection, not the drink) - very welcome during a time of sugar and sweets rationing.

Honey Chocolate.
Private bee-keepers may be glad of the following recipe for home-made honey chocolate: - ¼ lb honey, ¼ lb sugar, three tablespoonsful cocoa, ½ lb chopped home-grown nuts (hazel, cob, walnut, &c.), three tablespoonsful stale plain cake crumbs.
Put the honey and sugar in a saucepan over very low heat and allow the sugar to dissolve. Boil up, stirring in the cake crumbs and cocoa, beating until smooth, add the chopped nuts, and mix well. Spread on greased flat tin, leave to dry, cut into squares.

Tomorrow’s Story …

Asparagus and Age.

Quotation for the Day …

The confection made of Cacao called Chocolate or Chocoletto which may be had in diverse places in London, at reasonable rates, is of wonderful efficacy for the procreation of children : for it not only vehemently incites to Venus, but causes conception in women . . . and besides that it preserves health, for it makes such as take it often to become fat and corpulent, fair and amiable. William Coles, Adam in Eden (1657)

Papal Pasta.

Today, December 27th …

Giovanni Angelo Braschi was born into a wealthy aristocratic family on this day in 1717 in Cesena in northern Italy. In 1775 he was elected Pope as a compromise candidate after four months deliberation, and took the name Pius VI. He did not let his new role get in the way of the life of luxury to which he was accustomed – in fact he almost bankrupted the country partly on account of the magnificence of his entertainments.

A cookbook (Il Cuoco Maceratese) was published during his Papacy by Antonio Nebbia, which is famous on a number of counts. It documents the upper class cuisine of the time, and included mention of the fine French sauces developed by La Varenne. It also included a recipe for the famous lasagne-style dish of the Marchese region now called vincisgrassi (although he called it princisgras) which contains chicken livers, truffles and prosciutto.

The name of Nebbia’s dish is the cause of some controversy, with the popular theory that it was named for the Austrian General Windisch Graetz being impossible because the Napoleonic Wars which caused him to be in the region did not happen until long after the book was published. There are other mysteries in the world of pasta words - the origin of the word ‘lasagne’ itself for example. The first written Italian recipe occurs in a fourteenth century cookbook from Naples. However, something pasta-like called ‘loseyns’ is described in The Form of Cury – the late fourteenth century cookbook of the master chefs of King Richard II of England. An even more intriguing (but less likely) contender is a Viking-era dish called ‘langkake’. Naturally the Italians wont listen to any of these other theories, and probably count it treason against the state to do so.

A third pasta-naming mystery occurs in our recipe of the day. There is absolutely no clue in the late Victorian English tome ‘Cassell’s Dictionary of Cookery’ as to why this dish is styled “à la Pontiffe’. The ‘macaroni’ is in the form of ‘long ribbons’ too, which sounds closer to lasagne noodles than the small tubes that have the name today. Which is a fourth pasta-naming mystery, if my counting is correct.

Macaroni à la Pontiffe.
Boil eight ounces of long straight ribbon macaroni in the usual way, but fifteen minutes will be enough to swell it, which is all that is needed. Drain on a sieve, and when drained put a neat layer of it as a lining over a well-buttered mould; cover next with a quenelle forcemeat of fowl or rabbit, and full the mould with game or poultry, boned and filleted, some larks, also boned, and rolled with thin bits of bacon inside each, and some delicate strips or pieces cut into rounds about he size of a shilling, distributed with egg-balls and button mushrooms, previously simmered in gravy in the mould. Thicken the gravy, a littlr of which use to moisten the whole, cover with macaroni, and simmer, but do not boil, for an hour.

Tomorrow’s Story …

A terrible sea cook.

A Previous Story for this Day …

We had a story about Jane Austen on this day in 2005.

On this Topic …

Food for Cowboys and Popes.

Quotation for the Day …

Life is a combination of magic and pasta. Federico Fellini.

Food for cowboys and popes

Today, November 8th …

Today commemorates the admission in 1889 of Montana as the forty-first state of the USA. They breed them tough in the mountains, but not so tough that they don't use a euphemism for their biggest culinary specialty. “Rocky mountain oysters” are beef testicles, and the big event of the year in Montana is the “Annual Testicle Festival” (a.k.a “The Testy Festy”) at which two tons of the battered and deep-fried delights are served to hungry aficionados.

Testicles (from a culinary point of view, that is) probably have a greater number of “nice” names than any other food. Even the French sanitise them (slightly) by calling them rognons blancs (“white kidneys”). If you saw bulls’ jewels, cowboy caviar, Montana tendergroin (ouch!), or swinging beef (they gotta be joking!) on a menu, would you order first and ask afterwards?

For obvious reasons, testicles have a reputation as aphrodisiacs, which of course has nothing to do with why Bartolomeo Scappi, the personal cook to Pope Pius V included a recipe for “Pie of Bull’s Testicles” in his collection.

Boil four bull's testicles together with salt. Cut into slices and sprinkle with salt, pepper, nutmeg and cinnamon. Then, in a pie crust, place layers of sliced testicles alternated with mince of lamb's kidneys, ham, marjoram, cloves and thyme.

In recipe books from the days when nothing could be refrigerated, and nothing was wasted, animal testicles were usually called “stones”, and all sorts were used, including those from cockerels, which presumably then were no longer cockerels. They were included in many dishes, particularly pies and fricassees - the traditional repositories of kitchen odds and ends. Here is a recipe from “Receipts of pastry & cookery: for the use of his scholars” by Edward Kidder, a cookery teacher in London in about 1740.

A Lambstone and Sweetbread Pye
Boyle blanch & slice them season them with savory spice lay them in your pye with slicd
artichoke bottoms lay on butter & close your pye [with] A Lear [a thickened sauce, often poured in after a pie was cooked].

Tomorrow … All Hail the apple trees.