Artichoke Pie with Cheese and Herbs, 1570

Thoughts:

Whenever I feel like I’ve lost some direction when it comes to historical cooking, I like to sit down with some of my favorite old cookbooks and flip through until something inspires me. In this case, it was a pie from the 1570s Italian cookbook by Bartolomeo Scappi, and specifically an artichoke pie, which piqued my interest.

This recipe is in the section for crostata, from which I pulled another recipe for a peach crostata. This, like that one, calls for Scappi’s signature coil of dough around the outside of the pie. This time around, I spent more time trying to figure out what the heck one is supposed to do to make the dough “right”. I’m still not positive that I’ve nailed it down, but I can tell you that the pie was fantastic, regardless.

At its heart (small pun intended!), this is a very simple tart- crust, cheese, artichoke hearts, and a few mild spices. The combination of these ingredients, fresh and warm from the oven, is just lovely. The cheese melts into the nooks and crannies of the artichoke hearts, making each forkful a gooey delight. Although you can’t quite tell from the photo, the outside crust is a coil of dough layered with herbs and parmesan cheese, which means that the pie is tasty right through the last bite. It’s going on my list of staples for vegetarian guests, and I look forward to making it again this summer for interesting picnic/potluck foods!

Where in Westeros?

I’m guessing somewhere around the middle or southern end of the continent. It strikes me as a very King’s Landing dish, for whatever reason, but since artichokes thrive in warmer climates, the Reach would also be a strong contender.

Recipe for Artichoke Crostata

“Get artichokes in their season, as is said in the Second Book, on Prepared Dishes, at Recipe 213, and cook them in a meat broth or in salted water. Take the heart, which is their best part, and clean it well. If it is big, slice it and make the crostata or pie of it with the same ingredients as are used with the field mushrooms…” -The Opera of Bartolomeo Scappi, 1570

Cook’s Note: I went light on the sugar in the dough, since this is a mostly savory dish, but enough sugar layers might result in a nice crispy sort of a dough, similar to that amazing sweet croissant-like pastry whose name currently eludes me, but whose taste haunts me…

Prep: 30 minutes Chilling: 1 hour Baking:45 minutes

Makes 1 pie, or roughly 8 servings

Dough Ingredients:

3 cups flour
1 tsp. salt
1 cup chilled butter or lard, plus ~2 Tbs. melted for brushing
2 egg yolks
cold water, about 1 cup
1/4 cup sugar (turbinado or demerara are best)

Ingredients for filling:

2 14 oz. cans artichoke hearts
2 medium balls of mozarella (or provatura, if available)
2 Tbs. grated parmesan
1 tsp. each dried mint and marjoram
dash of verjuice, or wine vinegar

Begin by making your dough: Combine the flour and salt in a large bowl, then roughly cut in the butter until it is about the size of small peas. Add the egg yolks (the whites can be saved to make custard sauce for dessert- my favorite!), followed by just enough of the cold water to bring the mixture mostly together. Divide into two pieces, then wrap in plastic and chill for at least an hour.

Once the dough is chilled, take one half of it and roll it out on a lightly floured surface to a rectangular shape. Brush the middle of the dough with melted butter, sprinkle with sugar, then fold one side over like a letter. Brush this third with butter, sprinkle with sugar, and fold the last side over. Repeat this process at least once more- it creates layers in the dough- with this and the other half of the dough. Place the first half of layered dough back in the fridge while you work on putting together the pie.

Roll one half of the layered dough out to about 1/8″ thickness, and cut out a circle the same size as the bottom of your pan, and place it in the pan when you’re done (I used a springform pan, but a pie pan should work too). Take the scraps from that cutting and roll them out into a slender rope that is long enough to go around the outside of the pan. Roll it flat, to a few inches width, and spread with melted butter, and sprinkle with about 1 tsp. of the crushed herbs and 1/2 Tbs. of the parmesan. Roll up as you would a cinnamon roll, then give the whole coil several good twists to help keep it from unrolling. Lay the coil on top of the disc of dough in your pan, pressing to the edge of the pan slightly.

Now the fun part- the filling! Preheat the oven to 350F. Sprinkle the bottom of the pie with half the remaining crushed herbs, then a layer of artichoke hearts. Top this with a layer of sliced mozarella and the rest of the herbs, then more artichokes. Repeat this layering until you’ve used up all your ingredients. Sprinkle the top with the remaining parmesan, then set the pie aside.

Roll out the other half of the layered dough and cut into decorative shapes to cover the top, making sure to leave air vents. Brush the top of the pie with any remaining melted butter you have left. Bake for around 45 minutes, or until the top of the pie starts to turn a nice light golden color. Allow to cool for at least 10 minutes before slicing. Enjoy!

*If you have a lot of dough scraps, I suggest brushing them with butter, covering with cinnamon sugar, and baking until cooked. They make an amazing, easy, totally delicious dessert, especially if you used those two egg whites to make up some custard sauce!*

On February, coping mechanisms, and cloister gardens

It’s February, and you know what that means?

GARDENING!!

Well, sort of. I mean, not really. At all. The backyard is basically a giant ice patch, and there’s not a hint of anything green as far as the eye can see.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot to love in February: Valentine’s Day (which was always a family holiday when I was growing up, second only to Christmas), my birthday (Balloons! CAKE!!), ordering new honeybees (bzzzzzz) and the first hints of spring as the days lengthen.

But it’s often cold, murky, grey, and more than a little gloomy. So naturally I’ve been buoying my spirits by planning gardening projects for warmer months. After all, I get to start some seedlings in about a month, and they’ll need somewhere to go! I’ll also be shoring up the herb garden, moving things around and working on a more permanent fence and path, now that I know I like it where the garden is. But THAT’s another post, for another day. ;)

I recently rediscovered the notes I took last summer during a class on medieval cloister gardens (I’ll add the link when I find that, too). It was a really inspiring lecture, replete with a vivid slideshow and heaps of Latin names for historical plantings. Obviously, I was smitten. Even now, just thinking about it, I get a little glow of that late July warmth. Pair that with my trip earlier to the Chelsea Physic Garden in London, and I’ve been obsessively Pinning ever since…

So I pulled out some notebooks and started sketching. We’ve got a few good sections of relatively flat space around the house, and one, just up from the garage, is about 20’x30′. Can we say AMBITIOUS? But the more I’ve worked on this, the more I’m really keen to give it a go.

Here are the top three sketches:

The leftmost sketch is one I did last year, and really liked, until I did the other two earlier this week. I envision it being laid out like a cloister garden, with a heavy dash of potager-style planting. Basically, it’ll be a very pretty vegetable garden, with flowers and companion plantings scattered throughout. It will definitely take me several years to really get the thing sorted, but I’m guessing I can do the basic layout and at least the outside borders this year. The different sketches play with tiers of different heights, but I’m not sure how complicated I want to get with that.

Here are the absolutes:

the paths are roughly 2′ wide. That might get fudged a little one way or the other, but I won’t know until I lay everything out.
The back wall of the garden, at the tops of the sketches, will be a tall grape trellis. My father-in-law is giving me his vines, so I need a place to put them. There will be banks of hyssop and lavender below those, and possibly a pair of turf benches flanking the gateway out to the field.
The front wall, at the bottom of the sketches, will be predominantly cutting flowers. That side of the garden faces the road, and I’d love for the 4-7 cars that drive by every day to see something beautiful.
The front gate will have an arbor over it, with either climbing roses, or runner beans, or something. Maybe topped with bird houses. We’ll see.
A quince tree in the center of the garden. I’m pretty sure I can get a hardy variety that will grow here, and I’d love to not have to catch them during the single week a year they’re available in stores.
places for ALL the raspberries, because I love them so. Also, places for strawberries, asparagus, and corn, because I either have those already outgrowing their current spaces, or will definitely plant them again.

So, WHICH DO YOU LIKE BEST?!

Help me interwebs, you’re my only hope…

Roasted Quince

Thoughts:

When I recently posted on Facebook about finally snagging some quinces at the grocery store, a number of you chimed in with suggestions, ideas, and thoughts about how best to enjoy these quirky fruits. But one simple description stuck with me: baked with heavy cream. I just had to make it, so thanks, Lydia! :)

The result is a tender and easily prepared dessert. Rather than bringing the dish down, its simplicity speaks through the ages, especially in a day and age when dessert has been largely relegated to something ordered in restaurants, where it is fancy and complicated (don’t get me wrong- I always order dessert!). But why stop there? It would also make a divine breakfast for a lazy weekend morning. When prepared this way I don’t think the fruit itself has as much flavor as an apple, but it has a bit more body, which perfectly showcases the array of toppings. The nuts offer a counter-texture with their crunchiness, and the honey and cream elevate the whole thing to something just shy of showy. In short? It’s delish!

So, the next time you spy quince in the store, grab ’em, and give this a try!

Where in Westeros?

Just about anywhere, I’d suspect. Can’t you just see the children at Winterfell tucking into this after a morning playing out in the snow? Or the ladies in King’s Landing while they titter about the latest court gossip? The variety of toppings is endless: walnuts in the north, pistachios in the south, and perhaps even more exotic additions from across the Narrow Sea in port cities. It’s a lovely cold weather dish, and let me tell you: it makes Winter a whole lot more appealing!

Recipe for Roasted Quince

Ingredients:

2-3 quinces, sliced in half and cored
2 Tbs. salted butter, room temperature
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 Tbs. brown sugar
1/4 cup each pistachios, walnuts, chopped small
honey and heavy cream, to serve

For the baking dish:

1 cup water
2-3 bay leaves

Preheat the oven to 350F. Place the quince halves, cut side up, in a baking dish. Cream together the butter, cinnamon, and brown sugar, then divide the mixture evenly between the fruits. Pour the water and bay leaves into the baking dish around the fruit, and move to the oven. Bake for around an hour, or until the fruit is soft when poked with a fork or skewer.

To serve, carefully move the hot quinces to serving plates. Top with the chopped nuts, then pour over a bit of honey and heavy cream. Enjoy!

Margaery Tyrell’s Ideal Meal

Highgarden strikes me as a likely one of the best regions in Westeros in which to dine.

Seriously.

So when Margaery won the last round of voting for character themed meals, I was more than a little excited. You all were apparently inspired as well, since you had some really fantastic suggestions for this spread. As always, I took some of my favorites and worked them into the finished meal.

I took Josh’s idea of a consomme (a delicate mound of finely diced apple, carrot, leek, and mushroom in the centre of a large bowl, surrounded by fresh edible flowers), but opted for a nice spring lamb, rather than boar. The steaming broth for the soup was served separately, and made the flowers float when it was poured over. The broth, which was clarified with whipped egg whites, was dark and richly flavorful. Plus, as a bonus, the meat that went into making the broth was easily turned into a nice lamb pie.

As sides, in addition to a number of nibbles ideally suited to Margaery and her handmaidens, I served a small salad of summer greens, with fresh fruits and flowers, similar to Sansa’s Salad. I added a cheese plate for the Queen of Thorns, since we know how much she hates being made to wait for her cheese. I also made up a compound butter with parsley and turmeric, so it was the colors of House Tyrell, but I ran out of time to make the bread! Doh! And for a drink, I went with Te Kaihu’s idea of hibiscus flowers in a sparkling wine.

For dessert, we have Jennifer’s suggestion of an Apple Rose Pie, miniaturized, alongside Tanya’s suggestion of sorbet, but instead of orange and rosewater, I chose a peach sorbet in honor of Renly. I would LOVE to make up MellowEnglishGal’s suggestion of a croquembouche, but that’s too much work on top of all the rest of this spread. Soon, hopefully; it’s been on my bucket list for years!

The finished menu:

lamb consomme
summer greens salad
mini apple rose pies
cheese plate for the Queen of Thorns
nibbles- almonds, fruits, etc.
peach sorbets
compound butter with parsley and turmeric
hibiscus flowers in sparkling elderflower

So there you have it! This might be my favorite character meal yet, or at least tied for first. It’s simple but interesting, light but satisfying. It’s very much the kind of meal I prefer to enjoy in the heat of summer, so it was perfect as an outdoor picnic of sorts, just as soon as I had the photos I needed. ;)

Honorable Mention:

Wanda’s suggestion of stuffed pigeons with rose petal sauce
Rebecca’s idea of dandelion jelly, which she says tastes like honey and chamomile tea
Erica: steamed whitefish with simple veg and white wine vinaigrette
MellowEnglishGal’s idea of a croquembouche: filled with different pastry creams, decorated with edible flowers, sugared, honey-roasted or gilded almonds, spun-sugar, fresh strawberries/raspberries. It’s fiddly, rich, delicate and temperamental, ornamental but concealing a lot of complexity, absolutely stunning: Margaery

The Queen of Thorn’s cheese

Edible flowers: bean, pea, chamomile, borage, geranium, nasturtium

Apple Roses

Prosecco with hibiscus flower

Turmeric-Parsley Butter

Apple Rose with custard and redcurrants

Peach Sorbet with pea blossoms

Lamb Consomme

Character Themed Meals: Margaery Tyrell

When I polled our Facebook followers a few months back about which character they would most like to have a character themed meal for, the winner was resoundingly our lovely young queen Margaery.

This should be a delightfully tasty meal to create. The weather is warm, fruits are ripening on tree and vine, and there is an abundance of flowers everywhere. It’s a perfect time for some Highgarden fare, instead of the heavy stews from Castle Black that get me through the winter!

Because Highgarden is so rich in edible goods, and the Tyrells wealthy enough to purchase what they cannot grow, we pretty much have our pick of ingredients. I’m thinking the dishes should be lighter fare, not quite as informal as tapas, but not far off, either. Something including floral notes is a must, whether roses or something else. My elderflowers are just coming into bloom, so I think perhaps those will go into a drink.

Grains and fresh fruits are always good. After all, the Tyrells brought wagonloads of bread to distribute amongst the poor of King’s Landing to bolster support for Margaery, so we can guess that a variety of grains are grown in the Reach. Overall, I suspect the meal should be flavorful, interesting, fresh, and healthy.

So, what do you all think? Have any regional favorites that you think are just begging to be included in a Highgarden meal? As always, I’ll pick out my favorite suggestions and incorporate them into the finished meal, so points for creativity. ;)

Gooey Apple Rolls with Caramel Sauce

Thoughts:

Every now and again, I get recipe suggestions from readers, and when they’re good, I like to share them, too. My notes from over a year ago say that this one comes from FB reader Karyn,

And it is definitely a winner.

Dear readers, this is a recipe well worth making. The gooey warmth of the straight-from-the-oven rolls as you pull them apart is so comforting. Although it took me ages to try these out, it has actually become a staple here at The Inn, especially when overnight guests merit something a little special for breakfast.

One serious perk of this recipe is that it has the feel of cinnamon rolls, but the advantage of being a relatively last minute dessert, since it requires no time at all for the dough to rise, something that is often the downfall of my very good breakfast intentions.

Where in Westeros?

Honestly, anywhere I can still eat them.

But they strike me as a more northern dessert, with their hearty richness and apples. It’s a simple dish, at the end of the day, but filling and delicious. Because cinnamon is the only spice used, that could reflect the distance from bustling trade ports of the dish’s point of origin; spices in the medieval period in Europe were expensive ingredients, and I can only assume the same would be true of Westeros.

Recipe for Gooey Apple Rolls

Dough recipe:

2 ¾ cups flour
4 ½ tea spoon of baking powder
1 tsp of salt
2/3 cup of butter
1 cup of milk
3 cups of finely minced apples
1/4 cup cinnamon sugar

Sugar bouillon recipe, simmered for 5 minutes

2 cups of water
1 cup of brown sugar

Brown Sugar Glaze:

1 cup brown sugar
2 Tbs flour
1 cup milk
1 Tbs butter
a dash of vanilla

Begin by mixing up the dough: add together the flour, baking powder, and salt, then rub in the butter. Gradually work in the milk until you have a dough that has completely come together. Knead for a few minutes, then roll out on a lightly floured surface into a long rectangle about 1/4″ thick. Spread the minced apples over the dough, sprinkle with cinnamon sugar, and carefully roll the whole thing up, making sure to keep the apple bits as evenly distributed as possible throughout the roll.

Preheat the oven to 425F. Heavily butter a baking pan, probably around 9″x13″ or thereabouts. Make up the sugar bouillon by gently warming the water and sugar over medium heat until the sugar has dissolved. Remove from heat and allow to cool. Cut the rolled dough into slices roughly 1″ thick and lay in the pan, cut sides up. Continue until all the dough is used up (although ever since I can remember, I’ve eaten those little knobbly end bits that are obviously too ugly to be included… ). Pour the cooled sugar bouillon evenly over the rolls, and bake for around 25 minutes, or until the tops of the rolls are a nice golden color.

While the rolls are baking, make up the Brown Sugar Glaze. In a pot over medium-low heat, mix together the brown sugar and flour until the sugar is melted. Then add in the milk, butter, and vanilla. Bring up to a simmer for several minutes to thicken, then remove from heat.

Serve the rolls with a good drizzle of this glaze over top. It would also be great with a dollop of ice cream, and while I personally don’t care for nuts in baked goods, I can recognize that they would be a fantastic addition to this recipe!

Maple Snow Candy

Today, we’re going back to Winterfell, and apparently so is the rest of the East Coast. When life gives you a March blizzard, the only thing to get you through is to eat. I’m very much a proponent of eating your feelings, and since we’d nearly gotten rid of all our snow, and are now facing up to 2 feet more today, I’m just going to go on eating until it melts.

Starting with these:

If you haven’t ever encountered this, the idea is you boil down maple syrup and drizzle it over hard packed snow, which then sets it. These end up being a bit like maple candy lollipops, or like a hard taffy that melts in your mouth. And oh man, are they delicious.

Can’t you just see them being a seasonal treat when the Winter Town opens outside Winterfell? The young Stark children running about with the children of Ned’s bannermen, all of them with sticky hands and smiling faces. It’s a happy picture, and I don’t know about you, but I could use a little of that on such a murky, snowy day!

Maple Snow Candy Recipe

Components:

1/2 cup maple syrup (or lots, lots more)
candy thermometer
popsicle sticks
a dish of packed snow

Pack some fresh, clean snow onto a pie plate or a baking sheet, and set outside (or in the freezer) to keep it cold.

Pour your maple syrup into a saucepan over medium-high heat. Put the thermometer in, and bring the syrup up to soft-ball stage, about 235F. Take it right off the heat and drizzle it over the packed snow. Stick a popsicle stick in one end of the drizzled sugar and twirl into blobs. Eat, and be happy.

Theoretical Foods: Feasts of the Seven

Now that we’ve seen a bit of the High Sparrow in season 5, it got me thinking about the Faith of the Seven, especially in King’s Landing. In our own Middle Ages, the calendar was rife with feast days, saint’s days, and all manner of other religious holidays. The more I think about it, the more I bet something similar could be said of Westeros.

First off, the seven facets of the one are:

Maiden – innocence and chastity
Mother – fertility, compassion, mercy
Warrior – strength, victory, courage
Father – justice, protection
Smith – fortitude, help with tasks
Crone – wisdom, guidance
Stranger – outcasts, death

From that, I could easily extrapolate a few things, such as the Mother’s festival day would likely be in the fall, to coincide with the harvest. Maiden’s Day, as we see in Feast for Crows, is a day when only maidens may enter the septs, to sing songs and drape flower garlands at the feet of the Maiden’s statue- I can see some similarities to May Day, there.

While the Stranger isn’t formally worshiped or sung to, I sense that the observances around him would be more a preventative measure, such as our lighting pumpkin lanterns to scare away ghouls on Halloween. Perhaps a few specially baked cakes, left out on the doorstep, to appease wandering spirits? Sugar skulls akin to those used for the Day of the Dead celebrations?

So how about it? Can you think of any festival foods that you’ve enjoyed that could dovetail in with the deities in Westeros? One thing that I love about the fanbase for Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire is that it’s so international. The stories resonate with people from all over the world, who bring to it their own interpretations and traditions. As such, I’d love to hear what regional specialties you enjoy on festival days; If we collect enough ideas, I will be able to devote several posts to making recipes for those special feast days!

Roast Capon

Thoughts:

So, a few of you might have seen my Twitter post back in the winter, when I finally found a capon for sale at the local grocery store, of all places. I think I actually frightened a store clerk when I gave a little shriek-gasp of delight and disbelief before hurrying around to clutch the bird protectively; there were approximately 23 other capons for sale in the same case, but having searched high and low for one, no way was I letting anyone take MY capon.

And it’s been in the freezer ever since. Let me make something clear: I don’t have one of those amazing huge modern fridges. Mine came with the house, and while it’s perfectly adequate, it’s not exactly spacious. So a giant capon taking up valuable tater-tot room in the freezer was something that finally had to change.

For those who don’t know, a capon is essentially a gelded rooster. A eunuch, as it were, which accounts for both its size and tasty plumpness. They were all the rage in historical cooking, but have mostly fallen out of fashion nowadays, with the exception of Christmas dinners in some families. We will now be taking up that tradition, as well!

This was my first time actually cooking a capon, but given everything else that has passed through my kitchen, I wasn’t too worried. Once again, the historical recipe did not disappoint. The meat was lightly flavored from the stuffing (possibly too lightly, so take that into account if you try your hand at this recipe!), rich with juices and steaming. With the exception of the delicious dark meat, I didn’t find that the capon tasted too terribly different from a well-roasted chicken, but the overall tenderness of the meat made every bite just a little special. The bird was considerably larger than your average roasting chicken, which made it ideal for feeding about 6 people that night at The Inn. Plus, it made a delicious broth the next day, which will turn up in another post soon!

Now, just to deal with those frozen camel patties…

Recipe for Roast Capon

To rost capon or gose tak and drawe his leuer and his guttes at the vent and his grece at the gorge and tak the leef of grece parsly ysope rosmarye and ij lengs of saige and put to the grece and hew it smale and hew yolks of eggs cromed raissins of corans good poudurs saffron and salt melled to gedure and fers the capon there withe and broche hym and let hym be stanche at the vent and at the gorge that the stuffur go not out and rost hym long with a soking fyere and kep the grece that fallithe to baist hym and kepe hym moist till ye serue hym and sauce hym with wyne and guingere as capons be. -A Noble Boke off Cookry, 15th c.

Cook’s note: I served this, as suggested, with a ginger-wine sauce. That recipe, along with the Stewed Capon, are forthcoming. :)

Ingredients:

1 8-10 lb. capon, giblets removed
3-4 large shallots, peeled and roughly chopped
1 tsp. each rosemary, hyssop, parsley, and sage
2 hard-boiled eggs, roughly chopped
1/2 cup dried currants
pinch of salt
pinch of saffron (expensive, and optional)

Preheat the oven to 400F. Wash and pat dry the capon, then combine all remaining ingredients except the oil, and stuff the bird with them. spread the oil over the bird, and sprinkle with salt.

Periodically basting as you go, roast for 1.5-2 hours, depending on the size of your bird, until the juices run clear. Remove to a serving dish and let sit for several minutes. If you would like to make a gravy at this point, you can move the pan to the stovetop over medium heat and gradually whisk in a little flour until you have a delicious thick sauce.

Double Drogon Giveaway!

Now that the fifth season of Game of Thrones is in full swing, it’s time for a couple of giveaways! This week, I’m giving away TWO of the Funko POP! Drogon Figures. And following in the spirit of HBO’s #CatchDrogon movement, all you have to do is comment below, and say what recipe you would use to lure the little (alright, not so little anymore…) dragon in to land. The drawing will be random, so it can be any food, not just a Westerosi dish -playing to the judge won’t help! ;)

The names will be chosen on the morning of Saturday, May 2nd, at 10am EST. Good luck!

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