Ceremonial Dishes of England

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XV, Issue IV, 27 July 1895, Page 91

Ceremonial Dishes of England

THE tables of the English in mediaeval times greatly exceeded those of the present day in splendour of appearance and in abundance of good cheer ; for, despite modern extravagances, it is difficult to imagine the wonderful array of gold and silver, the marvellous representations of pastry, and the artistic decorations of the various dishes that adorned ancient feasts.

As an example of the lavish cookery of a royal household, that of Richard 11. may be cited. He employed two thousand cooks, some of which were French, and ten thousand visitors, including persons of all classes, were daily fed from his board. A glance at the records of feasts in the middle ages, such as the nuptials of Henry IV. and Jane of Navarre, and the institution, in 1460, of Archbishop Nevill, of York, brother of the Earl of Warwick, will give some idea of the lavish preparations. At the institution of the archbishop the sweets alone consisted of one thousand dishes of jelly pastes, four thousand cold custards, and two thousand hot custards.

Sweets are still important features of a ceremonial dinner in England. There is a great variety of jellies, custards, puddings, ices, tarts, and pies, and many of them, as the mince-pies, are made from the same receipts and in the same pans that were used three hundred years ago.

But the glory of architectural pastry has vanished, as will be seen from a description of some devices that decorated mediaeval tables. In the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries, pastry-cooks were required to be sculptorsand mythologists, and had to produce confections that were not so much for the palate as the honouring of a hero or the celebration of some social or political event. They were usually representations of arches, castles, giants, knights, ladies, and beasts with coats of arms painted in their proper places and in their rightful colours. In the middle ages COOKERY WAS OFTEN USED AS A MEANS FOR PRACTICAL JOKING, and consequently the old rhyme of the * Four-and-twenty blackbirds baked in a pie,’ that began to sing when the pie was opened, is historically correct, it being a common occurrence at old English feasts for a huge pie to be set on the table, from which a number of birds flew out when it was opened. At an entertainment of one of the famous Nevills, in the fifteenth century, a large pie was served under which were myriads of bright butterflies, and these flew out and fluttered about with great effect when the beautifully ornamented pastry was broken. The guests always wondered what new surprise the host or his chief cook had devised under the mysterious pastry. It will be remembered that even as late as the time of Charles I. the dwarf Geoffrey Hudson was presented to his queen, Henrietta Maria, in a covered pie. THE ORIGINAL PLUM-FUDDING WAS KNOWN AS * PLUM-PORRIDGE,’ and was always the first course at a Christmas dinner, and was brought on with the best meats. It was made by boiling beef or mutton with broth thickened with brown bread. When half-boiled, raisins, currants, prunes, cloves, mace, and ginger were added. WHAT THE CHRISTMAS PIE WAS maybe understood from the description of one published in 1770. This contained two bushels of flour, twenty pounds of butter, four geese, two turkeys, two rabbits, four wild ducks, two woodcock, six snipe, four partridges,

two neats’ tongues, two curlews, seven blackbirds, and six pigeons, being made by Mrs Dorothy Patterson, housekeeper at Howick. It weighed one hundred and sixtyeight pounds, and required two men to carry it to the table. AN INTERESTING SUPERSTITION CONNECTED WITH THE MINCE-PIE, originally known as mutton-pie, and associated with the Christmas dinner, is that the multiplied ingredients were symbolical of the various offerings brought by the wise men, and consequently it was deemed necessary to make them of a long and narrow shape, to represent a manger. During the Commonwealth. Christmas holidays and festivities being forbidden as irreverent .and pernicious, many conscientious persons,among whom Bunyan is included, scrupled to partake of mince pies, owing to the superstitious character

popularly attached to them. In the early days nearly EVERY CEREMONIAL OCCASION AND RELIGIOUS SEASON HAD ITS ESPECIAL CAKE OR BREAD. There was the birthday-cake, the christening-cake, the wedding-cake, the funeral wake-cake, the Mid-Lent cake, the Christmas-cake, the Twelfth-Night cake, the pan-cake, the simnel-cake, and the hot cross-bun. Each of these had its own significance, and they are all the descendants of the unleavened Passover and the Lord's Supper, where the cake or bread was established by divine symbol; or from that ancient relic of heathen custom —cake offerings to the gods. Of all the various buns none are more celebrated than the hot cross-buns, which are still provided for Good Friday. They are designated by a cross cut on their brown sugary surfaces. Their origin is of great antiquity. Cecrops, a king of Greece, who flourished about sixteen centuries before the Christian era, offered to his

gods sacred cross-bread under the name of ‘ bouu,’ the Greek word for an ox, and from this we derive our * bun.’ These cakes were made in the form of tbe horns of an ox, or moulded in an oval and stamped with the figure of a pair of horns. Loaves marked with the cross on the surface have been noticed on sculpture representing the miracle of the five barley-loaves, and may be seen in the Museo Borbonica, in Rome.

There was a time when the streets of London and of other towns re-echoed with the cry of :

* Hot cross-buns! Hot cross-buns! If you have no daughters. Give them to your sons! One a penny, two a penny. Hot cross-buns!'

Men, women, and children were early astir to supply the general demand, carrying large baskets covered with flannel and white cloth to keep their fresh wares warm. ONE OF THE MOST FAMOUS OF ALL CAKES was the Twelfth-Night cake, which contained, in addition to its plums, one bean and one pea, and the individuals who received these were king and queen for that evening of revels and merry-making. The best description of this is given in Robert Herrick’s ’ Twelfthnight, or King and Queen ’: * Now the mirth conies. With the cake full of plums. Where bean's the king of the sport here; Besides, we must know Must reveV as queen of the court here. Which known, let us make Joy-sops with the cake; And let. not a man then be seen here. Who ununred will not drink To the base from the brink A health to the king and the queen here.'

Some difficulty was experienced in finding a horse suitable for Mr Irving's requirement as Don Quixote, but now there is cast for tbe role of Rozinaute a lean and cadaverous equine quite in accordance with the accepted idea of that animal. One of the horses which Mr living attempted to use had been educated in a circus, and could not lie prevented from kneeling down when the band played.