Atlantian Spring Coronation Feast 2023 – Lord Heinrich von Holstein

April 1, 2023 – Barony of Storvik, Kingdom of Atlantia

By Heinrich von Holstein

Feast Description

The theme for this coronation is “trade routes”. I chose dishes that represent a journey along the Silk Road roughly from Persia to Constantinople. The time period would be vaguely around the 12th-13th centuries, however actual written recipes from the Byzantine Empire of that time are very rare and some extrapolation back to older Roman texts, namely Apicius’ De Re Coquinaria[6], was necessary. The Persian/Middle Eastern recipes are also not precisely placed along the route geographically, but sourced from text authored elsewhere such as Egypt and Andalusia.

We start with appetizers of nuts, dried fruits, and flatbread. This is to represent the travel-ready foods of trading caravan. The second and third courses are more luxurious and heavily spiced medieval Middle Eastern dishes. The fourth course is the big transition where we “enter Constantinople”. While there are a lot of ingredients and spices from the Middle East, we are introduced to some distinctly Roman preferences maintained by the Byzantine Empire, namely enjoyment of fresh vegetables among the nobility and use of the ubiquitous fish sauce known as “Garum”. The Fifth course continues the Roman theme but also adds a little flair from the region in the form of a yogurt dip. Lastly, dessert is a harmony with fried and honied dough fritters from ancient Rome next to rice pudding from Egypt.

Recipes and Redactions

Hummus

This dish of pureed chickpeas is very popular in the Middle East and Greece even today. The origin of the dish is not clear. Though there are mentions as far back as the 13th century[1], older recipes omit ingredients such as garlic, lemon juice, or tahini that are considered required today.

However, due to time constraints, I am not attempting to recreate an older form of hummus for this feast. Instead, I have taken plain store-bought hummus and simply embellished it with some black pepper, cumin, and olive oil.

Caliph’s Mustard Chicken

I encountered a description of this dish on the Eat Like A Sultan blog [2]. Unfortunately I have not found access to a translation of the original source. As such, I have only the blog’s description to go off of:

This delightful recipe is attributed to the Abbasid caliph al-Wathiq bi-‘llah (‘He who trusts in God’, 842-847CE), who apparently also wrote a recipe book. It is roast chicken smothered in a sauce made with mustard, sugar, (ground) walnuts and asafoetida. Serve decorated with rue and pomegranate seeds.

Whether “mustard” here means just the powdered seeds or a complete mustard sauce with vinegar is unclear. However I assumed the latter, and thus the mustard here is my own home-made version with a mix of yellow seeds, black seeds, and white wine vinegar. Also, I have substituted rue with parsley because getting fresh rue is very difficult.

Ingredients:

Chicken (thighs)
Mustard
Sugar
Walnuts
Asafoetida
Parsley
Pomegranite seeds

Roast (grill) the chicken. Allow to rest a bit, then chop into strips. Mix the mustard, sugar, walnuts, and asafoetida to make the sauce. More vinegar or water may be needed to loosen the sauce. Toss the chicken in the sauce and serve on a platter. Garnish with chopped parsley and pomegranate seeds.

Mujadara (rice & lentils)

This dish is mentioned by name in the Kitab al-Tabikh [3]

Mujaddara.1 It is made like aruzz mufalfal except that you don’t colour it with saffron, and you add half as much lentils as the rice. Follow the method mentioned for aruzz mufalfal.

The referred recipe “aruzz mufalfal” describes how to cook rice, though it also includes meat, mastic, and spices. Some more modern versions of mujadara are very simple with just lentils, rice, and fried onions instead of meat. In order to satisfy any vegetarian diners at the feast, I have gone with the onions. Mastic has also been omitted, as it is difficult to obtain.

Ingredients:

Rice
Lentils
Onions
Olive oil
Coriander
Cinnamon

If using dry lentils, cook according to packaging (boil for several hours). Wash the rice. Mix the cooked lentils with rice, spices, salt to taste, and water. Cook until rice is done. Caramelize the onions in olive oil. Plate rice and lentils, garnish with onions on top.

Fustuqiyya (meatballs and pistachio stew)

From The Sultan’s Feast [4]:

Cut up meat and cover with water. Skim off the fat and bring to a boil.63 When the meat is done, add dainty meatballs, pounded aṭrāf al-ṭīb, as well as cassia, mastic, salt, sesame oil and (dried) mint. When everything is cooked and only very little of the broth remains, remove the meat and fry it in oil and spices. Return the broth to it, thicken with pounded pistachios, and stew. Improve the flavour with lemon juice. Sprinkle a little rose water [on top], and rub the sides of the pot [with it]. When the pot simmers down, remove from the fire, Allah the Almighty willing.

While this recipe describes a dish of both meats and meatballs, I have opted for just meatballs due to budget constraints. Also, with the cost of pistachio nuts, this will be more like a pistachio “sauce” than a “stew”. Mastic has been omitted due to lack of availability.

Ingredients:

Ground beef
Eggs
Ground pistachio nuts
Sesame oil
Mint
Cinnamon
Coriander
Salt
Lemon juice
Rose water

Mix ground beef, eggs, salt, and cinnamon to make meatballs. Cook the meatballs (boil to be more accurate, though an oven may be easier). Use some of the liquid from cooking the meatballs to make the sauce of ground pistachios, mint, sesame oil, cinnamon, coriander, and lemon juice to taste. Garnish with rose water.

Tender Chickpeas

From the Andalusian text, The Book of Sent Sovi:

If you want to prepare tender chickpeas, wash them well. Take almond milk. and cook them with the milk and oil and salt; and put in one or two onions scalded with boiling water. When they should be cooked, put in parsley, basil, marjoram and other good herbs, and a little ground ginger and a little sour grape juice. This is the way to cook them when they are tender, but not among the first

1 If you want to prepare the most tender ones, boil the almond milk with oil, salt, and new onions and the herbs listed above and ginger and sour grape juice. Put in the chickpeas, washed with hot water, and they’d be done right away. In this way you can also prepare young broad beans; you can put in green coriander with some good spices, pepper, ginger, cinnamon

At the time of this feast, herb availability was pretty much limited to parsley. Sour grape juice (verjuice) is also hard to find and substituted with vinegar. I do follow the “most tender” double boiling method, but only water for the first boiling. I also reserve the onions and herbs until later in the cooking to keep them brighter.

Ingredients:

Chickpeas
Onions
Parsley
Olive oil
Salt
Ginger
Vinegar

Boil the chickpeas with a few quartered onions (leave the roots on for easy removal later), until the chickpeas are soft.. For the second boil, use almond milk, ginger, olive oil, and salt. Boil about an hour more, then add onions and vinegar to taste, then boil a bit longer. Garnish with parsley.

Lettuce with oxygarum

Oxygarum is a Roman dressing of garum (fish sauce) and vinegar, as described indirectly in Apicius’s De Re Coquinaria [6]. “Oxy” being a Latin prefix for “sharp” or “acidic” in a culinary context, and garum being a fermented fish sauce produced all around the Mediterranean sea for millenia. Apicius definitely mentions lettuce among other vegetables. While the Byzantines had more advanced silverware, the ancient Roman nobility tended to eat with their hands, so romaine hearts make a great “finger food” salad.

Ingredients:

Romaine hearts
Garum
Vinegar

Quarter the Romaine hearts. Mix 2 parts vinegar and 1 part garum, and lightly dress the lettuce with it. (For the sake of vegetarians or less adventurous diners, garum could be served on the side, and dress the lettuce with only vinegar.)

Boiled eggs with oxygarum

Apicius [6] has a more direct recipe for boiled eggs:

[327] BOILED EGGS – OVA ELIXA

ARE SEASONED WITH BROTH, OIL, PURE WINE, OR ARE SERVED WITH BROTH, PEPPER AND LASER.

“Broth” is this book’s translation of “garum”. I am serving the second part of this recipe, eggs with pepper and laser (aka “silphium” or “asafoetida”). Asafoetida is a very pungent ingredient, so I have decided to temper it with vinegar, which would make this dish eggs with spices and oxygarum.

Ingredients:

Boiled eggs
Vinegar
Garum
Black pepper
Asafoetida

Split the eggs in half. Dress lightly with oxygarum (or just vinegar, with garum on the side). LIGHTLY season with black pepper and asafoetida.

Roast Pork with onions, leeks, garlic, and garum

This dish takes inspiration not from a recipe but from a letter written in the 10th century by an unsatisfied diplomat visiting Constantinople [7]:

On account of the incomparable grief in my heart I made no reply to them, but did what they had ordered; judging that table not a suitable place where–I will not say to me, that is, the bishop Liutprand, but to your envoy–an envoy of the Bulgarians is preferred. But the sacred emperor soothed my grief through a great gift, sending to me from among his most delicate dishes a fat goat, of which he himself had partaken, deliciously (?) stuffed with garlic, onions and leeks; steeped in fish sauce: a dish which I could have wished just then to be upon your table, so that you who do not believe the delicacies of the sacred emperor to be desirable, should at length become believers at this sight!

He complains about the Emperor’s dining preferences being too pedestrian for his station. What is notable here is, almost a thousand years removed from Apicius, the Byzantines are still using garum at all levels of society. Leeks are also a very typical Roman ingredient.

Unfortunately, goat is beyond my feast budget, so I substituted pork loin for it. The exact preparation is unknown, but given that the author of the letter felt that this was too much of a common dish for an Emperor, I have kept my recipe simple.

Ingredients:

Pork loin
Leeks
Onions
Garlic
Garum

Slice the leeks and onions. Slow-roast the pork loin with the leeks, onions and garlic. After the meat has rested, season to taste with garum.

Yogurt dip with bread

Calling back to the Kitab al-Tabikh [3], we have a yogurt and chard dip:

Silqbi-Laban .5 Take chard with large ribs, cut off the edges of its leaves and cut it into pieces the length of a span. Wash it, then boil it in water and salt until it is done. Then dry it and put it in Persian yogurt and garlic,and sprinkle a little nigella on it,and use it.

It isn’t specified what this is meant to be served with, so I have opted to serve it with some bread to add a starch to this course.

Ingredients:

Greek yogurt
Chard
Garlic
Salt

Boil the chard in salted water until it is just a bit softened. Chop into small pieces. Mix it in the yogurt with garlic and serve.

Cucumber Salad

Another Roman vegetable side dish from Apicius [6]:

[84] ANOTHER CUCUMBER RECIPE – ALITER CUCUMERES

CUCUMBERS, PEPPER, PENNYROYAL, HONEY OR CONDENSED MUST, BROTH AND VINEGAR; ONCE IN A WHILE ONE ADDS SILPHIUM.

Pennyroyal omitted due to availability. As a reminder, “broth” is this book’s translation of “garum”. Since I have some “silphium” (asafoetida) I will use it.

Ingredients:

Cucumbers
Black pepper
Honey
Garum
Vinegar
Asafoetida

Slice the cucumbers thin. Mix the rest of the ingredients and dress the cucumbers with it.

Honey Fritters

A fried dessert from Apicius [6]:

[299] ANOTHER SWEET – ALITER DULCIA

TAKE A PREPARATION SIMILAR [1] [to the above] AND IN THE HOT WATER [bath or double boiler] MAKE A VERY HARD PORRIDGE OF IT. THEREUPON SPREAD IT OUT ON A PAN AND WHEN COOL CUT IT INTO HANDY PIECES LIKE SMALL COOKIES. FRY THESE IN THE BEST OIL, TAKE THEM OUT, DIP INTO [hot] HONEY, SPRINKLE WITH PEPPER [2] AND SERVE.

Very unusual (in modern times) to use pre-cooked dough for frying. Use of pepper in a dessert is also strange, though typically Roman.

Ingredients:

Flour
Milk
Olive oil
Honey
Black Pepper

Mix flour and milk in a pot and cook on low heat until it is a thick porridge, adjusting with more milk or flour as needed. Pour the mixture out on plates or parchment, spread to about ½” thick, and allow to cool. Cut the cooled and hardened dough into bite-sized pieces. Fry in 325-350 degree olive oil (careful not to let it get too hot, olive oil has a low smoke point) until golden brown. Toss with honey and pepper.

Rice Pudding

Lastly, a dessert still common in the region today, rice pudding. This dish exists all over the medieval world, but we’ll look at a simple recipe from The Sultan’s Feast [4]:

1. Recipe for rice pudding (aruzz bi-laban ḥalīb)

Wash and boil the rice and add a bit of mastic and cassia to it. For each raṭl of milk, take three ūqiyas of rice. Make sure the fire underneath is a gentle one. When it is done, put in containers to cool down. It is eaten with honey, dibs, or sugar.

Again, because it’s hard to get, no mastic in this preparation.

Ingredients:

Rice
Milk
Sugar
Cinnamon
Honey

Cook the rice with water. Then add milk, sugar to taste, cinnamon, and cook on low heat, until desired texture. Serve in a bowl and drizzle with honey.

Sources

[1] History of Hummus

Bodrum restaurant’s blog

https://www.bodrumnyc.com/blog/history-of-hummus

[2] Eat Like A Sultan

Daniel Newman

http://eatlikeasultan.com/the-caliphs-mustard-chicken/

[3] A BAGHDAD COOKERY

Charles Perry, Great Britain, 2005

https://docplayer.net/215349460-A-baghdad-cookery-book.html

[4] The Sultan’s Feast: A Fifteenth-Century Egyptian Cookbook

Ibn Mubarak Shah

Translated by Daniel L. Newman, London, 2020

[5] The Book of Sent Sovi Medieval Recipes from Catalonia

Edited by Joan Santanach

Translated by Robin M. Vogelzang

BARCINO, TAMESIS, 2008 Barcelona/Woodbridge

[6] Cooking and Dining in Imperial Rome

Author: Apicius

Commentator: Prof. Frederick Starr

Translator: Joseph Dommers Vehling

Release Date: August 19, 2009

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/29728/29728-h/29728-h.htm

[7] Liutprand of Cremona: Report of his Mission to Constantinople

Henderson translation

http://medieval.ucdavis.edu/20A/Luitprand.html

Menu

Feast Description

Recipes and Redactions

Hummus

Caliph’s Mustard Chicken

Mujadara (rice & lentils)

Fustuqiyya (meatballs and pistachio stew)

Tender Chickpeas

Lettuce with oxygarum

Boiled eggs with oxygarum

Roast Pork with onions, leeks, garlic, and garum

Yogurt dip with bread

Cucumber Salad

Honey Fritters

Rice Pudding

Sources