Eat like a Tudor peasant!

You can experience Tudor life without leaving home!  Here’s a recipe for their standard daily meal.  Most people in Tudor times ate pottage daily.  Don’t be put off by the expression ‘a mess of pottage’ – it is much nicer than it sounds, and also very healthy!  If you were rich, your pottage would always contain meat, but for us poor peasants it would have normally been vegetables, perhaps enriched by some meat stock if you have any bones to boil up. 

Recipe
 

First fetch water from the river or well, put it in your cauldron and light the fire under it.  (These directions are for purists only - everyone else might like to use water from the tap boiled in a saucepan on the stove!) Then use the boiling water to prepare some stock. It can contain meat or be vegetarian. Use leftover bones and chopped up meat - if you’re a wealthy peasant! (Non-purists may use stock cubes.)

Use about as much stock as the quantity of pottage you wish to end up with.  In this stock, cook as many different kinds of vegetables and herbs as you like. You can include the following:

onions of all varieties; leeks; cabbage of any kind; green beans or dried beans (if you are not using tinned beans cook these well first according to the instructions); carrots; parsnips; turnips; celery; thyme, sage, parsley, marjoram, rosemary.

Do NOT include tomatoes or potatoes (these were not brought to Europe until Tudor times and did not become common for several centuries) or other exotic vegetables such as aubergines, yams, okra etc.

When all the vegetables are cooked, add some porridge oats. If you want your pottage to be runny, like soup, add a couple of tablespoons of oats. If you want it to be extra thick and filling add a large cupful. Continue to simmer until the porridge is cooked.  Adjust the seasoning, serve with bread and cheese, and wash it down with a mug of good ale.

We’ve tried a number of Tudor recipes and thoroughly enjoyed them.  If you enjoy experimental cookery you can find books of medieval and Tudor recipes, but there are lots on-line.  Start by looking at:  www.godecookery.com  or www.tudorhistory.org