Stierbach Cooks Guild

1 lb of beef cut small (1/2 inch or ¼ inch dice), browned and simmered in water  (about 2 cups) for 1 hour.  This was premade.

2 1 lb packages of frozen chopped spinach.

1 Tbsp cinnamon

1 ½ tsp salt

1 ½ tsp pepper

1 cup of currants

Reheat the beef in a large soup pot.  Add the spinach, currants, spices and 6 cups of water and bring to a boil.  Serve.

NOTES: The broth was very bland.  The spices came through but the not the beef taste.  Will need to add beef bullion.  The original recipe called for Italian sausage and beef was substituted.

285. To prepare a thick soup popularly called vivarole.
Get ten eggs and beat them. Have a broth ready, made of butter, salt, water, pepper, cinnamon and saffron, and in it spinach, chard, mint and marjoram, all finely chopped up as for a tourte. When that broth has boiled a little while with the herbs, mix a little grated bread and cheese into the beaten eggs and pour that into the broth, giving it a stir with a spoon. When it comes to the surface, serve it hot.

Scappi, Bartolomeo, and Terence Scully. The Opera of Bartolomeo Scappi (1570): l’arte et prudenza d’un maestro cuoco. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008, p. 379.

FIRST REDACTION
SPINACH EGG DROP SOUP

2 cups beef bullion
1 TBS butter
1/8 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp pepper
1 bag baby spinach (9 oz) chopped small
2 TBS fresh mint, chopped and heaping
1 tsp chopped fresh marjoram
1 egg
1 tsp bread crumbs
1 tsp parmesan cheese

Bring the meat broth to a boil, add butter, cinnamon, and pepper. Add spinach and herbs and cover, at low heat for 5 minutes. Beat egg with bread crumbs and cheese. For one portion pour through a fork into soup.

NOTE: Interesting. The flavors of the mint and marjoram came out but not pepper or cinnamon. I would increase the pepper and cinnamon because it was a little bland. I was worried one egg per bowl would be too much but it was almost too little.

SECOND REDACTION
SPINACH SOUP WITH DUMPLINGS

1 pkg of chopped frozen spinach
6 cups of beef bullion
2 TBS of chopped mint
1 TBS of chopped marjoram
1 egg
1 heaping TBS of grated parmesan cheese, more if necessary
2 heaping TBS of grated plain bread crumbs, more if necessary

Bring the meat broth to a boil, add spinach and herbs. Heat through about 1 minute.
Have prepared a dough made of egg, bread crumbs, and cheese, very thick about the consistency of pancake batter. Drop rounded teaspoons of dough into the soup from the about the height of 12-18 inches so that they sink below the surface and cook, five to ten minutes until done. Serve.

210. To prepare a thick soup of garlic in meat broth with other ingredients.

When the cloves of garlic are clean there should be as many cloves as from fifty bulbs.  Parboil them, changing the water often so they lose their strenght, and finish cooking them in a good meat broth that is not too salty, along with slices of pork jowl and desalted sowbelly.  Just before you want to serve it, throw in a handful of herbs.  If there is no salted meat in it, you can belend in cheese and eggs, not failing to put the spices in the one and the other.  With them you can garnish and cook doves, cockrels and other fowl, serving them with grated cheese and cinnamon over the top.

Scappi, Bartolomeo, and Terence Scully. The Opera of Bartolomeo Scappi (1570): l’arte et prudenza d’un maestro cuoco. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008, p.243.

FIRST REDACTION

2 lb of clean garlic cloves

2 cups meat broth (bullion cubes)

1 slice of pork belly (thin slice about the amount and consistency of a slice of bacon)

1 TBS chopped herbs (basil, mint, thyme)

1 TBS cheese (parmesan)

Boil the garlic cloves for 30 minutes changing the water 3 times.  Then place in meat broth with chopped up pork belly and cook for a further 10 mintues.  Puree the garlic and stir in the cheese and fresh herbs at the last minute before serving.

SECOND REDACTION

2 lbs of clean garlic cloves

Olive oil

2 cups meat broth (bullion cubes)

1 heaping TBS chopped herbs (basil, mint, thyme)

3 heaping TBS of bread crumbs

3 heaping TBS of parmesan cheese

Roast the garlic cloves in aluminum foil for 20 minutes in 400 degree with olive oil until slightly browned.  Add garlic to meat broth and simmer for another 10 minutes.  Add herbs, bread crumbs and parmesan cheese and serve.

NOTES: I was aiming for something like French onion soup but didn’t succeed.  The first redaction tasted too bitter for my taste, which was why I did the second redaction.  This was slightly milder but still too strong to my taste.  Others at the table liked it better than I did but found little or no difference between the two redactions.

Alesia la Sabia de Murcia

215. To prepare a thick soup of common field mushrooms and other sorts of mushrooms.

Get field mushrooms (which are most delicate of all mushrooms) in their season, in Rome between the end of February and the middle of May.  Clean off the skin that is around them, and especially any sand on their stalk, and wash them in several changes of water.  Put them into a casserole pot where there is melted pork fat, pepper, and cinnamon, and saute them lightly with nothing else because as they cook they make their own broth.  When they have boiled a little, put in some yellow saveloy or slices of marbled prociutto to cook with them, adding a little good meat broth.  Before serving them, put in a handful of beaten herbs, a little grated bread, verjuice, pepper, cinnamon and saffron, and bring it all to a boil.  Serve them hot with the saveloy on top.

Scappi, Bartolomeo, and Terence Scully. The Opera of Bartolomeo Scappi (1570): l’arte et prudenza d’un maestro cuoco. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008, p. 245-246.

REDACTION

1 lb mushrooms (8 oz white and 8 oz Baby Belle) sliced

¼ tsp pepper

¼ tsp cinnamon

1 TBS butter

2 cup beef broth (from bullion cubes)

1 heaping TBS of chopped herbs (basil, mint, thyme)

1 heaping TBS of bread crumbs

1 TBS white wine vinegar

¼ tsp pepper

¼ tsp cinnamon

Sprinkle of saffron

Saute of the mushrooms in butter cinnamon and pepper keeping the lid on the pot most of the time so they will sweat (about 20 minutes at medium heat).  Add the beef broth and bring to a boil.  Add all of the rest of the ingredients and serve.

NOTES: This makes a modest soup for 8 people of about ½ cup apiece.  I like the combination of spices – the pepper came out strongly but tempered by the cinnamon.  I would call it more liquid than thick (more bread crumbs?) but nice.

Alesia la Sabia de Murcia