The Viandier of Taillevent: An edition of all extant manuscripts

Modernizing the VIANDIER

This page intentionally left blank Modernizing the Viandier The Nature of Early French Cookery In her survey of the genre of the mediaeval cookbook Marianne Mulon comments that early recipes demonstrate "avant tout 1'abus des epices."1 And, among a surprising number of other historians who should know better, Carson Ritchie echoes this assessment by asserting quite comprehensivelythat "the whole of medieval cookery revolved around the use of spices."2 It is, of course, a simple matter to leaf through the recipes contained in the Viandier, or in virtually any culinary collection of the late Middle Ages, and observe that spices occupy a dominant place among the ingredients forjust about any dish.3 From this observation to a conclusion that mediaeval cuisine is over­spiced and consequently indigestible is a small step, and one that, unfortunately, many observers have rashly made. Speaking specifically of the Viandier we may agree that the observation about the prevalence of seasonings is on the whole accurate. It is clearly true that these recipes frequently do call for "many" spices. However, unless the casual reader glancing through the Viandier becomes a practical cook, willing to accept a recipe as a set of instructions and to create a dish as close as is feasible to what was intended by the authors, then he or she cannot pass any serious judgement upon its gastronomic qualities or merits. What the willing, open­minded cook will find, working with a recipefrom the Viandier, is that the dish will very largely have the qualities that he or she chooses to give to it. This is exactly the case as it was in Taillevent's day. The reasons for the indeterminateness of the results are twofold. In the first place these written recipes do not attempt to indicate quantities, either in the net output or "yield" of any given recipe or in the amount of each ingredient that should be "measured" into the mix. These quantities, input and output, are obviouslyinterdependent. If the recipe is to be of general usefulness, suitable to prepare either an intimate serving for six persons or for a banquet of 600, then clearly quantities 1 "Les premieres recettes medievales," p. 937. 2 Carson LA. Ritchie, Food in Civilization: How History Has Been Affected by Human Tastes (New York: Beaufort and Sydney: Methuen, 1981), p.62. 3 Concerning the use of spices in mediaeval European cookery in general, see Toby Peter­ son, "The Arab Influence on Western European Cooking," Journal of Medieval History, 6 (1980), pp. 317­340. Peterson's argument is that Europeansemulated the Arabs in their food prepara­ tion and in according spices a prestigious role in a search for the sensuous pleasures of the good life. See also Eliyahu Ashton, "The Volume of Mediaeval Spice Trade," Journal of European Eco­ nomic History, 9 (1980), pp. 753­763; Bruno Laurioux, "De 1'usage des epices dans 1'alimentation medievale," Medievales, 5 (1983), pp. 15­31; and, by the same author, "Spices in the Medieval Diet: a New Approach," Food and Foodways, 1 (1985), pp. 43­76. 309 310 The Viandier of Taillevent cannot be specified. The cook's professionaldiscretion will determine whatever quantityof each ingredient is reasonable for the quantity of the dish being prepared. Time and again in the Du fait de cuisine Chiquart advises his reader to use an amount of an ingredient that is "appoint" or is "par bonne mesure."4 The authors of the Vianditr do not enjoin their cooks as explicitly to use good judgement in determining quantities, but the implicit caution is nonetheless there. One of a cook's most important professional functions is to judge what quantities are appropriate for whatever dish he is preparing. The modern cook using these recipes has exactly the same freedom as his or her mediaeval counterpart. It is up to him or her to allow experience and taste to guide in determining just how much of any particular ingredient to use. It is true that in some recipes the Viandier text will indicate that a greater amount of one herb or spice is to be used, that the tang of the vinegar should predominate, or that the dish should have a sweet flavour or a yellow colour. But these directions imply only relative amounts of an ingredient and never the exact quantity in any absolute sense. As a fourteenth­century cook would tell you, this food is only as...