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Mallard with onion sauce.
All text and pictures of dishes are the intellectual property of
Coquinaria and may not be reproduced without permission and acknowledgement..
recipe
may/june 2007
Mallard (wild duck) with
onion sauce
An English recipe from the fifteenth century.
Dutch version of this recipe
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A recipe from an English manuscript from the
middle of fifteenth century,
Harleian 4016 (edition) from the library of the
British Museum. The cookbook opens with the menu of a banquet that was
served to king Richard II and the Duke of Lancaster on September 23 1387 in the
palace of the bishop at Durham in London. The second menu in the manuscript is 56 years
younger, from a
banquet in honour of the installation of John Stafford as archbishop of
Canterbury in 1443. Both meals consisted of three courses. There are nearly
sixty years between the two meals, but little had changed during that period.
During the first course roast fowl was served, along with venison and frumenty,
for the second course more roast fowl and meat was served, with pottages
(thick nourishing soups), and in 1443 a bruet (a thick ragout-like
dish). Surely sauces were also served to accompany the roast fowl and meat, but
those aren't mentioned in the menus. The third course shows some change. There
were more sweet dishes in 1443 than in 1387, but both meals also served roast
small birds during 'dessert'.
Mallard was served in the first or second course. The recipe is for onion sauce,
and it is specified that this sauce is for mallard.
Roast fowl was presented whole, it had to be
carved prior to serving. That could be done at the side board by a squire, or in
smaller company by the host. It was expected of a gentleman that he knew how to
expertly dissect the presented food. One of the texts that teaches a young man
exactly how to do that is The boke of keruyinge of Wynkyn
de Worde (edition). This was printed in 1508, but
the original text was written earlier, between 1430 and 1440. The description on
carving mallard: "Goose, tele, mallarde & swanne: reyse the legges than the
wynges, laye the body in the myddes or in an other platter, the wynges in the
myddes & the legges after; lay the brawne bytwene the legges & the wynges in the
plater." (in the translation of Peter Brears: Goose, teal, mallard and swan:
take off the legs, then the wings; lay the body in the middle or in another
platter, the wings in the middle and the legs behind; lay the meat between the
wings and the wings in the platter.)
From the introduction to the edition of
this manuscript (together with another, Harleian 279 from about 1430)
from 1888 by Thomas Austin it is clear how scholars regarded the medieval
culinary arts: "Many of the Recipes that are
given here would astonish a modern Cook. Our forefathers, possibly from having
stronger stomachs, fortified by outdoor life, evidently liked their dishes
strongly seasoned and piquant [...]." This was written in the glory days of
the famous
English breakfast (with omelettes, bacon, kippers, beans in tomato sauce,
fried onions, fried toast, and so on), and heavily spiced doishes as
mulligatawny, khedgeree and curries that were introduced by returned colonials.
The pot and the kettle?
The original recipe
The recipe is taken from Harleian ms 4016 (edition
p.77). About the letter ž: this is the medieval English symbol for the 'th'
sound, the thorn. You can find it on your key board by using the
combination ctrl-alt-t. The same manuscripts that were used by Austin have been
used for the edition by Cindy Renfrow, with a translation in modern English that
I have taken the liberty to reproduce below. (edition).
Pikkyll pour le Mallard.
Take oynons, and hewe hem small, and fry hem in fressh grece, and caste
hem into a potte. And fressh broth of beef, Wyne, & powder of peper,
canel, and dropping of the mallard. And lete hem boile togidur awhile; And
take hit fro že fyre, and caste thereto mustard a litul, And pouder of
ginger, And lete hit boile no more, and salt hit, And serue hit forthe
with že Mallard. |
Pickle for the Mallard.
Take onions, and hew them small, and fry them in fresh grease, and cast them
into a pot, And fresh broth of beef, Wine, & powder of pepper, cinnamon, and
drippings of the mallard/ And let them boil together awhile; And take it
from the fire, and cast thereto mustard a little, And powder of ginger, And
let it boil no more, and salt it, And serve it forth with the Mallard. |
The modern adaptation of the recipe:
Printout version
The recipe is just for the sauce, not a word
on how the duck should be prepared. It's fairly safe to assume that it would
have been roasted, since you need the drippings of the mallard.
Don't use stock cubes or other commercially produced broth, but rather make your
own. Here you can find recipes for medieval beef
stock and modern beef stock.
On the picture you see not a mallard, but a pheasant. This dish had to be
photographed for a booklet, and at that moment all I had was this pheasant. I
hope to remember to make a picture next time I make this dish, wit a mallard.
For four persons.
List of ingredients:
2 wild ducks (mallards)
4 to 8 slices of lard
Onion sauce:
3 onions
50 gram (1/4 cup) lard, diced in small cubes
1 decilitre (1/2 cup) each of beef stock and wine
(white or red)
1 tsp. in all of cinnamon and pepper (2:1)
drippings of the mallard
1 Tbsp. mustard of 1 tsp. ground mustard seeds
1 tsp. ginger
salt to taste
Preparation in advance:
Prepare the ducks.
If you choose to use a roasting tin, or roast them on a gridiron, lay them on
their back, and drape two slices of bacon over the breast. If the birds are
roasted on a spit, bind four slices of bacon around them and use kitchen twine
to keep them in place. Don't forget to put a dripping pan under the mallards to
collect the drippings.
You can already fry the diced lard for the sauce. The cracklings are delicious
to nibble, but very salty. Don't feed them to your pets, however cutely they beg
for it.
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Preparation:
Roast the mallards. To get the typically smokey flavour of a charcoal fire you
should use a barbecue, but take care that the drippings do not fall on the
coals, because the resulting flames will burn the mallards instead of roasting
them. Besides, you'll need the drippings for the sauce. You can also roast the
ducks in front of a charcoal fire, as they did in the Middle Ages. The lechefrite or
dripping pan was a standard utensil in medieval kitchens.
But you can also roast the birds the modern way, in the oven, at a temperature
of 175EC/350EF for 45
to 60 minutes (depending on whether using a convection or conventional oven.
Check if the mallards are done, because times vary according to the oven you
have, and the birds. They should have a core temperature of 75 to 80EC/165 to
175EF.
Keep the ducks warm while you make the sauce by enveloping them in crinkled
kitchen foil (shiny side to the inside).
Prepare the sauce. Fry the onions in the melted lard, add broth, wine and
drippings, and pepper and cinnamon. Simmer on a slow fire for fifteen minutes,
then finish to taste with mustard(seeds), ginger and salt.
To serve:
The birds were first presented whole, and then cut at the table or the side
table: first the legs and wings are cut off, then the breastmeat is lifted from
the carcass and cut in sizelable pieces or slices. The carcass is then placed in
the middle of a dish, the sliced breastmeat arranged next to it with the wings,
the legs are placed behind. By the time the duck was cut and arranged the meat
wouldn't be piping hot anymore, which is a good thing if you eat with your
fingers.
The sauce can be served in separate sauce boats or poured in the dish on which
the mallard is served.
Ingredients
All descriptions of ingredients
Mustard:
This has always been a popular
condiment. Mustard is made from the seeds of several species of the brassica-family
(cabbage). From some varieties the leaves can be eaten, and the seeds not only
serve to make mustard, but can also be pressed to yield a culinary oil, or
distilled to make a medicinal oil. There are black, white and brown mustard
seeds (from brassica nigra, sinapis alba en
brassica juncea), each with their own specific properties. The first to are
indigenous to Europe, the brown mustard has its origins in Asia. A recipe for
making your own mustard: French
mustard.
Mallard:
Wild ducks are smaller than the white domesticated ones, they weigh around 2
pounds, tame ducks weigh 5 to 8 pounds. Mallards also have a much lower
percentage of fat. The hunting season is from august to february, but mallards
are at their best in september, before the cold sets in. However, wild duck can
be bought frozen all year. Always check your mallard for pellets before
preparing it.
In the Netherlands you can also buy kooieenden. According to my lexicon
these are decoy ducks in English. See
decoy in Wikipedia. Ducks that
are caught in a decoy are not shot but killed by breaking their neck, so they
won't have pellets and contusions.
Why a recipe for mallards in May/June when they are at their best
in September? On May 1st 2007 the dvd
Crusade in Jeans
appeared, and in a special Dutch edition there is an extra: a small cookbook
with medieval recipes, written by Marleen Willebrands and me. This is one of
the recipes from that booklet.
Bibliography
The editions below
are in my possession. Links refer to available editions.
All books mentioned on this site
T. Austin,
Two fifteenth Century Cookery-Books. [,,,] Reprint Oxford University Press, 2000 (oorspr. 1888),
digitale
editie.
 Wynkyn
de Worde, The Boke Of Keruynge (Book Of Carving) 1508,
met
inleiding, vertaling, illustraties en glossarium door Peter Brears. Southover
Press, 2003.
Cindy Renfrow, Take a thousand eggs or more
A translation of medieval
recipes from Harleian MS.279, Harleian MS. 4016, and extracts of Ashmole MS.
1439, Laud MS. 553, and Douce MS. 55, with over 100 recipes adapted for modern
cookery. Uitgegeven in eigen beheer, 2de editie, 1998. Twee delen.
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This page was updated on
23-07-09 (d-m-y).
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All text and pictures of dishes are the intellectual property of
Coquinaria and may not be reproduced without permission and acknowledgement..
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