Another Roman Recipe To Delight All

[Pertinax]

Pliny tells us that the womb is better if there has been a miscarrige rather than a normal birth. The first of these wombs is called ejectitia the second porcaria. It is best after the second pregnancy and least tasty when weakened by several normal births,After the sow is slaughtered the womb becomes pale and thin quickly-one must act with dispatch.The wombs of older animals are better especially if not completely cleaned .

After a misscarriage one day from that date is tastiest. The udder is also tastiest when piglets have not yet drunk from it.

 

recipe: remove ovaries and soak in salt water. Wash and stuff ( with leeks ,pepper,cumin, rue and garum.Add fine pork mince ,pine kernels ).Make sure you sew the womb up tightly ,cook with plenty of dill and olive oil over a low heat. When cooked reduce the cooking liquid and use as a sauce.

 

Delicious!

 

Later we will peruse the recipe for fat puppies.

[Moonlapse]

Sounds delightful. I'm sure the womb sauce is much tastier 'if not completely cleaned'. I think I'll check with the guy in the deli and see if he has some uncleaned womb from an old pig.

[FLavius Valerius Constantinus]

Why not just add extra vinegar and table salt. LOL

[claudia]

I guess I would be prepared to try anything once, but not too sure about the "not perfectly clean" part, does he mean that blood makes it more tasty *gag*

 

[Hamilcar Barca]

The Romans did have a number of familiar foods; hot dogs, pizza, marshmallows, steak etc. Then of course you've got the baked door mice and expired fishpaste ketchup to go on everything. But pigs womb?! When in Rome I guess... Thanks for sharing pertinax/pliny I never knew about that one. I'd like to hear more

[Pertinax]

Wait till I post the puppy recipe

 

The Romans were keen on kebabs and beer -many of the urban poor in "apartments" having no real cooking facilities. So contemporary descendants of the Icenii and Brigantes would have been quite at home in a Pompeiian ganea ( " a place to gorge yourself") or the gurgustium ( "a place to stuff yourself").

Nero often popped out in disguise for a bit of low life carousing in town.

 

Dont forget to check my "moray eel " thread in the after hours lounge for more food tips.

[Pertinax]

Elegabalus had the knackof making traditional recipes even more interesting-

"ten days in a row he served the udders of wild sows with the womb attached, thirty per day.With this he served peas with pieces of gold ,lentils with onyx, beans with amber and rice with pearls. He also sprinkled pearls over mushrooms instead of pepper" (Opilius Macrinus)

 

The guests were allowed to keep the pearls.Elegabalus was certainly an entertainig host -at one meal serving the brains of 600 ostriches.

[Hamilcar Barca]

wow

[FLavius Valerius Constantinus]

I thought the Romans ate weird stuff, but all these descriptions of other foods just... I can't explain.

[Pertinax]

A note on serving styles:

 

The Repositorium (my favourite) is of course a buffet ,great care would be taken to produce attractive display dishes .Guests helped themselves without much assistance from slaves.

 

Roasts-brought in whole and carved by the specialised scissor slave in an elegant manner (sometimes to music)

 

Plate service-like a modern restaurant-not much enjoyed by the fashionable seen as unsociable and vulgar (barbarians -note this, and no licking the meat juices )

 

A table each-the old Etruscan mode ,similar in many ways to Japanese dining .Elegant but rather restrained

 

Athenian style -buffet but individual tables-not popular,mainly like haute cuisine today-not enough grub.

 

and I leave you with a stinging rebuke of Celtic customs " they eat a little bread ,but great quantities of meat ( boiled,grilled or roasted on a spit). They may eat hygienically ,but they do so with bestial greed"(Athenaeus )

[FLavius Valerius Constantinus]

Little bread, meat and meat. That sounds like the diet of a British sailors back then when scurvy was still uncured.( Note, scurvy grass was a very common flowering plant rich in Vitamin C that sailors commonly ate to cure scurvy. Many other plants cure such diseases.)

[Pertinax]

Use your Brain:-

Wash two calf's brains under cold running water .Remove the veins and the membrane,then leave to soak for an hour.Wash again.Poach the brains in salted water for 15 minutes.Preheat oven to 180 deg C. Remove them from the liquid then pound to a smooth paste.Pound lovage seed in a mortar, add anchovies and peppercorns to form a paste.Grind into this paste some oregano and add 3 eggs.Combine with the brains and reblend.

Line a baking tin with papyrus (greaseproof paper)pour in the mix ,cover with more papyrus steam in a bath of water for 45 minutes.Take out and leave to cool.

Sauce of hot wine /anchovies and pepper ,stir into this tractum ( a type of cracker, breadcrumbs nowadays) allow to absorb all fluid.Serve the pate sliced with the sauce .Voila!

Regarded as a most subtle and flavoursome dish.

 

Barbarian readers ,greetings! As always I have tips for you when visiting a Roman Civitas or if you are very wealthy,Rome itself. I know that in Gaul you might well wash even on a daily basis, and change your trousers with the turning of the seasons, however in Rome during a meal you will probably be obliged to wash three times! Do not be alarmed this is not Womanish affectation.So prior to aperitifs( wormwood-will kill your intestinal parasites) you wil wash,then sample hors d'oeuvres( oysters ,olives ,snails,sea urchins) and have perhaps two more separate courses of food( firstly perhaps moray eel and roast meats then to follow roast hare or a tastey pig's womb).Then you must wash again. Then dessert will be served(figs ,peaches ,rare fruits, snails ,tripe) during this course the children of the house will sacrifice to the household Gods .After this expect a few snacks and then finally supper with drinks.You should wash again at this point.You might find you have stayed up all night and your fellow guests are quite drunk and vomiting decorously to squeeze a little more in ,this is fine it shows they appreciate the effort made by the host.

Better than a wattle hut in Gaul eh?

Edited November 16, 2005 by Pertinax

[Scipio Africanus]

Was it not customary for Romans to lay down during the meal? I remember seeing this somewhere..

 

 

And tripe..for desert?? nasty

[Pertinax]

yes indeed Scipio, it reflected the solemn posture of the dead.Have a look at the "Around the Roman Table" thread in the Colesseum and possibly the "Moray Eel " thread.I have noted different dining styles.

 

Dinners reclined on the left elbow and ate only with the right hand -never both hands ,this was considerd barbaric. Position at the Triclinium was a matter of very strict etiquette.Clients,freedmen and slaves would possibly sit to the rear of the Triclinium.

Edited November 16, 2005 by Pertinax

[FLavius Valerius Constantinus]

Err..thanks for the disgusting description Pertinax.

Yes, it was customary for the Romans to lay down during the meal, well for the rich Roman it was. The plebeians don't care anyhow. I believe the triclinium is the area for dining. I think I'm wrong though.