One of the things that fascinates me about the Middle Ages is the food. I have several cookbooks that are compiled from medieval texts and this recipe is from my favorite one: it’s called The Medieval Kitchen: Recipes from France and Italy by Odile Redon, Francoise Sabban and Silvano Serventi. I like that each recipe includes the translated medieval text first (they wrote recipes like my MIL did: “Take enough butter and mix flour into it until it looks right…”) followed by the authors’ notes and then a modern version of the recipe which they’ve tested.

Last night, I made the Torta Bolognese, which I’ve made a number of times before. The translation is Herbed Swiss Chard and Cheese Pie, and it’s an awesome way to cook swiss chard. It’s also vegetarian.

Here’s a picture of my tart, fresh from the oven:

And here’s a picture of the interior:
The recipe instructs you to puree the ingredients for the filling until you have a smooth green paste, but I don’t do that. I use the chard with red stems and dice them up as well, then just chop it all fine. I’d rather see the green chard with red flicks in the egg filling than have it be all green. (The tomatoes have a red onion relish on them, btw.)

Next up, I want to try the Civet of Hare, probably the one from the Ménagier de Paris.

You can buy this book at Amazon – here’s the link.

Have you ever cooked historical recipes? What did you make and what did you think of the result?