A Recipe for History: Just Causes by Georgia Piggott

June 9, 2023

This article was written for Annabel & Grace, which is now part of Rest Less.

This article is from Dorset author Georgia Piggott on how historical recipes from the 17th century inspired her latest book, Just Causes. It just shows us all that there are so many skills to be learned, and we never know what we could be good at until we try.

Just Causes author, Georgia Piggott
GEORGIA PIGGOTT

From a young teenager, I wanted to write, but school and then a career buried all thoughts of authorship. It wasn’t until I took a year’s sabbatical that the creative streak turned a corner, and I got to work. It was always going to be historical fiction, always some form of murder mystery.

Initially, my heroine Alice was going to be a middle-aged woman on her own, useful in her community and intelligent enough to solve mysteries. In the end, rather than build her a forty-year backstory with all the complications of marriage, children and how she came to be this useful person, I put Alice in the position of a young woman starting out in life and then took away her entire household to see what happened next.

As it turned out, what happened next was that I found myself signing up for various training days to discover what skills a young woman might have in 1625. I joined a few courses led by, amongst others, Ruth Goodman, the social historian who advises film and TV dramatisations and museums like the V&A.

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I learned cheesemaking in a Tudor kitchen – so dark with only one window that finding the knife box was a hazard in itself! We made a cheddar-type cheese (mine was dreadful!) and a soft cheese (rather good). I made butter – I remember a great deal of vigorous pounding in the churn. Another time I learned how to butcher game, de-feathering and draw pheasants and pigeons, and how to deal with rabbits. That was all done out in the open air.

On another course, we started off with top-flight handwashing, early-modern style – soapwort is a common perennial, and its leaves do actually lather. We went on to cook an entire meal, including frying fish in butter on a trivet over the fire, making a pottage with oatmeal, and picking salad leaves from plants that are seen nowadays as mere weeds. We ate the meal, too, though I wouldn’t recommend the pottage!

One of my favourite recipes from that period is one I devised by picking a neighbour’s medlar tree and experimenting. It was much later that I discovered the medlar tree at the Weald and Downland Museum in Sussex, where I learned so much about cooking in Alice’s time. An autumn fruit, the medlar ripens around October/November. You find them sometimes in farm shops, greengrocers and delis. They’re an odd-looking fruit – and not at all common these days, but they were immensely popular in the period just before the English Civil War when my heroine Alice was preparing a meal for Daniel and Sam in her beleaguered home whilst unearthing the truth of an old murder.

Finding a recipe involved digging around old cookery books. It was a kind of forensic process, not at all helped by the fact that both Tudor and Stuart’s medlar recipes insist on opening with the instruction: “Take Medlers when they be rotten …’

This is enough to turn a 21st-century stomach and may explain why hardly anybody these days has heard of this glorious and versatile fruit.

In actual fact, ‘rotten’ should be read as very ripe or ‘bletted’ as those in the know say. When cooked and sweetened, the medlar turns a lovely russet red; I would describe the flavour as like spiced apple, with a gritty texture.

Writing a historical mystery has led me to all sorts of unexpected places. Details appear that I never planned, and Alice’s story takes turns I never envisaged. One of the great pleasures of writing is when it takes on a life of its own. It is an exciting mix of ingredients, and as I sit down to explore the ensuing events on Alice’s journey, there is always something new to discover.

Here is my medlar tart recipe for today. I have adapted it from one of the many online extracts from The Accomplished Cook by Robert May. He was a celebrity cook of the 1660s, producing dishes for King Charles II, but various recipes exist from Tudor times which are pretty much identical to his. There is a bit of work required on the medlars, but the result is worth it.

Medlar Tart

Ingredients:

A 375g pack of ready-rolled shortcrust pastry will be ideal if you don’t enjoy making your own. Or try these quantities – 225gr flour, 50gr butter, 50gr lard, pinch salt, 9 tsp water

1.5kgs medlars, bletted and pulped [see below]. This should make about 1 litre of pulp

3 egg yolks

100g sugar

1tsp ground cinnamon

2.5cm root ginger, grated

Bletted medlars

This is a ripening process when the medlar turns from orangey-yellow to brown and becomes very soft or ‘bletted’. If you buy or pick them while they are still firm, simply store the fruit in a cool room and wait a week or two.

Pulped medlars

Take the bletted medlars, cut them in half, place them in a pan of water just enough to cover them and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and cook, stirring occasionally, until the water has reduced by half. Rub through a coarse sieve. Discard pips and skins and use the pulp.

Method

Pre-heat the oven to 200C/180C Fan/Gas 6.

Use the rolled-out pastry to line a greased 20cm [8-inch] deep flan dish. Prick with a fork and bake 10-12 minutes until the colour is just beginning to turn golden.

Combine the pulped medlars, egg yolks, sugar, cinnamon and ginger in a mixing bowl, and stir well. Pour into the pastry base and place in the middle of the oven for 20 minutes.

Reduce the heat to 190C/170C Fan/Gas 5 and cook for a further 20 minutes. Cover if necessary; the top should be just browned.

Serve on its own or with ice cream, crème fraiche etc. Can be eaten hot or cold.

Just Causes by Georgia Piggott is out now in ebook and paperback, published by Crumps Barn Studio.

For more book reviews, click HERE.

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