Peasant's by the Hearth

Flemish

Pieter Aertsen (1508-1575)

White Bean Soup¹

For to  make a potage feneboiles:

Take white beans and seeth them in water and bray the beans in a mortar all to nought and let it seeth in almonds milk and do theein wine and honey and seeth raisins in wine and do thereto serve it forth (The Forme of Cury, 1378)

Serves 4

6 ounces (1 cup) dried white beans

1/2 pint (1 1/2 cups) almond milk (see sauces)

1/4 pint (1/2 cup) white wine

4 tablespoons honey

1 ounce (2/3 cup) raisins, plumped in hot vinegar in which you have dissolved a little brown sugar

Soak the beans in water for 1 hour, drain, put them in a saucepan and cover with salted water.  Simmer until tender for about 1 hour.  Drain, reserving the cooking water.  Put the beans into a saucepan with the almond milk, wine and honey and simmer for 10 minutes.  If the soup is too thick, dilute it with the cooking water.  Season to taste and add the drained raisins.  Simmer for 5 minutes and serve.

Soup in Three Colors¹

Medieval English people were very visual about their food.  They loved strange shapes and particularly enjoyed dishes of unusual colors.  This is one version of a popular multi-colored soup.

Serves 4 -6

1 1/2-2 pints (4 cups) creamy blended potato soup

1/8 teaspoon powdered saffron

4 tablespoons (1/4 cup) cooked spinach or fresh parsley, chopped

Divide the soup into three portions.  Leave the first portion white and chill. Infuse the second portion with the saffron, over very low heat, until it is brightly colored.  Strain and chill.  Then infuse the third portion with the chopped spinach or parsley, over low heat, straining when it has turned a good green.  Chill.  When you are ready to serve, put some soup of each color into each individual bowl, making a pattern of the three colors and keeping them as distinct as possible.

Onion Soup With Almonds¹

Dorry, Soupes Dorrye": endored or "gilded" soups glazed with almond milk.  The term "endoring" covered any method which gave the food a golden appearance: by the use of egg yolks, saffron, or in this case a crusty surface made of bread and almonds, such as the cheese and bread we ar used to in French onion soup.

For to make soupes dorry:  Nym onions and mince them small and fry them in oil d'olif - Nym wine and boil it with the onions.  Toast white bread and do it in dishes and good almond milk also and do them about and serve it fourth (Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery Books)

Serves 4

6 ounces (2 cups) finely chopped onion

2-3 tablespoons olive oil

1 pint (2 1/2 cups) white wine

1 pint (2 1/2 cups) almond milk (see sauces)

3 tablespoons coarsely ground almonds

8 slices french bread, lightly toasted

A little extra oil and butter

Saute' the onions in the oil until golden; add the wine and almond milk and season to taste.  Simmer for 20-30 minutes.  Meanwhile saute' the ground almonds in a little extra oil until they are golden but not too crisp.  Spoon the soup into individual fireproof bowls, or into a large bowl shallow enough to fit under the broiler or grill.  Lay a slice of toast on top of the soup in each bowl or spread all the slices out on the larger one.  Scatter the oily almonds on top of the toast, dot with butter and grill very lightly.

^{1Seven Centuries of English Cooking, A Collection of Recipes by Maxime de la Falaise, Grove Press, New York}