The World That Was

Hello and Welcome to The World That Was! Today, I'm making a quick and easy accompaniment to any medieval Irish meals you have planned - a bowl of praiseach (pronounced: prashock)! The basis of this is a simple savour porridge, that's then flavoured with some sautéed mustard greens! Although wild mustard (charlock) greens are usually used, any suitably pungent edible greens can be used! In any case, let's now take a look at The World That Was!  Ingredients (for 4 portions) Mustard Greens / Turnip Greens 2 cups oatmeal (or oat groats) 2 cups milk (or water) butter Method 1 - Prepare the Greens To begin with, we need to chop some greens. Though praiseach is normally made using wild mustard (charlock), you can also use normal mustard greens, or even turnip greens (like I'm using here). They all have similar taste profiles - being pungent, slightly spicy greens - that react similarly when being cooked. In any case, chop your greens finely, removing any untoward-looking leav...

Hello and Welcome to The World That Was! This weekend is the pre-Christian Irish holiday of Samhain - celebrated more widely as Halloween! Due to my current circumstances, instead of a recipe this week, I'll be doing this instead! Pumpkins weren't present in Ireland until well after the Columbian Exchange, but turnips are an indigenous vegetable here - and were carved for millennia. In any case, let's now take a look at The World That Was! Follow along with my YouTube video, above! If you like what I do, consider checking out my Patreon! Ingredients A Turnip Method 1 - Cut top off turnip To begin making a carved turnip, you of course need a turnip! Try and get a large turnip, as it'll be more sturdy once carved. Cut the top off the root bulb - alternitively you can cut the base off the turnip, using the leaf bundle at the top as a handle! Either way, be very careful when cutting into this. Turnips are notoriously difficult to cut easily. Plus, if you're careless - l...

Hello and Welcome to The World That Was! Today, I'll be taking a look at some pre-Roman cider, from Gaul! As most of our records come from Roman sources, we don't get much insight beyond "The Gauls are so different to us Romans, they don't even drink wine! They just drink fermented grains and fruits like barbarians" And while these are, inherently, totally biased records, they provide a decent look at what they drank! Since we know that apples were cultivated in this region, and has a history of cider production, we can assume that Gauls created archaic forms of cider - which I'll now attempt to do now! In any case, let's now take a look at The World That Was! Follow along with my YouTube video, above! If you like what I make, please consider supporting me on Patreon! Ingredients Enough apples for 2-3L apple juice honey (to taste) dried yeast Special Utensils Glass Demijohn/Terracotta pot Siphon DISCLAIMER Before I begin, I have to reinforce that this is a...