The post Renaissance Tarts – Cooking Class & Talk appeared first on Miss Foodwise.
]]>
Clara Peeters, Antwerp, 1611
New date for this workshop:
Friday 28 july 2017 – 14h – in the Historical Kitchen of Port Eliot House, St-Germans, Cornwall UK.
Learn about these intricately decorated tarts and their meaning, see how they were made using the original tools.
Growing up in Flanders, Belgium, it feels as if still life paintings have always been a big part of my life. My entire childhood I’ve sat at the dinner table at my parents house, gazing at a dark still life painting with a pumpkin which hung on the wall on the other side of the room. Nothing makes sense in the image, why has the pumpkin such a prominent place on this formal dining table, and why is it on a formal table with china cups in the first place. A pumpkin like this would be more at home in a kitchen scene, on a bare wooden table, ready to be cut, its pips taken out, and the flesh diced for soup or stew.
Mysteries like these in food paintings have always intrigued me. One of my first books was a shabby old artbook with renaissance still life paintings by the Dutch and Flemish masters. All the food in the paintings had such carefully thought out symbolism. Bread indicates humility and catholic faith, a peach means truth and oysters mean lust. A glass of wine with little liquid in it symbolises the fragile nature of life but also wealth. In combination certain fruits and foods can tell a story. A paining with peaches and a butterfly mean hope and faith. Oysters or oyster shells in the vicinity of a woman in a painting means that the woman is promiscuous. If a bun of bread is near, it means she has lost her humility and has given in to the desires of the flesh. Heavy stuff no? An abundance of fish symbolises the catholic faith, but a cat near the fish means doubt, the painting could mean a warning not to take everything for granted when it comes to faith (big lessons to learn here).
But what those still lives also teach us is what people ate in the past and what utensils they used. Clara Peeters (image top page) shows the extraordinary skill of the chef who created that stunning centrepiece of a tart which is finished with a delicately carved pastry lid. This painting shows the best example of a renaissance tart. The tarts I have become infatuated by.
For my workshops I aim to tell you about the traditions and symbolism of these tarts and how to make them. You will learn an old pastry recipe and how to carve the lid using an authentic 18th century tool.
This summer I will be teaming up with Port Eliot festival and I will be teaching a class about these renaissance tarts in the historic kitchen of Port Eliot house. It’s a unique opportunity to cook historical food in a matching kitchen. I’m very excited about this and hope to see some of you there 28 july!
Want me to come and speak/teach at your event or cookery school?
I am available to teach this class wherever you like, get in touch to talk about classes that suit your interest. My most popular classes or talks are Renaissance tarts, historical puddings, and the history of British food.
Artus Claessens, Antwerp around 1644
Adriaen Coorte, Middelburg, between 1683-1707
You might also like this recipe for a quince tart here >
The post Renaissance Tarts – Cooking Class & Talk appeared first on Miss Foodwise.
]]>The post Three Acres Creative Gathering – New dates and a Recap appeared first on Miss Foodwise.
]]>
New Dates april 20-23 2017
In october my friends Giulia and Sarka and I hosted our first Three Acres Creative Gathering. An event born out of our own habit of meeting up several times a year to cook, eat, drink together, laugh and inspire each other. We each live in different countries so gatherings are always planned ahead. This made us think…
On a crisp and unusually sunny first of januari Giulia and I sat by the fire in her Tuscan family home, sipping fennel tea and talking about creativity. We wondered if we could create an event to include others in our usually quite private meet-ups. And so on our next get-together – in London this time – Sarka and Giulia and I decided to make it happen. A creative gathering in the rolling Sienese countryside, catching the very end of summer as a preparation for the cold and dark months ahead.
Our guests came not only from Italy but also from The Netherlands, Ecuador and the USA. A diverse bunch of women, all creative and eager to spend a few days with other creative people. We visited an organic sheep cheese farm situated in a rough rural landscape with the most exquisite view. We tasted the different cheeses with the farms thick fig compote made from their own precious few figs and slices of new season pears in an unusually warm autumn sun outside. The red wine served from a large glass carafe into lemonade glasses tasted like a rich grape juice, we all knew that back home it was already winter and savoured every moment.
We talked about our photography, our journey, our experience and our plans. We learned how to handle sourdough and take care of a starter culture from Manuela. We made all natural body products with Claudia, the products so pure you can eat them if you wanted to. Irene from Val Di rose showed us some secrets in flower arranging and table settings so we could go home to be perfect dinner party hosts. Giulia taught us Tuscan cooking in her beautiful new country kitchen and studio which she built in her family home. There were sourdough pizza’s baked in Giulia’s family wood fired oven in the garden, so were the beans, cooked overnight with olive oil and herbs for lunch the day after. Buttery beans which were then scooped onto toasted sourdough bread, first rubbed with fresh garlic. I could just feast on this every day, good bread, good olive oil and good beans plus garlic, what is not to adore. We visited the town of Siena at sunset and had more food therapy at a rustic ristorante in one of the narrow medieval streets. We always wondered if we could eat more that day and then the next feast came and we tucked in with greed and happiness, the sun on our faces.
And after this first chapter there will be a next… and so we are happy to announce the final dates for our spring creative gathering in April from the 20th late afternoon until the 23rd in the evening. Our location will be the the beautiful surroundings of Siena where you will stay in a working farm, but don’t worry, you won’t need to help with the farming!
Registration opens in a week but places are limited so if you want to be sure of your spot you can email me to reserve until the booking page goes live.
Why not read Simone, Manuela and Irene‘s blog posts about our lovely weekend together!
The post Three Acres Creative Gathering – New dates and a Recap appeared first on Miss Foodwise.
]]>The post Quince tart and our workshop in Dorset appeared first on Miss Foodwise.
]]>
A still life of puddings I created for Borough Market Life Magazine – featuring the quince tart
Two weeks ago on a frosty yet sunny winter morning, we welcomed our workshop attendees at All Hallows Cookery School in Dorset. We started with tea and mini mince pies plus pancakes from the AGA for the early birds. It was hard to get started because we were all having so much fun getting to know each other, or catching up. We made the more delicate puddings from my book, a sweetmeat pudding – otherwise known as the Bakewell pudding, Snake fritters and a quince tart with intricate pastry work. Lunch was beef with prunes, lovingly prepared by our host and owner of the school Lisa Osman. I can’t think of a dish more fitting on a day of English cooking. After all, beef and pudding have been the icon of English food for many centuries. There was a time during the Napoleonic war when eating roast beef and plum pudding would have showed your patriotism. Visitors from all over Europe spoke with high regard about the quality of English meat and beef especially.
After our rather festive lunch in Lisa’s beautiful dining room which made me feel as if I was in a Jane Austen novel, she taught us wreath making which sounds far more easy than it actually was. We struggled and have a huge respect for wreath makers now. We all concluded we now understood why a impressive wreath is so pricy. It takes a ton of work, and will leave you with very painful hands. I finished mine at home and now have it on my front door for all to see.
We are planing more workshops at All Hallows Cookery School in the new year, so if you fancy coming to one, or gifting a workshop to a loved one, then do get in touch with Lisa. All Hallows also has a couple of beautiful rooms so you can make a weekend out of it, or if you’re in the area you can just stay at the house as she is available for bed and breakfast when she has availability.
Now on to that quince tart. I had made the quince jam at home as it takes a couple of hours to make and we didn’t have the time to do that on our day in Dorset. As I said in my previous post where I gave the recipe for quince cheese, you can use that recipe and just not let the jam dry in the oven to become paste. You can dry a part for quince cheese, and use the rest for a tart. But what you also can do is make the filling especially, and then you can use less sugar.
Picture by Rebecca Williams
Picture by Rebecca Williams
Elaborately decorated tarts like this one were all the rage in 17th century England. Oliver Cromwell the puritan and general partypooper would not have been pleased to see this luxurious tart on his table. He wanted people to eat more simple no-frills meals in order to be closer to god. The whole story about these kind of puddings you’ll find in my book of course. But for now here’s the recipe.
Quince tart
While the original historical recipe uses slices of quince and a syrup made out of the cooking liquid, this version using a jammy quince puree is much more to modern tastes. I’m pretty sure however that they made the same tart this way too. Why wouldn’t they!
The trick to get a beautiful dark colour is to cook the quince and the jam slowly and for a long time. The peel I’m told is also adding to the reddish colour so I never peel the fruit. I do’t remove the cores, because there is a lot of pectin in the pips to thicken the jam. But you can of course peel and core, it’s just not worth the hassle!
What do you need
Makes a 20 cm tart – I find using a enamel plate gives a better result than a pie or tart casing.
- 1 quantity shortcrust pastry, recipe in my book, or use high quality all butter pastry from the shop*
*If you are using store bought pastry you need to buy two packs if you want to make a pastry lid as well. - 3 large quinces, 600 g, roughly chopped each
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 2 cloves
- peel of 1 lemon
- 350 g raw sugar
- 1 egg, beaten, for egg washing
Method
Prepare the shortcrust pastry as instructed in my book or use shop bought. If you are using a pastry lid, don’t blind bake the pastry base. Line the pie dish with the pastry, leaving enough pastry on the rim to fasten the lid to.
Preheat the oven to 160C (315F).
In a large saucepan cover the quinces with water and boil until tender with the spices. Remove the quinces from the saucepan and save the spices (you might not even find the cloves and lemon peel as they can have disintegrated. Just remove the cinnamon.
Blend to a puree using a stick blender. Proceed as for making jam adding the sugar, put the cinnamon back in, being careful as quince jam tends to spit. A way around this is to not make the jam on a hob but first bring it to a boil and stir for 5 minutes, remove the spices, then transfer the pan covered in greasproof paper into the oven at 160°C. Leave there for 45 minutes, then check on it, it should be thick and perfect for a pie filling.
**If you see any woody bits in your puree, I would advise to strain it through a sieve. If you aren’t picky about a few bits, just leave it in.
If using a pastry lid, cut a circle of pastry the same size as the pie dish and carefully place it over the filling. Crimp the edges, or create a nice pattern using a pastry jigger if you have one. Decorate as you please.
Egg wash the pastry lid well and bake in the middle of the oven for 45-50 minutes.
Enjoy as a pudding, or an afternoon treat!
Check out other quince recipes on this website:
Quince Rataffia (quince liqueur) >
And check out Jul’s Kitchen roast quince with rice pudding here >
Special thanks to Rebecca Williams from the blog ‘Hold the Anchovies Please’, who attended the workshop and kindly allowed me to use a couple of shots of the workshop! See her post here >
The post Quince tart and our workshop in Dorset appeared first on Miss Foodwise.
]]>