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Let Lory (Larded Milk): Medieval English Custard Recipe | Harleian MS 279

Let Lory, a medieval English saffron milk curd dish from Harleian MS 279
Let Lory, also called larded milk, from Harleian MS 279

Few medieval dishes feel as curious and unexpected to modern diners as Let Lory, sometimes called larded milk. Found in Harleian MS 279, dated to about 1430, this unusual English dish sits somewhere between a soft custard, a fresh cheese, and a delicate entremet. Milk scented with saffron is gently curdled with eggs, drained, and dressed with a warm sauce of sweetened yolks and warming spices.

To modern eyes, Let Lory may appear unusual, yet medieval cooks seem to have delighted in dishes of curdled milk and eggs. Similar preparations appear across Europe, from the English Forme of Cury recipe for Letelorye to French recipes for larded milk. These dishes blurred the line between custard, cheese, and composed delicacy.

Rather than a hearty pottage or broth of the first course, Let Lory feels especially at home among the entremets, the often-overlooked dishes served between courses to delight guests and shift the rhythm of the feast. Soft, rich, and lightly perfumed with saffron and spice, it makes an excellent conversation piece for historical dinners, reenactment feasts, or anyone curious about the stranger corners of medieval cookery.

What Is Let Lory?

Let Lory belongs to a family of medieval dishes often described as larded milk or curdled milk custards. These recipes use milk, eggs, heat, and sometimes acid to form tender curds. The result is not a smooth modern pudding. It is closer to a soft fresh cheese or delicate egg custard served with sauce.

The Harleian version begins with milk, saffron, salt, and eggs. The richer version adds a sauce of egg yolks, sugar, ginger, cloves, and mace. This transforms a simple dairy dish into something elegant enough for a feast table.

The Original Recipe

.lviij. Let lory.

Take Mylke, an sette it ouer þe fyre; take Salt & Safroun, an caste þer-to; take Eyroun, þe ȝolke an þe Whyte y-strainyd a lyte, & caste it þer-to; whan þe Mylke his skaldyng hote, caste þe stuf þer-to, an þenne stere yt tyll it crodde; and ȝif þou wolt haue it a-forsyd with lyȝt coste, Take Mylke, & make it skaldyng hote, & caste þer-to Raw ȝolkes of Eyroun, Sugre, pouder Gyngere, Clowes, Maces, an let not fully boyle; & so hote, dresse it forth, an ley it on þe crodde; & ȝif þou wolt a-forse it in maner of charlet, do it in fastyng dayis, & serue it forth.

Modern Translation

Take milk and set it over the fire. Add salt and saffron. Take eggs, both yolks and whites, strain them a little, and add them to the milk. When the milk is scalding hot, add the egg mixture and stir until it curds. If you wish to enrich it at little cost, take milk and make it scalding hot. Add raw egg yolks, sugar, ginger powder, cloves, and mace, but do not let it fully boil. Serve it hot over the curds. If you wish to enrich it in the manner of charlet, do so on fasting days and serve it forth.

Interpreted Recipe: Let Lory

Serves 8 as a small feast dish or entremet

For the Saffron Milk Curds

  • 3 cups whole milk
  • 1 cup heavy cream
  • 4 eggs, beaten
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 generous pinch saffron
  • 2 teaspoons white wine vinegar or verjuice, optional

For the Spiced Egg Sauce

  • 1 cup whole milk
  • 8 egg yolks, beaten
  • 2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons sugar
  • 1 teaspoon ground ginger
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground mace
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground clove

Method

  1. Place the milk, cream, salt, and saffron in a heavy-bottomed saucepan or double boiler. Warm gently until the milk is steaming and scalding hot, but do not let it scorch.
  2. Beat the eggs until smooth. Slowly pour the beaten eggs into the hot milk, stirring constantly.
  3. Continue stirring over gentle heat until the mixture begins to curdle. The curds should look soft and tender, not rubbery.
  4. If the mixture is slow to curdle, add 2 teaspoons white wine vinegar or verjuice. Stir gently until curds form.
  5. Remove from the heat and allow the curds to cool slightly.
  6. Line a strainer with several layers of cheesecloth and place it over a bowl. Spoon the curds into the cheesecloth and drain until most of the whey has been removed.
  7. For a softer dish, drain briefly. For firmer slices, gather the cheesecloth and press gently until the curds hold together.

To Make the Spiced Egg Sauce

  1. Warm the milk with the sugar, ginger, mace, and clove until steaming.
  2. Temper the beaten egg yolks by slowly whisking in a little of the hot milk.
  3. Return the tempered yolks to the saucepan and cook gently, stirring constantly, until the sauce thickens.
  4. Do not let the sauce boil. Remove from heat as soon as it coats the back of a spoon.
  5. Spoon the warm sauce over the drained curds and serve.

Kitchen Notes

Milk scorches easily, so use low heat and patience. A double boiler is helpful for this recipe. The finished curds should be tender and delicate, not dry. If you prefer a firmer presentation, drain the curds longer and press them lightly before serving.

The optional vinegar or verjuice helps the milk curdle more quickly. This is especially useful if your eggs do not produce a clear curd on their own.

What Does Let Lory Taste Like?

Let Lory is mild, creamy, and gently spiced. The saffron gives the curds color and a faint floral warmth, while the sauce adds sweetness and spice. The texture is not the same as modern custard. It is closer to soft cheese curds dressed with a thin, warm custard sauce.

For a feast, serve Let Lory in small portions. It works well as an entremet, an opening dish, or a curious dairy course between heavier dishes. It is especially suitable for a luncheon, tasting table, or educational feast where guests enjoy learning about unusual medieval foods.

Humoral Notes

In medieval dietary theory, milk and eggs were generally considered nourishing, moist, and strengthening. They could be suitable for people needing gentle or restorative foods. The warming spices in the sauce, especially ginger, clove, mace, and saffron, help balance the cooler and moister qualities of the dairy.

This balance of rich dairy and warming spice may explain why dishes like Let Lory remained attractive in medieval kitchens. They offered comfort, nourishment, and refinement in one small dish.

Related Historical Recipes

Let Lory belongs to a wider family of medieval custards, curdled dairy dishes, and egg-thickened preparations. Similar recipes include:

  • Forme of Cury: Letelorye, an English recipe using eggs, cow’s milk, butter, saffron, and salt.
  • Le Ménagier de Paris: Larded Milk, a French version that could include bacon for meat days or verjuice for fasting days.
  • Liber Cure Cocorum: Lede Lardes, another English version in which milk and eggs are curdled, sliced, and cooked further.
  • A Noble Boke off Cookry: Ledlardes, a later English continuation of the same culinary tradition.

More Custards and Dairy Dishes from Give It Forth

Feast Planning Notes

For modern feast service, Let Lory is best served in small portions. It is rich, unusual, and memorable, making it a better supporting dish than a centerpiece. Serve it warm in small bowls or spooned onto small plates as part of an entremet course, dairy course, or opening selection.

Because it contains milk and eggs, this dish should be prepared close to service and kept safely chilled or warm as appropriate. It is vegetarian, but not vegan or dairy-free.

Why Serve Let Lory?

Let Lory is one of those medieval dishes that invites conversation. It shows how cooks transformed simple ingredients into something refined through heat, spice, color, and texture. For a reenactment feast, class, or historical luncheon, it offers guests a memorable taste of the medieval table without requiring expensive ingredients.

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Æppla Syfling: Following the Trail of an Anglo-Saxon Apple Butter

Æppla Syfling: Following the Trail of an Anglo-Saxon Apple Butter

Sometimes revisiting an old recipe does not reveal mistakes. Sometimes it reveals how much care went into the reconstruction in the first place.

A few weeks ago, while revisiting an Anglo-Saxon feast I originally prepared in 2003, I found myself in a strange place: ten pages deep into Google searching for Æppla Syfling.

The odd thing?

Most of the results led right back to me.

Or rather, to a much younger version of myself.

Back in 2003, for Ceilidh XVI, I prepared an Anglo-Saxon inspired feast using recipes from Mary Savelli’s Tastes of Anglo-Saxon England. Like many historical cooks of my generation, I trusted her work because she attempted something genuinely difficult: taking fragmentary evidence and transforming it into dishes that modern cooks could understand, discuss, and place on the table.

One of those dishes was Æppla Syfling, translated simply as apple butter.

At the time, the recipe felt entirely reasonable. Apples, cider, honey, mint, cumin, and black pepper cooked into a soft accompaniment to bread or the feast table. I made it, served it, enjoyed it, and moved on.

More than twenty years later, curiosity got the better of me.

What exactly had Mary seen in this recipe?

And perhaps more importantly:

What did Anglo-Saxons mean by the word syfling?

Anglo-Saxon inspired feast prepared for Ceilidh XVI in 2003
Ceilidh XVI, March 29, 2003. The original Anglo-Saxon inspired feast where Æppla Syfling first appeared on my table.

Original Feast Context: Æppla Syfling was originally prepared for Ceilidh XVI, an Anglo-Saxon inspired feast held on March 29, 2003.

📜 Read the original feast record:
Ceilidh XVI – March 29, 2003

🍏 Explore the updated feast research:
Reconstructing an Anglo-Saxon Feast: Ceilidh XVI Revisited

The Value of Revisiting Old Recipes

One of the gifts of maintaining a long-running historical cooking blog is that older work remains visible. That is not always comfortable. Old recipes can show what sources were available, what assumptions were common, and what questions had not yet been asked.

But older work also preserves something precious: the moment when a cook took the evidence available and made it practical.

That matters especially for Anglo-Saxon food. Unlike later medieval English cookery, we do not have a large collection of household recipe books telling us exactly how these dishes were made. Instead, we work from scattered clues: medical texts, glossaries, archaeology, food rents, monastic rules, comparative sources, and later culinary habits.

In 2003, that work was harder than it is today. Searchable manuscript databases, digitized medieval texts, OCR search tools, online dictionaries, and high-resolution scans from major libraries were not sitting one click away.

Most historical cooks worked from the books they owned, interlibrary loans, photocopies, conference notes, handwritten bibliographies, and the generosity of other researchers.

A Note on Mary Savelli’s Work: This revisit is not an attempt to correct Tastes of Anglo-Saxon England. If anything, it has deepened my appreciation for it. Mary Savelli was doing something genuinely useful: building practical bridges between fragmentary Anglo-Saxon evidence and modern kitchens.

That is the spirit in which I returned to Æppla Syfling.

Not to ask, “Was Mary wrong?”

But to ask, “What was Mary seeing?”

What Does Syfling Mean?

That question led me somewhere unexpected.

Not first to a recipe.

Not even to a manuscript.

It led me to a dictionary.

According to the Bosworth–Toller Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, the Old English word syfling refers broadly to a food eaten with bread, an accompaniment, or something supplemental served alongside a staple food. Even more intriguingly, the dictionary glosses æppla syfling as apple sauce.

That stopped me for a moment.

Had I misunderstood the recipe all these years?

The longer I sat with the idea, the more I found myself circling back to Mary Savelli’s original interpretation with fresh appreciation.

If syfling means an accompaniment eaten with bread, then translating Æppla Syfling as apple butter begins to make practical sense. Historical cooks often choose familiar language to help modern readers understand unfamiliar ideas, and “apple butter” immediately communicates an apple-based preparation meant to accompany bread or a meal.

English speakers have long used the word butter for soft fruit preparations:

  • Apple butter
  • Pear butter
  • Pumpkin butter

Not dairy butter, but soft, spoonable fruit accompaniments.

Seen through that lens, Mary’s choice feels less like a literal translation and more like an interpretive bridge between Anglo-Saxon foodways and a modern kitchen.

Language Note: Syfling does not need to mean “butter” in the dairy sense. It points toward an accompaniment eaten with bread. That makes “apple butter” a surprisingly sensible modern way to describe a soft apple preparation served at table.

Following the Flavor Trail

If the word syfling started making more sense, the next question became flavor.

Why mint? Why cumin? Why pepper?

At first glance, these seem unusual companions to apples. Yet the deeper I looked into Anglo-Saxon medicine and comparative culinary traditions, the more thoughtful Mary Savelli’s reconstruction began to feel.

What I expected to find, if I am being honest, was evidence that I might reinterpret the recipe dramatically.

Instead, I found evidence that Mary may already have understood more than I first realized.

Bald’s Leechbook, Digestion, and Familiar Flavors

Bald’s Leechbook is not a cookbook. It is a 10th-century Old English medical manuscript, deeply influenced by earlier Mediterranean medical traditions inherited through Greek, Roman, and Byzantine learning.

That matters because Anglo-Saxon medical texts often preserve familiar kitchen ingredients in practical use: apples, herbs, honey, vinegar, butter, milk, ale, grains, and warming spices.

While revisiting Mary Savelli’s reconstruction, I found something in Bald’s Leechbook that stopped me in my tracks.

In Book II, Chapter XII, a digestive remedy “for spewing, and in case that a man’s meat will not keep down” combines several ingredients that felt immediately familiar:

  • Mint
  • Pepper
  • Cumin
  • Sour apples
  • Wine
“For spewing, and in case that a mans meat will not keep down… take one ounce of seed of dill, four of pepper, three of cumin… put into water in which mint has been sodden and sour apples… if the man be not in a fever, eke it with wine.”

Thomas Oswald Cockayne, Leechdoms, Wortcunning, and Starcraft of Early England, Vol. II, Book II, Ch. XII.

That does not prove Æppla Syfling exactly. Historical evidence rarely works so neatly.

But it demonstrates something important:

Anglo-Saxon medicine already understood apples, mint, pepper, cumin, and wine as ingredients that belonged together.

Even more fascinating, Cockayne notes that this remedy partly reflects the medical writings of Alexander of Tralles, a Byzantine physician whose work helped transmit older Mediterranean medical traditions into medieval Europe.

In other words:

Anglo-Saxon medicine did not emerge in isolation.

It inherited centuries of medical thinking in which foods, herbs, and spices were understood to warm, cool, stimulate digestion, soothe discomfort, and support bodily balance.

Page from Bald's Leechbook Anglo-Saxon medical manuscript
Bald’s Leechbook, Book II, Chapter XII. Digestive remedies preserve combinations of mint, cumin, pepper, sour apples, and wine.

Ann Hagen, Fruit Sauces, and Digestion

Ann Hagen’s work on Anglo-Saxon foodways provides another fascinating clue.

Hagen notes that fruit sauces were traditionally served with meat and fish dishes and could help “cut the fat,” making richer foods easier to digest.

Even more intriguingly, she points out that Anglo-Saxon leechdoms mention sauces of vinegar, honey, and herbs, observing that there is little reason to suppose these belonged only to medicine.

In one discussion, Hagen references:

“sweet apples, marinaded in wine, then stewed and sweetened with honey and peppered.”

That combination immediately caught my attention.

Not because it proves Æppla Syfling exactly, but because it demonstrates something important:

apples, honey, pepper, herbs, and sharp liquids already belonged together in Anglo-Saxon thinking.

Apples provide tartness and body. Honey softens the edge. Mint brightens. Pepper and cumin warm.

Seen this way, Æppla Syfling begins to feel less like an odd reconstruction and more like a very plausible accompaniment for richer foods on an Anglo-Saxon table.

Roman Echoes: Apicius

Mary also pointed toward Apicius, the Roman cookbook tradition.

This does not mean Anglo-Saxons were cooking Roman recipes unchanged. Rather, it suggests that flavor families survived and evolved across centuries.

In John Edwards’ The Roman Cookery of Apicius, a cumin sauce for oysters combines:

  • Pepper
  • Mint
  • Cumin
  • Honey
  • Sharp liquids such as vinegar

No apples, of course.

But the flavor logic feels strikingly familiar.

Sweet. Sharp. Herbal. Peppery.

Modern cooks sometimes find these combinations surprising. Ancient and medieval cooks clearly did not.

Explore Apicius Online:
Roman Cookery of Apicius

Mary Savelli’s Original Reconstruction

One of the things I expected to find while revisiting this recipe was evidence that I might want to reinterpret it more dramatically. Instead, revisiting Mary Savelli’s original instructions revealed something surprising:

She was closer to an Anglo-Saxon interpretation than many may have recognized.

Her recipe does not resemble the thick, heavily reduced modern apple butter many of us imagine today.

Instead, it produces something softer, brighter, and far more sauce-like.

Æppla Syfling – Apple Butter
Makes 1½ cups

  • 2 medium apples, peeled and finely chopped
  • 1 cup apple cider (or apple juice)
  • 2 tbsp honey
  • ⅛ tsp ground black pepper
  • ¼ tsp each dried mint and cumin leaves

Method:
Boil the apples in the cider for 30 minutes or until soft; purée. Thoroughly mix the remaining ingredients into the apple purée and cool.

Recipe adapted from Mary Savelli, Tastes of Anglo-Saxon England.

At first, I thought I might reinterpret this dish as something looser and more relish-like.

Looking back at Mary’s original instructions, however, I realized she may already have been aiming for exactly that.

What changed for me was not the recipe itself.

It was understanding the historical logic behind it.

My 2026 Interpretation: I would keep the heart of Mary’s recipe and its soft, sauce-like texture. If anything, I would be careful not to reduce it too far. I would aim for a tart, herbal apple accompaniment eaten with bread or served beside richer foods.

Æppla Syfling: A Modern Historical Reconstruction

Serves 8

Ingredients

  • 6 medium tart apples, peeled, cored, and chopped
  • 1 cup apple cider or unsweetened apple juice
  • 1 to 2 tablespoons honey, or to taste
  • 1 tablespoon fresh mint, finely chopped, or 1 teaspoon dried mint
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
  • 1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
  • Pinch of salt, optional
  • 1 to 2 teaspoons cider vinegar, optional, if your apples are not tart

Method

  1. Place the chopped apples and cider in a saucepan over medium heat.
  2. Bring to a gentle simmer, then reduce the heat and cook until the apples are soft, stirring occasionally.
  3. Mash the apples with a spoon or potato masher. For a smoother sauce, press through a sieve or use an immersion blender briefly.
  4. Stir in the honey, mint, cumin, pepper, and salt if using.
  5. Taste. If the sauce is too sweet or flat, add a small splash of cider vinegar.
  6. Continue cooking only until the mixture is soft and spoonable. Do not reduce it into a dense preserve unless you prefer a more modern apple butter texture.
  7. Serve warm or at room temperature.

To Serve

Serve Æppla Syfling with warm bread, oatcakes, roast pork, sausage, fish, sharp cheese, or as part of an Anglo-Saxon inspired feast board.

Cook’s Note: For a version closer to modern apple butter, continue cooking the mixture over low heat until thick and deeply reduced. For my current interpretation, I prefer to leave it looser and more sauce-like, preserving the tartness of the apples and the brightness of the mint.

2003 Version vs. 2026 Interpretation

In 2003, I understood this dish primarily through the modern phrase apple butter. In 2026, I still think that phrase is useful, but I understand it more broadly.

A syfling was an accompaniment. Something eaten with bread. Something that made the staple more flavorful, nourishing, or pleasant.

So yes, Æppla Syfling can still be understood as apple butter.

But perhaps not only as the thick sweet preserve many of us grew up with.

It may also be apple sauce. Apple relish. Apple accompaniment. A tart, herbal spoonful of something bright beside bread and meat.

And in that sense, Mary’s original translation may have been doing exactly what good reconstruction often does: giving modern cooks a doorway into a much older kitchen.

Frequently Asked Questions

What does Æppla Syfling mean?

Æppla means apples. Syfling refers broadly to a food eaten with bread or an accompaniment. Bosworth–Toller glosses æppla syfling as apple sauce.

Is Æppla Syfling really apple butter?

It can reasonably be understood that way if “apple butter” is used broadly to mean a soft apple accompaniment served with bread or at table. It may not have resembled the thick, heavily reduced sweet preserve many modern cooks associate with apple butter.

Why does the recipe include cumin and pepper?

Cumin and pepper may seem surprising with apples today, but they make sense in a historical context where sharp, sweet, herbal, and warming flavors often appeared together. Bald’s Leechbook, Ann Hagen, and Apicius all help contextualize this flavor family.

Would this have been eaten with meat?

Possibly. Ann Hagen notes that fruit sauces could accompany meat and fish dishes and help cut richness. Æppla Syfling would make sense with sausage, pork, beef, fish, cheese, or bread.

Was Anglo-Saxon food medicinal?

Food and medicine overlapped in Anglo-Saxon culture. Medical texts regularly used common kitchen ingredients, including fruits, herbs, honey, vinegar, dairy, and grains. This does not mean every dish was medicinal, but it does show that food and bodily comfort were closely connected.

More Like This

Sources and Further Reading

Final Thought: Revisiting this recipe made me appreciate Mary Savelli’s work more. With modern tools, digitized sources, and twenty years of additional cooking experience, I understand Æppla Syfling differently today. But the trail she followed still feels thoughtful, plausible, and very much worth tasting.

Would you serve Æppla Syfling with warm bread, or beside sausage and roast pork?

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Reconstructing an Anglo-Saxon Feast: Ceilidh XVI Revisited (2003–2026)

Reconstructing an Anglo-Saxon Feast: Ceilidh XVI Revisited (2003–2026)

What began as a simple update to an old feast post became something much more interesting: a return to the table with better sources, sharper questions, and a little culinary archaeology.

Anglo-Saxon inspired feast prepared for Ceilidh XVI in 2003
Ceilidh XVI, March 29, 2003. An Anglo-Saxon inspired feast revisited more than twenty years later through updated sources, culinary archaeology, and historical reconstruction.

Original Feast Record: This post revisits an Anglo-Saxon inspired feast cooked for Ceilidh XVI on March 29, 2003, and later documented on Give It Forth in 2015.

Read the preserved original feast post here.

In March of 2003, I prepared an Anglo-Saxon inspired feast for Ceilidh XVI. At the time, I relied heavily on the sources available to me, especially Mary Savelli’s Tastes of Anglo-Saxon England. Twelve years later, in 2015, I documented the menu and recipes on Give It Forth. Now, more than two decades after the feast itself, I am returning to that table with fresh eyes.

This revisit is not meant to erase the original feast. The old post remains part of the record: a snapshot of what I knew, what I could access, and how I interpreted Anglo-Saxon foodways at the time. Instead, this new hub gathers updated research, source links, and revised questions as I work through the menu dish by dish.

Some recipes may stand up better than expected. Others may need to be reframed as interpretive, Roman-influenced, or modern stand-ins. A few may even prove more historically thoughtful than their critics have allowed.

Culinary Archaeology Note: For this revisit, I am separating the original feast record from the updated research. The 2015 post preserves the menu and recipes as they were remembered and recorded. This hub asks what we can learn now by returning to the sources.

The Original Menu

First Course

Second Course

  • Hriðer Smeamete – Stewed Beef
    Updated recipe post: coming soon
  • Beren Briw – Barley Polenta
    Updated recipe post: coming soon
  • Hunigbæe Moran – Honeyed Carrots
    Updated recipe post: coming soon

Third Course

  • Sciellfisc – Shellfish
    Updated recipe post: coming soon
  • Brǣdan Fisc – Fish Baked with Coriander
    Updated recipe post: coming soon
  • Pisan – Peas with Salt and Oil
    Updated recipe post: coming soon

Fourth Course

  • Sumerlio Mearhgehæcc – Summer Pudding
    Updated research note: coming soon
  • Hunigæppel – Honey Nut Cakes
    Updated recipe post: coming soon

Anglo-Saxon Dining at a Glance

  • Seasonality mattered. Fresh foods, preserved foods, dairy, fish, and meats all followed the rhythm of the year.
  • Bread was central. Many meals were built around bread with an accompaniment, relish, cheese, meat, fish, or pottage.
  • Boiling and stewing were common. These methods made practical use of tough meats, salt meats, grains, legumes, and vegetables.
  • Food and medicine overlapped. Medical texts regularly used common kitchen ingredients such as apples, herbs, honey, vinegar, butter, milk, and ale.
  • Sharp sauces had a purpose. Tart fruit, vinegar, herbs, and spices could help balance rich foods and aid digestion.

Why Revisit This Feast?

Anglo-Saxon food is difficult to reconstruct. Unlike later medieval English cookery, we do not have a large body of direct culinary recipe collections from the period. Instead, evidence must be gathered from many places: medical texts, herbals, glossaries, food rents, archaeology, monastic rules, later culinary traditions, and comparative Roman or early medieval sources.

That means any reconstructed Anglo-Saxon feast requires caution. It also means that some older reconstructions, especially those written for practical cooks, may be more thoughtful than they first appear. They may not always show their full source trail, but that does not mean there was no trail.

One of the most interesting examples from this feast is Æppla Syfling, originally presented as “apple butter.” At first glance, the recipe looks odd to modern readers: apples, apple juice, honey, black pepper, mint, and cumin. But when examined beside Ann Hagen’s work on Anglo-Saxon food, Bald’s Leechbook, and Apicius, the dish begins to look less like a sweet spread and more like a tart, savory sauce meant to accompany meat or fish.

Food as Medicine in Anglo-Saxon England

One of the most useful ways to understand this feast is through the idea that food and medicine were not sharply separated. Anglo-Saxon medical texts often use ordinary ingredients: apples, herbs, butter, honey, vinegar, milk, ale, grains, and meats. These foods could nourish, strengthen, soothe, stimulate, cool, warm, or aid digestion.

This does not mean every meal was planned according to the fully developed humoral theory familiar from later medieval medicine and cookery. But it does suggest that Anglo-Saxon cooks and healers understood food as something that affected the body. A dish could be pleasurable and practical. A sauce could taste good and help rich food sit better in the stomach.

Food as Medicine: The pantry and the pharmacy were close neighbors in early medieval England. Herbs, fruits, honey, vinegar, dairy, and grains appear in medical texts not as exotic curiosities, but as everyday materials used to restore, strengthen, soothe, and balance the body.

Medical and herbal texts circulating in Anglo-Saxon England also support this broader food-as-medicine context. The Old English Herbarium, derived from the late antique Herbarium of Pseudo-Apuleius, survives in several manuscripts and belongs to the same world of practical plant knowledge as the leechbooks. These texts show a culture in which herbs and foods were understood through their effects on the body.

For this feast, that matters. Mint, cumin, pepper, vinegar, honey, apples, and other ingredients were not merely flavorings. They carried associations with digestion, appetite, preservation, and bodily comfort.

Page from Bald's Leechbook Anglo-Saxon medical manuscript
Bald’s Leechbook, a 10th-century Old English medical manuscript preserving remedies using familiar foods and herbs, including preparations involving apples, mint, cumin, and pepper.

Source Spotlight: Bald’s Leechbook

Bald’s Leechbook is a 10th-century Old English medical collection. It is not a cookbook, but it is filled with preparations using familiar foods and herbs. That makes it valuable for understanding how Anglo-Saxon people thought about ingredients, digestion, and bodily effects.

The apple preparation that seems most relevant to Æppla Syfling involves sour apples or crabapples with mint, pepper, and cumin in a digestive context. This does not prove that the dish was served at table exactly as Mary Savelli reconstructed it. It does show that apples, herbs, and warming spices belonged together in an Anglo-Saxon medicinal-food vocabulary.

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Roman Echoes: Apicius

Roman Influence: Apicius preserves a number of sharp, savory sauces that combine herbs, spices, honey, vinegar, and fish or shellfish broth. These are not Anglo-Saxon recipes, but they help show a wider ancient and early medieval taste for sweet, sour, herbal, and savory combinations.

A Roman parallel? John Edwards’ The Roman Cookery of Apicius includes cumin sauces for oysters and shellfish using mint, cumin, pepper, honey, and vinegar. While not Anglo-Saxon, these flavor combinations help contextualize the sharp, herbal qualities of Æppla Syfling.

This matters because Mary Savelli’s apple recipe includes honey, mint, cumin, and pepper: a combination that looks much less strange when compared with Roman sauces for fish and shellfish. The Roman evidence does not make Æppla Syfling Roman, but it helps explain the culinary logic behind a sharp, spiced sauce served with rich or savory foods.

Case Study: Æppla Syfling

The apple dish may become the first full deep-dive in this revisit because it reveals how complex early food reconstruction can be.

Mary Savelli’s recipe uses apples, apple cider or juice, honey, black pepper, mint, and cumin. At first glance, calling this “apple butter” encourages modern readers to imagine a sweet spread for bread. But the evidence points in another direction.

  • Hagen: Fruit sauces could accompany meat and fish and help “cut the fat.”
  • Bald’s Leechbook: A preparation involving sour apples or crabapples appears with mint, pepper, and cumin in a digestive context.
  • Apicius: Roman sauces for shellfish include sharp combinations of pepper, mint, cumin, honey, vinegar, and broth.

Taken together, these sources suggest that Æppla Syfling may be more plausible as a savory apple sauce than as a modern-style apple butter. It may belong beside sausage, pork, beef, or fish rather than on breakfast toast.

Working Interpretation: Æppla Syfling was likely tart, herbal, lightly sweetened, and digestive. A modern reconstruction should probably lean toward crabapples or tart apples, less honey, and a sauce-like texture rather than a heavily reduced preserve.

Full research post: Æppla Syfling: Anglo-Saxon Apple Butter or Savory Apple Sauce? (coming soon)

Reconsidering Mary Savelli

Tastes of Anglo-Saxon England has often been criticized because many of its recipes are interpretive. That criticism is understandable. Anglo-Saxon cooking sources are sparse, and modern readers often want direct manuscript recipes with clear instructions.

However, this revisit suggests that at least some of Savelli’s reconstructions may deserve a more generous reading. The apple dish, for example, appears to draw from a recognizable source pattern: Hagen’s discussion of fruit sauces, Bald’s Leechbook and its apple preparation, and Apicius as a comparative model for sharp, spiced sauces with honey, mint, cumin, and pepper.

That does not make the reconstruction certain. It does make it historically defensible. For Anglo-Saxon foodways, where the evidence is fragmentary, that distinction matters.

What I Would Change Today

Revisiting a feast after more than twenty years feels a little like opening an old cookbook written by another version of myself. Some choices still surprise me. Some make me wince a little. Others, unexpectedly, make more sense now than they did then.

Historical cooking changes as research changes. Revisiting old work is not about proving younger versions of ourselves wrong. It is about understanding the choices we made, learning what we missed, and asking better questions. Sometimes old recipes need correction. Sometimes they need context. And sometimes they turn out to have a better source trail than expected.

That is what makes this revisit so exciting. It is not simply a recipe update. It is a chance to ask how Anglo-Saxon people may have thought about food: as nourishment, medicine, status, seasonality, pleasure, and comfort.

Recipe Status and Research Notes

As I revisit each dish, I will sort the recipes into broad categories:

  • Historically Grounded: Recipes or dishes with strong support from Anglo-Saxon sources or foodways.
  • Interpretive Reconstruction: Dishes built from plausible ingredients, methods, archaeology, or comparative evidence.
  • Roman or Classical Influence: Recipes drawn from Apicius or other Roman sources used to fill gaps or show culinary continuity.
  • Modern Stand-In: Dishes included for feast service, seasonality, or practical reasons but not directly Anglo-Saxon.

This does not make the original feast “wrong.” It makes the update more transparent. Readers can see where the evidence is strong, where it is speculative, and where the cook made practical choices.

Updated Recipe Links

As each recipe is revisited, I will add the updated posts below.

Frequently Asked Questions About Anglo-Saxon Food

Did Anglo-Saxons use spices?

Yes. Pepper, cumin, coriander, and other seasonings appear in medical, herbal, and comparative culinary contexts. Imported spices were not everyday peasant staples, but they were known and used in elite, medical, and monastic settings.

Was Anglo-Saxon food bland?

Not necessarily. Herbs, vinegar, honey, dairy, salt, preserved foods, and imported spices could create complex flavors. The surviving evidence suggests a cuisine that could be sharp, herbal, rich, smoky, sour, sweet, and savory.

Did Anglo-Saxons eat apples with meat?

Direct culinary recipes are scarce, but evidence from Ann Hagen’s work, Bald’s Leechbook, and later medieval English foodways suggests that fruit sauces could accompany meat and fish. Tart apple preparations may have helped balance rich foods.

Was food considered medicine?

Often, yes. Anglo-Saxon medical texts regularly use ordinary foods and kitchen ingredients. This does not mean every meal was medicinal, but it does show that food and bodily health were closely connected.

Did Anglo-Saxons use humoral theory?

Anglo-Saxon medical culture inherited ideas from classical and late antique medicine, but the elaborate humoral meal planning familiar from later medieval Europe was not yet fully developed. It is safer to speak of digestive logic, bodily effects, and food-as-medicine rather than fully formalized humoral dining.

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Sources and Further Reading

  • Original Give It Forth feast record: Ceilidh XVI – March 29, 2003
  • Mary Savelli, Tastes of Anglo-Saxon England. Anglo-Saxon Books, 2002.
  • Ann Hagen, Anglo-Saxon Food: Processing & Consumption. University College London, 1992.
  • Thomas Oswald Cockayne, ed., Leechdoms, Wortcunning, and Starcraft of Early England.
  • Leechdoms, Wortcunning, and Starcraft of Early England, Volume II.
  • Apicius, Cookery and Dining in Imperial Rome, translated by Joseph Dommers Vehling.
  • Herbarium of Pseudo-Apuleius, Old English herbal tradition.

Next in this series: The first full recipe investigation will look at Æppla Syfling and ask whether this so-called Anglo-Saxon “apple butter” is better understood as a tart apple sauce for meat and fish.

What do you think? Would you spread Æppla Syfling on bread, or serve it beside roasted meat?

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Medieval Braised Kale and Collards in Beef Broth (Lange Wortys de Chare)

Medieval Braised Greens in Beef Broth - Lange Wortys de Chare

Lange Wortys de Chare, medieval braised greens simmered in beef broth and thickened with bread.

Much like Caboges, this dish of mixed greens braised in beef broth is far better than it appears at first reading.

A simple dish of greens? No. This is kale and collards, or other sturdy greens, first parboiled, then simmered again with beef, marrow bones, saffron, salt, and grated white bread. The result is not a sad little bowl of boiled leaves. It is a savory, bread-thickened pottage with rich broth clinging to the greens.

At a glance: This is a 15th-century English greens recipe from Harleian MS 279. The greens are cooked twice, enriched with beef broth and marrow bones, seasoned with saffron and salt, and thickened with grated white bread.

That is what medieval cooks did so well. They took humble ingredients and gave them structure, seasoning, fat, and patience.

What Is Lange Wortys de Chare?

Lange Wortys de Chare appears in Harleian MS 279, a 15th-century English cookery manuscript edited by Thomas Austin in Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books. The title may be understood as long wortes, or leafy greens, cooked with flesh. In this case, the flesh is beef with marrow bones.

This recipe belongs to the same family of medieval greens and vegetable pottages as Medieval Wortys, Lange Wortes de Pesoun, Joutes, Whyte Wortes, and Caboges.

Why Did Medieval Cooks Boil Greens Twice?

This recipe asks the cook to parboil the greens first, then cook them again in the beef broth. That may sound redundant, but it is an important part of the method.

Many sturdy greens, especially members of the brassica family such as kale, collards, cabbage leaves, and mustard greens, can be bitter or tough. The first boiling softens them and removes some harshness. The second cooking gives them flavor. Plain water takes something away; broth gives something back.

Kitchen lesson: The first boil tames the greens. The second boil feeds them. This is the difference between plain boiled greens and a medieval pottage worth serving.

That is still good kitchen sense. Modern cooks do similar things with collards, kale, mustard greens, and other bitter greens when they simmer them with stock, fat, smoked meat, or seasoning. Medieval cooks were not merely enduring greens. They were making them delicious.

Caboges and Lange Wortys: Cousins in the Pot

Caboges and Lange Wortys de Chare use nearly the same technique. Both recipes begin by parboiling the vegetable, then cooking it again in broth with marrow or marrow bones. Both use saffron and salt. Both are thickened with grated bread.

The difference is the vegetable. Caboges uses cabbage. Lange Wortys de Chare uses leafy greens. If Caboges is the cabbage cousin, Lange Wortys de Chare is the earthier, greener sibling.

What Greens Can You Use?

I used a mixture of kale and collards, which works beautifully. Both are sturdy greens and fit well with the medieval idea of wortes or coleworts. Other good choices include mustard greens, turnip greens, beet greens, cabbage leaves, or a mixture of bitter and mild greens.

I would avoid using only tender spinach unless you want a very soft result. Spinach cooks quickly and does not behave like kale or collards in a long simmer. This recipe wants greens with some backbone.

Best modern greens: kale, collards, mustard greens, turnip greens, beet greens, cabbage leaves, or a mixed pot of sturdy bitter greens.

For a deeper discussion of medieval wortes, coleworts, and the brassica family, see my post on Medieval Wortys.

Why Add Bread to Braised Greens?

The manuscript calls for a loaf of white bread to be grated into the pot. This is not filler. Bread was one of the great medieval thickeners, used in sauces, soups, stews, and pottages. Grated white bread dissolves into hot broth and gives it body, turning thin cooking liquid into something soft, rich, and spoonable.

For modern cooks, day-old manchet or another fine white bread is ideal. It grates better than fresh bread and thickens the broth more smoothly. Add it slowly, stirring well, because bread clumps are stubborn little gremlins.

Why This Dish Belongs at a Feast

Greens were inexpensive, useful, and widely available, but this recipe is not plain poverty food. Beef, marrow bones, saffron, white bread, and the labor of cooking the greens twice all raise the dish. It is budget-friendly compared with showier meats, but still rich enough to belong on a feast table.

This would be an excellent dish for an SCA feast. It is affordable, flexible, and deeply period in technique. It can be served brothier or thicker, lighter on the greens or packed with them. Greens cook down dramatically. A great heap becomes a much smaller pot. That is what greens do.

Greens and Humoral Balance in the Medieval Kitchen

Medieval cooks did not think about food only in terms of flavor. Food was also understood through the lens of humoral theory, in which ingredients were believed to possess qualities such as hot, cold, moist, or dry. Leafy greens were often considered cooling and moistening foods, useful in balancing richer or warmer dishes.

Yet greens could also be viewed as difficult if eaten raw or prepared poorly. This may help explain the careful treatment in recipes such as Lange Wortys de Chare. First the greens are parboiled, softening harshness and bitterness. Then they are cooked again in rich beef broth with marrow and saffron, ingredients associated with warmth, nourishment, and comfort. Bread thickens and softens the dish further, creating something more balanced and sustaining.

Humoral note: The greens begin as cooling, moist, and potentially harsh. The broth, marrow, saffron, and bread transform them into a warmer, richer, more sustaining pottage.

In other words, medieval cooks were not simply boiling vegetables. They were transforming them into food considered more agreeable to the body as well as the table.

Historic Recipe

The recipe below is from Thomas Austin’s edition of Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books. Harleian MS. 279 (ab. 1430), & Harl. MS. 4016 (ab. 1450), with extracts from Ashmole MS. 1429, Laud MS. 553, & Douce MS. 55.

.j. Lange Wortys de chare. Take beeff and merybonys, and boyle yt in fayre water; þan take fayre wortys and wassche hem clene in water, and parboyle hem in clene water; þan take hem vp of þe water after þe fyrst boylyng, an cut þe leuys a-to or a-þre, and caste hem in-to þe beff, and boyle to gederys: þan take a lof of whyte brede and grate yt, an caste it on þe pot, an safron & salt, & let it boyle y-now, and serue forth.

Modern Translation

Take beef and marrow bones, and boil them in clean water. Then take good greens and wash them clean in water, and parboil them in clean water. Take them up from the water after the first boiling, cut the leaves in two or three pieces, and put them into the beef, and boil together. Then take a loaf of white bread and grate it, and add it to the pot with saffron and salt. Let it boil enough, and serve it forth.

Modern Recipe Notes

This interpretation uses kale and collards as the greens, homemade beef stock as the broth, grated bread as the thickener, and saffron as the seasoning. If you have marrow from making the stock, add it at the end so it remains visible and rich.

The original recipe begins with beef and marrow bones boiled in water. For modern kitchens, prepared beef stock is easier. Homemade stock made with marrow bones is ideal.

Wild Brassica oleracea, ancestor of many familiar greens and cabbage-family vegetables. Image originally linked from kottke.org.
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Medieval Braised Cabbage with Marrow Bones – Caboges from Harleian MS 279

Medieval Braised Cabbage with Marrow Bones: Caboges from Harleian MS 279

Caboges, a medieval braised cabbage dish from Harleian MS 279, served here with bread.

A humble dish of cabbage can still surprise you.

When I first made this recipe for Caboges from Harleian MS 279, I expected something plain and useful: boiled cabbage, perhaps a little broth, a serviceable green thing on the side of the table. Instead, I found tender cabbage braised in rich broth, scented with saffron, thickened with fine bread, and finished with marrow from the bones. It was cabbage dressed for court.

Even sworn cabbage haters tried it and wanted more. Success!

This recipe is one of several vegetable-forward dishes from Harleian MS 279, a 15th-century English cookery manuscript edited by Thomas Austin in Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books. It belongs in the same delicious family as medieval wortes, Whyte Wortes, Lange Wortys de Chare, and Joutes.

What Are Caboges?

Caboges is the Middle English form of “cabbages.” But this is not simply boiled cabbage. The recipe directs the cook to clean and parboil the cabbage, press it dry, chop it, and then cook it again in fresh broth with marrow bones. The broth is thickened either with grated fine bread or with a strained meat gruel. At service, the marrow is knocked from the bones and placed visibly in the dish.

That finishing touch matters. This is where the recipe moves from plain vegetable cookery into feast-worthy food.

Why Was This Medieval Cabbage Recipe Fit for a Feast?

Modern readers often imagine medieval vegetable dishes as plain or rustic, but medieval cooks knew how to elevate simple ingredients. Here, cabbage becomes noble through treatment:

  • It is cooked twice for better texture and flavor.
  • It is simmered in fresh broth rather than plain water.
  • It is enriched with marrow bones.
  • It is colored and scented with saffron.
  • It is thickened with grated fine bread into a soft pottage.

The cabbage may be inexpensive, but the broth, marrow, saffron, bread, fuel, and kitchen labor all add value. This is one of the joys of medieval cooking: the simplest vegetable can become something luxurious when handled with care.

How Would Caboges Have Been Served?

Caboges would likely have appeared among the wortes, pottages, or vegetable dishes of a medieval meal, served alongside roasted meats, meat pies, bread, or other greens. The marrow bones and saffron suggest a dish meant for a table with resources, not merely a plain household cabbage. This is the kind of recipe that reminds us that medieval feast food was not only about spectacular meats and subtleties. Sometimes the quiet dish at the side of the table was doing serious work.

Why Did Medieval Cooks Use Bread to Thicken Soup and Pottage?

Bread appears throughout medieval cookery as a thickener for sauces, pottages, broths, and stews. Before modern cornstarch, commercial thickeners, or the familiar flour-and-butter roux, cooks often relied on grated bread, soaked bread, ground almonds, egg yolks, or strained grain and meat mixtures to give body to a dish.

In this recipe, the manuscript calls for fayre brede, or fine bread. For a modern kitchen, a day-old manchet or other good white bread works beautifully. It grates more easily than very fresh bread and dissolves into the broth, creating a smooth, velvety texture. I originally made this with grated Rastons, but manchet is likely the better everyday recommendation for readers who want to recreate the dish.

Bread also reflects the no-waste wisdom of the medieval kitchen. Yesterday’s loaf could become today’s sauce, sop, trencher, or pottage. In Caboges, the bread is not filler. It is the quiet magic that turns broth into something spoonable and satisfying.

Why Does the Recipe Offer Bread or Meat Gruel?

The recipe gives two ways to enrich and thicken the dish: grated fine bread, or a strained gruel made from fresh meat. The bread version is more approachable for a modern kitchen and produces a smooth pottage. The meat-gruel version would have made the dish even richer, especially in a busy medieval kitchen where broth, meat, and strained cooking liquids were already part of the day’s work.

Why Do the Marrow Bones Matter?

The marrow bones are not incidental. The recipe tells the cook to boil the cabbage with marrow bones, then knock out the marrow and lay two or three pieces in the dish at service. That means the marrow is both flavoring and garnish.

For modern cooks, bone marrow can feel unfamiliar, but it brings deep richness. Think of it as the medieval equivalent of finishing a dish with butter, olive oil, or the most luxurious spoonful of beef essence imaginable. If you make your own stock with marrow bones, do not waste the marrow. Use it. The manuscript wants you to.

Cabbage in Medieval Food Philosophy

Cabbage and other brassicas were useful, filling, and widely eaten, but they could also be considered coarse, windy, or difficult if poorly prepared. This recipe manages cabbage through careful technique. Parboiling softens and tames it. Pressing removes excess water. The second cooking in broth makes it nourishing. Saffron adds warmth and fragrance, while bread gives the broth body. The result is not limp cabbage water, but a carefully balanced pottage.

Historic Recipe

The recipe below is from Thomas Austin’s edition of Two Fifteenth-Century Cookery-Books. Harleian MS. 279 (ab. 1430), & Harl. MS. 4016 (ab. 1450), with extracts from Ashmole MS. 1429, Laud MS. 553, & Douce MS. 55.

.iiij. Caboges. Take fayre caboges, an cutte hem, an pike hem clene and clene washe hem, an parboyle hem in fayre water, an þanne presse hem on a fayre bord; an þan choppe hem, and caste hem in a faire pot with goode freysshe broth, an wyth mery-bonys, and let it boyle: þanne grate fayre brede and caste þer-to, an caste þer-to Safron an salt; or ellys take gode grwel y-mad of freys flesshe, y-draw þorw a straynour, and caste þer-to. An whan þou seruyst yt inne, knocke owt þe marw of þe bonys, an ley þe marwe .ij. gobettys or .iij. in a dysshe, as þe semyth best, & serue forth.

Modern Translation

Take good cabbages, cut them, pick them clean, and wash them well. Parboil them in clean water, then press them on a clean board. Chop them, and put them in a clean pot with good fresh broth and marrow bones, and let it boil. Then grate fine bread and add it, and add saffron and salt. Or else take good gruel made of fresh meat, strained through a strainer, and add that. When you serve it, knock the marrow out of the bones and lay two or three pieces of marrow in the dish, as seems best, and serve it forth.

Modern Recipe Notes

This interpretation follows the breadcrumb-thickened version of the recipe rather than the alternate strained meat gruel. The first boiling softens the cabbage and removes some of its stronger edge. Pressing the cabbage keeps the final dish from becoming watery. The second cooking in broth gives depth, while the grated bread thickens the broth into a soft pottage.

The saffron is included in the original recipe, but I mark it as optional for modern cooks because of cost. If you have it, use it. It adds color, fragrance, and a little medieval splendor.

Simple ingredients: cabbage, broth, bread, saffron, and marrow.
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