Capons Salpamentati / Sopramentati in a Renaissance Carnivale First Service
Originally published: September 28, 2021, 12:19 PM
Updated: May 22, 2026
This is one of those recipes that keeps returning to my table.
I first prepared this dish during the COVID years, when SCA feasts had largely gone quiet in our area. We had not yet returned to the normal rhythm of events and feast halls, but I still wanted to cook period food for people I loved. So I made a small historical picnic lunch for close friends. That earlier lunch can be found here: Crown Tournament Chez Beauvisage Picnic Lunch.
The dish was a hit then, and it was a hit again when it appeared in my Renaissance Carnivale feast. I was delighted to find this preparation, or something very close to it, listed in a period banquet menu. There is a particular joy in being able to point to a historical menu and say, “Here it is. This belongs here.”
This version is not a strict reconstruction of Scappi’s whole stuffed capon. Instead, it is a practical feast-cook adaptation: chicken breast, prosciutto, herbs, cheese, spices, and lemon, served cold in neat slices. It is economical, elegant, make-ahead friendly, and especially useful in a meat-forward service where a little richly flavored poultry can go a long way.
The Carnivale Menu Context
This dish appeared in the Primo servitio posto in tavola, the first service placed on the table, in a Carnivale banquet menu:
Insalata di cicoria bianca, insalata di carote, prosciutto sfilato, testa di ruffolatto fredda, fette di cedro condite con aceto rosato, zuccaro & cannella, grue arrosta fredda, capperini, capponi salpamentati & salsiccioni bolognesi.
In English, this service included white chicory salad, carrot salad, shredded prosciutto, cold testa, citron slices dressed with rose vinegar, sugar, and cinnamon, cold roast crane, capers, seasoned capons, and Bolognese sausages.
That first service is rich, bright, acidic, salty, and deeply meat-forward. The cold capon belongs beautifully in that company. It offers a composed, spiced poultry dish that can be prepared ahead and served sliced among other cold meats, salads, preserved flavors, and sharp garnishes. The lemons, capers, rose vinegar, and citron are not decorative afterthoughts. They help balance the richness of the meats and keep the opening service from feeling heavy.
A Note on Salpamentati vs. Sopramentati
The Carnivale menu lists capponi salpamentati. In the digitized period text, the word can be easy to misread as falpamentati, because early printed books often use the long s, which resembles an f to modern eyes. Read as modern type, the word is best understood as salpamentati.
Bartolomeo Scappi’s related recipe, however, is titled cappon sopramentato. Are these precisely the same term? I cannot say that with absolute certainty. Historical spelling and culinary vocabulary are often flexible, and menus may use terms differently than recipe headings. What I can say is that the culinary context is very close: a capon preparation, heavily seasoned, suitable for cold service, and appropriate to a formal first service.
For this reconstruction, I chose Scappi’s detailed recipe for cappon sopramentato as the closest surviving practical guide to the capponi salpamentati named in the Carnivale menu.
Source Text: Scappi’s Capon Recipes
The following recipes are from Bartolomeo Scappi’s Opera dell’arte del cucinare (1570), translated by Terence Scully in The Opera of Bartolomeo Scappi (1570): The Art and Craft of a Master Cook, p. 198.
122. To boil a boneless capon
When the capon has been prepared in either of the above ways (skinned and deboned), get the flesh from the breast of another uncooked capon, and a pound of prosciutto and pork fat together, and beat those finely with knives, adding in half an ounce of common spices, a handful of finely chopped herbs, two egg yolks and two ounces of grated cheese. Stuff the capon with that mixture, pushing it into the wings and thighs; sew it up so the stuffing cannot come out, with its wings and thighs trussed, put the capon into an ample earthenware or copper pot with cold water and put that on the fire.
123. To boil and prepare the capon “sopramentato”
When the capon is plucked and drawn, whether stuffed or empty, boil it in a meat broth or else in water with a piece of prosciutto and crushed pepper. When it is done, take it out of the broth and let it drain. Then make several slashes across the thighs, body, and breast. Sprinkle it all over, especially in the slashes, with a mixture of sugar, pepper, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and fennel flour. Let it cool. When you wish to serve it, do so with it cold, with cut-up lemons over it. Before sprinkling it, you can also splash it with rose vinegar.
Authentic Recipe vs. Modern Feast Adaptation
The period recipe calls for a whole capon, optionally stuffed with another capon breast, prosciutto, pork fat, herbs, egg yolks, cheese, and common spices. That is a luxurious preparation, and exactly the sort of thing one expects from a high-status Renaissance kitchen.
My modern feast version is more modest and practical. Rather than stuffing a whole bird, I butterfly chicken breast, season it, add prosciutto and a cheese-herb mixture, roll it into pinwheels, and poach or bake it. For the Carnivale feast, I used a single butterflied chicken breast and a single slice of prosciutto to feed several diners because the rest of the service was already very meat-forward.
This is not a perfect one-to-one reconstruction. It is an interpretation. But it preserves the heart of the dish: seasoned poultry, prosciutto, aromatic spices, herbs, cheese, lemon, and cold service. More importantly, it is delicious and has become a favorite among those who have eaten it.
Common Sauce Spices
First, you will need to put together your common spices. This is delicious, and I use it quite a bit in my cooking. I have sometimes substituted cubebs and long pepper for the pepper and ginger to create a spicier blend.
Rupert de Nola’s Libre del Coch (about 1529) gives instructions for Common Sauce Spices. Roughly translated, the instructions are:
Cinnamon three parts; cloves two parts; one piece ginger; pepper a part; some dry coriander well ground; a little saffron. Be all well ground and sifted.
Common Sauce Spices, Amended
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon
- 2 teaspoons cloves
- 1 teaspoon ginger
- 1 teaspoon pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon dry coriander, ground
- Pinch of saffron
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