(this is the documentation provided with a KAS entry)
This entry is a brandy based
apricot cordial that has aged nine years.
For many years, I dabbled in
the art of cordial making, experimenting with how long a cordial should
macerate and what makes the best base, blending flavors and determining when to
introduce sweetening agents into the creations in my kitchen. It was something I was quite proud of, and
something I spent a lot of time working on during those rare Sunday afternoons
at home.
Life happens to you, as it
did to my family. We found ourselves
moving to a new home, and like many things my “maceration box” was packed away
and carefully stored. The intention had
been to pull it out shortly after the move so cordials could be settled and
prepared for the next event’s arts and sciences competition. The reality was that the box was resettled in
a hard-to-get-to cabinet in the kitchen and forgotten.
That is, forgotten until a
determined cleaning out of my kitchen lead me to the box and its contents --
and my carefully detailed notes. After
determining the viability of this cordial, I decided this would be an excellent
chance to enter this beverage in this competition.
My notes show that this
cordial was created on February 20th, 2000. I placed a half pound of dried apricots in a
jar and added three cups of Christian Brothers white brandy. I capped it and let it sit. I reopened it June 14th to see if
the brandy had taken on the flavor of the apricots, and to add one cup of sugar
that had been dissolved into one cup of boiling water (sugar syrup). I recapped it and let it sit. I sampled it on August 20th, 2000
to determine if I would add more sugar or if it was ready for competition. While I did decide it had the proper balance
of ingredients, I decided to instead enter two of my other cordials in the
competition instead. On April 23, 2001,
I noted that the solution had achieved a rich orange color. This was the last entry I had for the
cordial.
My choice of apricots for
this cordial were based on my research of historical fruits and on the types of
fruit used in period. Though I did not
have an example of an apricot cordial or brandy in period, I did have examples
of the use of apricots as far back as Roman times (appearing in Apicius 4.3.6
in the recipe for Pork and Apple Minutal).
I chose white brandy as my base because it was the closest I could come
to a period cordial without entering the distillation process myself. Brandy is distilled wine and has been
documented as the base for cordials and liqueurs throughout period. I chose the white (or clear) version to best
show the color left behind by the macerated fruit.
After discovering the lost
box, I went to my files and found general documentation on cordials that I had
researched at the time. I include it
here with this entry with some additions and changes; my learning curve has
expanded in the past several years, and I have a better insight into what
cordials are and their place in my kitchen.
Do note, I use the terms “cordial” and “liqueur” interchangeably; I have
yet to see a variant between the two terms.
A Brief History of
Liqueurs
Liqueurs and cordials are for
the most part flavored beverages made from fruit, seeds, spices and/or herbs,
macerated into a distilled alcohol (usually brandy). Some liqueurs are also sweetened with sugar
or honey.
According to Hurst Hannum's Brandies
and Liqueurs of the World, the first spirits were distilled in China around
the ninth century B.C. -- probably a
rice and sugar wine. In Egypt,
distillation was perfected to capture the essences of herbs, plants, and
flowers. The science of distillation
continued in the Roman Empire, and was spread to the Middle East by the
Moors. During the Middle Ages,
distillation became a major tool of alchemists in their efforts to turn base
metals into precious metals.
In the mid 13th century, an
alchemist by the name of Arnold de Villanova taught his skills in Spain and
France. Villanova is known to be one of
the first to ascribe medicinal properties to flavored alcohols. In one of his many treatises, he discussed
the distillation of wine into a spirit.
He was so excited by the spirit's curative and restorative powers, he
named it "aqua vitae," Latin for "water of life."
One of the first mentions of
the distillation of wine appeared in a legal document from Armagnac dated
1411. That document is currently housed
in the office of the French Departement d'Haute-Garonne. Distilled alcohols spread through Europe so
quickly that in 1559 the lawmakers of Bordeaux forbid distillation within the
city limits for fear of fire. Some
believe cultures in northern Europe began distilling grain products as far back
as the mid-14th century.
The word brandy is said to
have been derived from the Dutch term brandewijn, or burnt wine, in
reference to the fire applied to wine in the first stages of the distillation
process.
A recipe in Hugh Plat’s Delightes
For Ladies is titled “Secrets in Distillation.” The first recipe “How To Make True Spirit of
Wine,” discusses the distillation process:
Take
the finest paper you can get, or else some Virgin parchment, straine it very
right & stiffe over the glasse bodie, wherein you put your sack, malmsie or
muskadine, oile the paper or virgin parchment with a pensill moistned in the
oyle of Ben, and distil it in the Balneo with a gentle fire, and by this meanes
you shall purchase onely the true spirit of wine. You shall not have above two
or three ounces at the most out of a gallon of wine, which ascendeth in the
forme of a cloude, without any dewe or veines in the helme, lute all the joints
well in this dis- tillation. This spirit will vanish in the ayre, if the glass
stand open.
However, Plat’s work mostly
concerns non-distilled beverages. Sir
Kennelm Digby, on the other hand, talks about the flavoring of wines and such,
but never calls for distilled products in his primary work, The Closet Open’d.
The flavoring of distilled
alcohol seems to have developed its roots not in the kitchens of gentlewomen
but in the monasteries and alchemist shops of the 14th and 15th
centuries. Alchemist "waters"
and "elixirs” were apparently sold to cure ills. It was during this period that many of the
monastic herbal elixirs were developed.
The secret recipes of these particular concoctions have been handed down
over the ages, and are the basis for such liqueurs as Chartreuse, Benedictine,
and Amaretto.
As distillation became better
understood, and as spices, herbs, and sugars from the New World became
available, bitter elixirs gave way to more flavorful drinks. The distribution of such drinks expanded as
well. An example -- in 1575 Lucas Bols
founded one of the world's first commercial liquor houses in Amsterdam. Another -- the founding of Danzig Goldwasser
from Der Lachs in 1598.
Sugar is another element to
consider. There has been a misconception
pluralized that honey and not sugar was the available sweetener for most of the
Middle Ages. However, in my experience
as an SCA cook I have found sugar listed in dozens of resources. For this instance, I cite Le Menagier de
Paris, a late 14th century French cookbook that employs sugar in
several recipes. This would pretty much
show that sugar was contemporary for use in period cordials. Additionally, two recipes from Cindy
Renfrow's A Sip Through Time dated 1550 to 1625 utilize sugar in their
composition.
The Process of Making
Liqueurs
The term liqueur is derived
from the Latin word liquefacere, which means to melt or dissolve. In practice, a liqueur is simply a sweetened
spirit flavored by vegetable substances.
There are two ways to flavor a spirit into a liqueur -- maceration and
distillation. In maceration, the plants,
fruits, or herbs are soaked in a base alcohol for a sufficient period of
time. The process is similar to that of
making tea. Soft fruits such as berries
and currants, stone fruits like cherries and apricots, and zests of lemon,
tangerine and orange are usually macerated for liqueurs. The maceration itself lasts from just a few
days to several months. The liquid, once
macerated, is referred to as an infusion.
In distillation, the
flavoring agent is added to an un-aged but already distilled spirit, and
distilled once again. Most plants,
herbs, and seeds are distilled, rather than macerated. The resulting alcohol is called a distillate.
After the preparation of the
distillates or infusions, the sweetener is added, usually in the form of a
simple syrup. The solution is then
typically allowed to age for a period of two weeks to six months… though in
this rare instance the cordial presented is nine years old.
In my introduction, I talked
about the notes remaining from the process of creating this cordial. On discovering this cordial, I decided to
determine its viability by sampling a small amount in a separate vessel. I discovered that the cordial has achieved a
rich orange-brown tone similar to that of a commercially produced dark
rum. The taste to me is strong but not
quite cloying, and it seems to betray itself as being an aged beverage. This is certainly a beverage to be sipped
slowly.
Bibliography
Apicius. The Roman
Cookery Book. Translated by Barbara Flower and Elizabeth Alföldi-Rosenbaum.
London and Toronto: Harrap, 1958.
Digby, Sir Kennelm. The
Closet Opened, England, 1615.
Hannum, Hurst. Brandies and Liqueurs of the World.
Doubleday, Garden City, NY, 1976.
Plat, Sir Hugh, Delightes
for Ladies. Humfrey Lownes, London 1602 Crosby Lockwood & Sons, Ltd.,
London 1948.
Power, Eileen
(translator). The Goodman of Paris
(Le Menagier de Paris), 1393, London: Routledge, 1928. Text from the Internet Medieval Sourcebook
online at http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/goodman.html
Renfrow, Cindy. A Sip Through Time, A Collection of Old
Brewing Recipes, author published, Sussex, NJ, 1994.
Sibley, Jane aka Mistress
Arwen Evain fert Rhys ap Gwynedd, O.L. C.M. "Brewing". The
Complete Anachronist. Vol.5.
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