Roasting, baking and blanching on the fire

This weekend at my local SCA shire's event, we had a potluck lunch. I decided to challenge myself a bit by trying recipes and techniques that could have been used in Italy during the 16th Century. Only one recipe was an original from an Italian cookbook, the other two were more based on known ingredients and techniques from the time period.

I wish I had made some arrangements for photography, because I probably looked delightfully goofy standing over this large open-fire grill outside the event all morning, standing in the smoke, wearing my apron over my coat and with a very-not-appropriate-to-period Polartec fleece hat for warmth. The day was quite windy, so starting the fire was difficult and keeping it at a constant temperature was impossible.

The plan: get to the event site to unload the woodpile and start the fire at about 8 a.m., have three items prepared for lunch by 11 or 11:30. Planned items: spit-roasted leg of lamb, blanched asparagus with dressing and herbs, bread baked in a pot in the coals. And if anyone showed up to watch me cook, I intended to ask that person to roll marzipan stuffing to put inside dates for something to do while we chatted.

Considering the setbacks with the fire and the fact that I've never tried to cook over an open fire on a deadline before, I was pleased that my plan worked. It only did because I had an assistant, who turned up without being asked, who could watch the fire while I did a few last-minute preparations or who could deliver plated items while I continued cooking the last item. She also stuffed the majority of the dates.

Spit-roasted leg of lamb
recipe inspired by Buon Appetito, Your Holiness: Secrets of the Papal Table by Mariangela Rinaldo and Mariangela Vicini
four-pound leg of lamb, organic and free-range (mine also happened to be certified halal, which becomes irrelevant when you see the next ingredient)
1/2 pound pork fat (I used a very fatty bacon)
1 Tbsp dried rosemary leaves
5 cloves garlic
salt and pepper
2 cups red wine

Mince the pork fat and cut it together with rosemary and garlic that have been minced. Cut lamb into two nearly-equal pieces. One piece will likely have the bone in it. Make deep incisions on the side of each pieces of meat and stuff with the pork-garlic-rosemary mixture. Meat may need to be tied with kitchen twine so the stuffing does not fall apart while loading it onto the rotisserie spit. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and roast indirectly over hot coals that are still sending up a little bit of flame. Turn occasionally while the lamb roasts at a temperature that is hot enough to cause some sizzling, but not hot enough to quickly burn the lamb. Baste by brushing occasionally with wine.

The leg of lamb was the item that got the most effusive praise from eaters, and it proved to be the most difficult. Lesson one: spit-roasting is to be done with indirect heat, not flames leaping up to the food. On the other hand, having a bit of an overbrowned (okay, blackened) crust did add lots of flavor until I figured out how far away from the flame to place the spit. Lesson two: bring a secondary cooking vessel in case roasted meat needs finishing in a pan or covered pot. So glad I had that cast-iron skillet handy so I could pour in the rest of my wine for basting and just cook off the lamb in pieces in the skillet. The wind was cooling off the lamb leg on the other sides while it cooked on one side over the fire, so the very center never came up to temperature on the spit. If I'd had an extra hour to leave it over the fire, it eventually would have cooked fully, but I didn't have the time to wait. If the fire hadn't been constantly blown around by wind, I think the 2 1/2 hours the lamb roasted on the spit would have been long enough.

I was very excited about the bread for its flavor and texture. It came out of the baking pot with a black bottom, a caramelized-looking top and springy texture. I have learned quite a bit about bread from another shire member, Simon, in the past year or two, plus I have received tips whenever I ask from Laura, who bakes where I work. A bit more practice with baking hasn't hurt me either. Simon got me started with using sourdough starter instead of always relying on packaged yeast. Finding motivation to start sourdough is simple when Simon hands out little packets of dried sourdough starter from his own collection at a class. Sourdough starter is a pre-1600 technique, as is baking in a pot buried in hot coals. To accentuate sour flavor and add a bit of beery yeasty taste that could have come from using ale barm for yeast, I followed the recipe for Almost No-Knead Bread from Cooks Illustrated. That recipe uses beer and vinegar for part of the liquid. Instead of the instant yeast called for in the recipe, I added some of Simon's sourdough starter. The bread dough sits in a bowl at room temperature overnight to develop flavor. The pot I used for baking was not made of the correct materials, being a cast-iron pot instead of the more-likely-for-pre-1600 Italy clay baking pot, but it was the only heavy covered pot I have that I'd be willing to put in a fire. Lesson from this experiment: the bread probably only needs half as much baking time as in the oven at home. I checked it after 45 minutes of the expected hour, but I think I could have gotten away with only 30 minutes of baking time and had less burnt crust to cut off.

The part I know would turn out fine in this experiment even if nothing else did was the asparagus. I found some directions from a Renaissance Italian cook indicating that asparagus should be boiled until just tender, then dressed with oil and vinegar and fresh herbs. Even at my worst with outdoor cooking, I can manage to boil water as long as I have enough fuel. The vegetable was perfectly crisp-tender the way I like it, then I dressed it with a simple red wine vinegar-olive oil vinaigrette (with a dash of sugar), salt, pepper, and chopped fresh parsley. No need for the cold-water shocking after blanching. The air was brisk enough that the asparagus cooled off right quick after I put it on the serving plate. I was pleased to see that the plate of vegetable disappeared just as quickly as my other dishes. I guess the people who like asparagus ate it enthusiastically.