p45  Book I. The Careful Experienced Cook
Liber I. Epimeles

1 Sextarii. Tor. partes XV; G.‑V. pondo XV; List. partes XV . . . pondo lib. . . . qui continent sextarios sex. One sextarius (a "sixth") equals about 1½ pint English.

2 Pepper. Piperis uncias IV — ordinarily our black or white pepper grains, but in connection with honey, sweets, and so forth, the term "pepper" may just as well stand for our allspice, or even for any spi­cing in general.

3 Charcoal. Still a favorite filterer for liquors.

List. Apicius is correct in starting his book with this formula, as all meals were started with this sort of mixed drink.

Tor. deviates from the other texts in that he elaborates on the cooking process.

1 Tor. Melirhomum; non extat. G.‑V. M. perpetuum, i.e., having good keeping qualities.

2 Tor. reads thus whereas others apply "endurance" to the honey itself. The honey could not be preserved (perpetuum) by the addition of pepper. Any addition, as a matter of fact, would hasten its deterioration unless the honey were boiled and sealed tight, which the original takes for granted.

1 G.‑V. Apsinthium.

2 The mention of a name in a recipe is very infrequent. Camerinum is a town in Umbria.

3 Now Saintonge, Southern France.

4 Black Sea Region.

5 Weight of indefinite volume, from Thebae, one of the several ancient cities by that name. List. thinks it is an Egyptian ounce, and that the author of the recipe must be an African.

6 Wanting in Tor.; G.‑V. costi scripulos senos.

1 Used principally as a laxative medicine. List. These wines compounded of roses and violets move the bowels strongly.

1 A substitute.

1 Like the above, a flagrant case of food adulteration.

1 Ex Lister whose version we prefer. He says, Alias die erit candidum while Tor. adds white salt, saying, sal si adieceris candidum, same as Tac. This is unusual, although the ancients have at times treated wine with sea water.

1 List. Liquamen, id est, garum. Goll. Fish sauce.

2 Tor. Qui liquamen corruptum corrigatur.

3 Dann. Ventilate it. Goll. Whip the sauce in fresh air.

4 List., G.‑V. si salsum fuerit — if this makes it too salty — Tor. si hoc nihil effecerit.

5 Tor. novem spicam immittas; List. Move spica; Goll.‑Dann. stir with a whip.

6 A classic example of Apician confusion when one interpreter reads "s" for "f" and "novem" for "move" and another reads something else. Tor. is more correct than the others, but this formula is beyond redemption. Fate has decreed that ill-smelling broths shall be discarded.

V. Method still popular today for pickling raw meats. The originals treat of cooked meats (Tor. nucula elixa; G.‑V. unguellae coctae; Tac. nucella cocta). Dispensing with the honey, we use more spices, while pepper, cloves, bay leaves, also onions and root vegetables. Sometimes a little sugar and wine is added to this preparation which the French call marinade and the Germans Sauerbraten-Einlage.

V. Method still in practice today. Salt mackerel, finnan haddie, etc., are parboiled in milk prior to being boiled in water or boiled or fried.

Dann. Exactly as we today with fried herring and river lamprey.

1 Tor. vas ascernum, corrected on margin, ab aceto. List. vas ab aceto, which is correct. G.‑V. lavas ab aceto; V. the oysters? unthinkable! Besides it would do no good.

2 Goll. Take oysters out of the shell, place in vinegar barrel, sprinkle with laurel berries, fine salt, close tight. V. Goll.'s authority for this version is not found in our originals.

V. There is no way to keep live oysters fresh except in their natural habitat — salt water. Today we pack them in barrels, feed them with oatmeal, put weights on them — of no avail. The only way English oysters could have arrived fresh in Imperial Rome was in specially constructed bottoms of the galleys.

1 List. and G.‑V. uncia — ounce. Making an ounce of laser go a long way. Tor. nucea; Tac. nucia. Lister, fond of hair-splitting, is irreconcilably opposed to Tor., and berates Caspar Barthius for defending Tor.

List. Quam futilis sit in multis labor C. Barthii ut menda Torini passim sustineat, vel ex hoc loco intellegere licet: Et enim lege modo uncia pro nucea cum Humelbergio, & ista omnia glossemata vana sunt.

V. both readings, uncia or nucia are permissible, and make very little difference. We side with Tor. and Tac. because it takes more than an ounce of laser to carry out this experiment.

2 Laser, laserpitium, cf. dictionary.

3 V. This article illustrates how sparingly the ancients used the strong and pungent laser flavor [by some believed to be asa foetida] because it was very expensive, but principally because the Roman cooks worked economically and knew how to treat spices and flavor judiciously. This article alone should disperse for all time all stories of ancient Rome's extravagance in flavoring and seasoning dishes. It reminds of the methods used by European cooks to get the utmost use out of the expensive vanilla bean: they bury the bean in a can of powdered sugar. They will use the sugar only which has soon acquired a delicate vanilla perfume, and will replace the used sugar by a fresh supply. This is by far a superior method to using the often rank and adulterated "vanilla extract" readily bottled. It is more gastronomical and more economical. Most commercial dishes are synthetic, some injurious. To believe that any of them impart to the dishes the true flavor desired is of course ridiculous. The enormous consumption of such extracts however, is characteristic of our industrialized barbarism which is so utterly indifferent to the fine points in food. Today it is indeed hard for the public to obtain a real vanilla bean.

Cf. also notes regarding flavoring to Nos. 276‑7, 345 and 385.

1 Tor. and Tac. nechon; G.‑V. cnecon; Dann. penion.

List. indigna fraus! V. We all agree with Lister that this is contemptible business. This casts another light on the ancients' methods of food adulteration.

V. We keep grapes in cork shavings, bran and saw dust.

1 Tor. conditura malorum Punicorum; Tac. mala granata; G.‑V. mala et mala granata.

1 V. Excellent idea, for the stems, if removed, would leave a wound in the fruit for the air to penetrate and to start fermentation. Cf. also the next formula.

2 G.‑V. defritum, from defervitum; defrutum is new wine, spiced, boiled down to one half of its volume.

3 This precept would not keep the fruit very long unless protected by a closefitting cover and sterilization. Cf. No. 24.

1 See the preceding formula.

1 Tor. conditura malorum Medicorum quae et citria dicuntur. V. Not quite identified. Fruit coming from Asia Minor, Media or Persia, one of the many varieties of citrus fruit. Probably citron because of their size. Goll. Lemon-apples; Dann. lemons (oranges). List. Scilicet mala, quae Dioscorides Persica quoque & Medica, & citromala, Plinius item Assyria appellari dicit.

2 G.‑V. vas vitreum; Tac. and Tor. vas citrum; V. a glass vessel could not be successfully sealed with plaster paris, and the experiment would fail; cf. note 3 to No. 21.

V. This and the foregoing formulae illustrate the ancients' attempts at preserving foods, and they betray their ignorance of "processing" by heating them  p53 in hermetically sealed vessels, the principle of which was not discovered until 1810 by Appert which started the now gigantic industry of canning.

1 The kind of vegetable to be treated here has not been sufficiently identified. List. and G.‑V. rapae — turnips — from rapus, seldom rapa, — a rape, turnip, navew. Tac. and Tor. Lapae (lapathum), kind of sorrel, monk's rhubarb, dock. Tor. explaining at length: conditura Rumicis quod lapathon Graeci, Latini Lapam quoque dicunt.

V.: Tor. is correct, or nearly so. Turnips, in the first place, are not in need of any special method of preservation. They keep very well in a cool, well-ventilated place; in fact they would hardly keep very long if treated in the above manner. These directions are better applied to vegetables like dock or monk's rhubarb. Lister, taking Humelbergius' word for it, accepts "turnips" as the only truth; but he has little occasion to assail Torinus as he does: Torinus lapam legit, & nullibi temeritatem suam atque inscientiam magis ostendit.

Now, if Torinus, according to Lister, "nowhere displays more nerve and ignorance" we can well afford to trust Torinus in cases such as this.

Dann. Clean [peel] the truffles . . . in another vessel place the peelings, seal the vessels . . . V. this would be the ruin of the truffles, unless they were "processed" in the modern way. Our originals have nothing that would warrant this interpretation.

1 In view of the white pepper as directed above, this seems superfluous. White pepper and ginger omitted by Tor.

This is one of the few medical formulae found in Apicius.

Edward Brandt, op. cit., Apiciana No. 29, points out the similarity of this formula with that of the physician, Marcellus, who lived at Rome under Nero, Marcell. med. 30, 51.

1 The original does not state the liquid in which the olives are to be placed.

Hum. in illud, legendum puto, in muriam.

Hum. is correct. Olives are preserved in brine to this day.

Schuch's version of this formula (his No. 27) follows our No. 28, together with his own No. 28, To Keep Damascene Plums [etc.] which is wanting in List., G.‑V., and all the earlier editions because it is from the codex Salmasianus and will be found among the Excerpts of Vinidarius at the end of the Apician recipes.

1 Cyrene, a province in Africa, reputed for its fine flavored laser.

2 Parthia, Asiatic country, still supplying asa foetida.

The African root furnishing laser was exterminated by the demand for it. Cf. Laser in Index.

1 Tor. Silphij folium; List. Sylphium, folium; G.‑V. Silfi, folium, the latter two interpretations meaning silphium (laser) and leaves (either nard or bay leaves) while both Tor. and Tac. (silfii folium) mean the leaves of silphium plant.

2 Malobathrum, malobatrum, malabathrum — leaves of an Indian tree, wild cinnamon.

1 Also Elaeogarum.

V. Directions are wanting whether the above ingredients are to be added to the already prepared garum, which see in dictionary. Gollmer gives the following direction for garum: Boil a sextarius of anchovies and 3 sextarii of good wine until it is thick purée. Strain this through a hair sieve and keep it in a glass flask for future use. This formula, according to Goll. should have followed our No. 9; but we find no authority for it in the original.

Oenogarum proper would be a garum prepared with wine, but in this instance it is the broth in which the truffles were cooked that is to be flavored with the above ingredients. There is no need and no mention of garum proper. Thus prepared it might turn out to be a sensible sauce for truffles in the hands of a good practitioner.

Note the etymology of the word "garum," now serving as a generic name for "sauce" which originally stood for a compound of the fish garus.

Cf. Garum in index.

Cf. No. 111, A Harmless Salad.

Bran. op. cit., p25‑6, of Greek origin.

1 List. and G.‑V. Hypotrimma.

V. This formula, lacking detailed instructions, is of course perfectly obscure, and it would be useless to debate over it.

2 Tor. and Tac. cariotam; Sch. cariotum; List. and G.‑V. caroenum. This (carenum) is new wine boiled down one half of its volume. Cariotum is a palm wine or date wine.

Cf. Note to No. 33.

1 Wanting in Torinus.

Ex Tor. first sentence wanting in other texts.

1 List. and G.‑V. moretaria, from moretum.

2 Dann. calls this "Kalte Schale" which as a rule is a drink or a cold refreshing soup, popular on the Continent in hot weather. Not a bad interpretation if instead of the broth the original called for wine or fruit juices.

V. Mortaria are ingredients crushed in the mortar, ready to be used in several  p58 combinations, similar to the ground fine herbs, remoulade, in French cuisine that may be used for various purposes, principally from cold green sauces.

3 Wanting in Tor.

1 Wanting in List.

The cumin sauce formulae are under chap. XV in G.‑V., following our No. 30.