Friday, April 8, 2011

Feasts of Ice and Fire: Feast to Welcome King Robert to the North

Before joining the SCA, I came across a series of books by George R.R. Martin, A Song of Ice and Fire.  George is an amazing writer and I fell in love with the books.  One of the truly great things about the books, and I am know I am not alone in thinking this, is his descriptions of the feasts.  They leave me hungry and make my mouth water no matter how many times I read them.

Reading a discussion board devoted largely to GRRM and ASoIaF, a woman started a discussion about ASOIAF Dinner Party.  The first thing that popped into my mind was recreating some of the dishes from the books.  This wasn’t what the author of the topic had in mind, but the idea stuck with me.

With the help of a few others, I went through the books finding descriptions of the feasts, used those ideas and have expanded upon them using knowledge of historical food preparations and feasts.  Using primarily traditional recipes from medieval and renaissance Europe and the Mid-East and some that were fully created by myself based on the descriptions from the books.


The first feast in the books is to welcome King Robert to the North and is shown to us through the eyes of fourteen year old Jon.  The description tells us the feast has already lasted four hours; the hall is smoky and filled with the smells of fresh baked bread and roasted meats.  Only two items are mentioned, honeyed chicken and roasted onions dripping in brown gravy.

We know that breads and roasted meats are also served, and this would fit with a typical medieval feast, so I have filled in the rest of the feast using information from a later feast held at Winterfell as my guide.




1st Course

Rye Bread
Soft Cheese Spread
Honey Butter
Onion Relish
Spicy White Fish
Vegetable Beef Soup


2nd Course

Wild Boar (a pork roast)
Current  Wine Sauce
Mustard sauce
Roast Duck with Orange Sauce
Tarragon Lemon Salmon Fillets
Armored Turnips


3rd Course

Onion Tart
Baked Sole stuffed with Crab
Roast Prime Ribs

Honeyed Carrots


4th Course

Roast Beef with Mushrooms in Wine Sauce
Honeyed Chicken
Roasted Onion with brown gravy



5th Course (dessert)

Lemon Cake
Spiced Loaf
Baked pears

4 comments:

  1. Mmm hmm...what he said! ^^ YUM. (Maybe because I'm always thinking with my pregnant tummy.)

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  2. I just want Lemon Cakes... that was CAKES... not some single little cupcake thingy..

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  3. The recipe I used for the Lemon Cakes makes more of a bar cookie. While the ingrediants might be ok, I am not sure the cooking method passes the medieval muster. A "cake" in medieval times is likely to be more of a cookie. This is something that it would be hard to find authentic proof of, so I went with a rich dessert as it seemed to suit Sansa's taste.

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