During an evening of inappropriate food, some of them surely wondered: What is the king thinking? My own such moment came during a medieval-themed feast near the Tower of London, which was hosted by “Henry VIII.” Not only did it feature a historically inaccurate king-Henry VIII was a Reformation king-and historically inaccurate food, it culminated with a historically inaccurate conga line. After all, medieval people must have attended the odd crappy feast, too. Those still craving their history fix can take solace, however. Gustave Flaubert famously wrote, “Our ignorance of history makes us slander our own times.” When it comes to slander caused by ignorance, history is sometimes on the receiving end, too. (The studios had a thing for bringing the Middle Ages to the big screen in the ‘50s: Knights of the Round Table, Prince Valiant, The Black Shield of Falworth, The Black Knight.) Yet historical stereotyping, wherever you find it, is symptomatic of a deeper societal ill. So, the real question is: Where does the familiar medieval stereotype come from? As with all questions of intellectual decline, Hollywood deserves some blame. Medieval food was many things-garish, over the top, unsubtle. Similarly, the Excalibur’s roast Cornish game hen is a recent chicken breed that was popularized by a 1960s poultry mogul.
The same goes for potatoes (dragon’s eggs).
Tomatoes didn’t make it to Europe until Spanish conquistadors brought them back from South America in the 1500s. A tomato might seem medieval when used as the foundation for the Excalibur’s “dragon’s blood soup” (not to be confused with Medieval Times’ “dragon tail soup”), but medieval people simply could not have eaten food that wasn’t present in their world. 7: Medieval people ate food they couldn’t possibly have eaten. All the sotelties (there were three, one for each course) served at the coronation banquet for Henry VI cited his politically hopeless claim to the throne of France-the second sotelty, for example, depicted Henry in between his father and the Sigismund, the holy Roman emperor who supported his claim. Often, they resonated with the political theme of the occasion. Courses would often end with a “sotelty” (subtely) similar to an amuse-bouche, a “sotelty” was an ornamental offering, usually made from dough or marzipan, which showed off the chef’s skill. The third course, which was never eaten because the feast ran late, included three meat, two fish, five bird, and two fruit dishes. At the coronation of Richard III in 1483, for example, there were three courses, each of which included at least 15 different dishes.
Before that, grand meals were eaten much the way North Americans eat Chinese food today, with many dishes served simultaneously. The idea of eating one main dish during every course, which is called service à la russe, didn’t become popular in Europe until the 19 th century.
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