This is the digital translation of a book in Hungarian that I have tried recipes from before. Here is the book reference:
The Prince of Transylvania’s court cookbook
From the 16th century
THE SCIENCE OF COOKING
You can find a copy of it here: http://www.medievalcookery.com/etexts/transylvania-v2.pdf
The recipes I have tried are here: Prince of Transylvania's court cookbook
Today I picked recipe number 804, found on page 154.
Pogácsa from milk.
Pour milk onto the pan, don’t let it boil all the way, put flour into a plate; once the milk is hot, pour it onto a plate, mix it well, don’t add too much, the dough should be dense and big; whip some eggs into a pot afterwards, add salt and pour it onto it, then whip it again; have lots of eggs so that the pogachas will grow and swell. Afterwards, cut these while the dough is warm; don’t add too much milk, there should be more eggs than milk. The butter shouldn’t be too hot, else the upper part could come down.
Obviously I needed to do some interpreting on this! I looked at a variety of modern pogacha recipes, but they all used yeast and this one does not mention it. So I started looking at modern bread recipes that don't use yeast, and cobbled together a basic strategy for making this bread.
My primary guide was from the glossary of the Prince's book (the 7th page of the PDF, not a numbered page in the book):
Pogácsa: a small short cylindrical baked good, similar to the American biscuit (the rolled and cut version as opposed to the drop variety), often with flaky layers.My Redaction
6 cups flour (I used about half bread flour and half all-purpose), divided into 3 cups/3 cups
1 cup milk
6 eggs
1 teaspoon salt
about 3 tablespoons butter, melted
This attempt was rather hit-and-miss, "give it a try and see what happens." In reality, it was quite fun to test my skills and senses. I decided that the butter is not mixed into the dough but brushed over the top of each biscuit before baking.
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Heat the milk in the microwave until quite warm but not boiling. I did 1/2 cup increments, each heated for 30 seconds on full power.
3. Add the milk to 3 cups flour. Mix, first by hand and then with the mixer, until it is lumpy and moist.
4. Beat the eggs in a bowl, add the salt, then pour the whole mixture into the bowl with the flour and milk. Stir by hand for a while then let the mixer stir it. It will break up the lumps and become very wet.
5. Mix in the rest of the flour, 1/2 cup at a time so it mixes in and doesn't fly all over the kitchen. I stopped mixing when the dough was sticking to itself more than the bowl.
6. Put a dusting of flour on your work surface and also dust the dough and your hands. Put the dough on the surface and pat it into a mass that is uniformly thick, about 3/4 to 1 inch. That is the depth of my small biscuit cutter.
7. Cut out pogachas and place them on a greased baking sheet. I reshaped the remaining dough as needed until the sheet had enough pogachas on it.
8. Brush melted butter over the top of each pogacha.
9. Bake for 20 - 25 minutes, until the bottom is light brown and there might be some coloring on the tops or sides. I tried one at 15 minutes but it was still doughy-moist on the inside.
This recipe made about 3 dozen pogachas.
The Verdict
They puffed up slightly and did not spread much. They were a little crispy on the outside. Inside they were denser than yeasted bread but I was surprised that they were not as dense as I thought they might be -- I worried about making small rocks. The crumb was finely textured and there were a few air bubbles inside.
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| Right piece is upside down to show the bottom |
When warmed up in the microwave the next day, with a moist towel, they were surprisingly good.
Success! I would try these again some time, but I would play with the mixing procedure to see if I could make them lighter.
When I looked at this recipe I thought of this one. Which is more like a choux paste.
ReplyDeleteTo make various sorts of fritters, and first to make Venetian fritters Chapter 136, page 370
Put to boil six libre of goats milk in a casserole well tinned, with six ounces of fresh butter, four ounces of sugar, four ounces of rose water, a little saffron and enough salt. When the boil begins to rise add into it two pounds of flour little by little. Mix continuously with a wooden spoon until it becomes stiff like bread dough. Take it from the casserole and put it into a stone mortare and pound it for a quarter of an hour. Then take it out and put it into a bowl of copper or of ceramic, mix it with a wooden spoon or with a hand until it chills. Then have twenty four fresh eggs and put them in one by one, mixing continuously with the wooden spoon or with the hand until the paste because liquid. After adding the eggs beat for a quarter of an hour until it makes blisters (bubbles?) and leave it to rest for a quarter of an hour in a warm place then beat again. Then have ready a frying pan with hot lard, and take the mixture and put it over a plate and with the mouth of a bottle well greased with cold lard or with a cane of white iron cut the fritters and put them into the lard and give them gentle heat, and several times move the pan making the fritters dance in the lard without touching (each other) and when the fritters begin to be cooked they will crack, because by nature they puff up and become like medlars. Many times one will see that they have taken enough color and they are light, take them out with a slotted spoon and serve them hot with fine sugar on top. With this paste one can make various works with the syringe (pastry bag) but it should be somewhat thicker than that used for fritters if one wants to make them better with the syringe. Let them bake for half an hour in an oven which is not too hot and serve them with fine sugar on top.
I must admit it is how I am planning to make them for my feast next Month.
Taken from here:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_3etO4Q0bw-_Gqqgyd7-1lAwMyRe2XVZdC3sxL4H_2U/edit?usp=sharing
I suspect this will make a better biscuit than what I produced. Please let me know how it turns out!
ReplyDeleteI think the "pound it for a quarter of an hour" part is intriguing. That should develop the gluten, right? I wondered, in my process, if that would be a mistake since there were no air bubbles to trap, and the typical American-style biscuit is handled so little as to not develop it. I even worried about using my mixer as much as I did because of that. What do you think?
Love what you did here. I wonder if folding in more butter (cold) while kneading would lead to those flaky layers? I have to admit, I’m not much of a baker.
ReplyDeleteI’m thinking those would be lovely with the pork cracklings and cheese in the more modern pogasca.
I suspect you are right. I didn't put any butter in the dough because of the line that said the butter shouldn't be too hot or the upper part might come down. I thought that meant the butter needed to be brushed on top. But mixing some in was a thought I had and was suggested by the non-yeasted recipes I saw. I didn't spend any time kneading the dough by hand but I could have.
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