The Marchpane Knot Garden

Marchpane is an early form of marzipan which along with jellies would have dominated the 17th Century dessert table. Marchpane was a status feature and as such would be made into elaborate designs and even decorated with gold leaf in the wealthiest of houses.

Find out more at www.darcytodionysus.com,  www.theoldfoodie.com and www.livinghistorytoday.com

A classic banquet table would have centred around a marchpane in the form of a knot garden similar to the one above, made by historicfoods.com. Check out their beautiful gallery here. 

 

We drew our own inspiration from Zaphora's back garden in North London which is laid out exactly like this one but is currently in need of a winter tidy. Read about the history of knot gardens and find out how to plant one yourself (perhaps on a smaller scale). These designs will inspire you whether you plan to bake a knot garden or plant one.

Our design was of course made with salt dough, air-dryed overnight, painted and then sealed with a pva glue mixture (exact details to follow).

Remember to add some wholemeal flour for an authentic look.

Our finished result (below) looked like a beautiful tile.

A real marchpane would be made with marzipan (traditional recipe here) then glazed with fruit jellies and pastes for colour.

If you're the sort of person who peels marzipan out of their Christmas cake rather than eating it then the principal could perhaps be applied to a pastry dish with a little trial and error. A quick and easy snack for a school packed lunch.

Flaming Good Fun for all the Family

Before we start cooking, a quick mention of a 17th Century game your guests could be playing while you add the finishing touches to your banquet. 

Here's one we're working on

You will need:

A long stick
An apple
A candle
Matches
A blindfold


 




Simply suspend the stick around head height. Tie the apple onto one end and the candle onto the other. Light the candle. Blindfold the player and point him or her in the vague direction of the stick. What could possibly go wrong?

We're looking to collect more examples of games from the period. They clearly knew how to have fun. If you know of any please let us know.

Coming next...

Divvying up the chores.

One of us got to craft these intricate biscuits.....





 

while the other just had to knock up an early Stuart Knot Garden Centerpiece.


We flipped a coin.

Coming soon....

Boughs of holly and bowls of dough

Salt dough recipe:
half, half, whole

half a cup of salt
half a cup of water
whole cup of flour
muscle power or a food mixer

Culinary one-upmanship

We'll show you how to knock up an edible 17th Century centrepiece for your banquet table this Christmas. 

Love thy Neighbour We were lucky enough to have access to the wilds of the estate. We used mistletoe, bay, holly, ivy and willow to make this kissing bough and decorate the hall. Luckily ivy seems to be the easiest and most abundant of these plants to gain the greatest effect. Haven't had this one blessed yet but have briefed the front of house volunteers to hug everyone who walks through the door. Think they agreed in principal but we did walk off quickly.

An early 17th Century apple bobbing game. A stick, an apple, a lit candle, a blindfold and no health and safety issues whatsoever.

A 17th Century Christmas - prickles and salt dough

We’re getting a historic house ready for a Stuart Christmas. Our period is the early part of the 17th Century (before Oliver Cromwell and his parliamentary party put the dampers on most kinds of fun for a few years).

Decorations

 

Greenery was free and so houses would have been decorated with holly, ivy, bay, rosemary and mistletoe regardless of income. A holy or kissing bough would have been hung at the entrance; it would be blessed by a priest and guests would be hugged under it as they entered as a gesture to get rid of any hard feelings that may have built up over the year. We've done some (authorized!) foraging to recreate the 17th Century look.

 

Food and Drink

http://www.historicfood.com/galleries.htm
 

The Stuarts were big on sweet foods – a banquet at the time would have been a table full of desserts (straight to the good stuff - no wasting effort on nutrition). We took our ideas from historicfoods.com who cooked the food in this picture for real. Ours will be made from salt dough.

We’ll put in links to the images and recipes we're following - you might be able to make edible versions. If you do, please let us know how they tasted!

We’ve learned lots along the way, including that it’s best not to mess about with salt dough the day after wrestling with holly. In the next few posts we'll show you how we're getting on and hopefully have the finished result next week!