Pandoracon 2012 Schedule

Pandoracon 2012 – September 28-30

Pandoracon is a new convention and it's local to me, so when I heard they were looking for programming I figured it was worth a try. I'm currently signed up to run the following panels, though I may end up being involved in more.

I usually enjoy smaller conventions more - everything is more relaxed and there's much more chance of actually being able to talk with the guests of honor.

Medieval Food
Fantasy games and novels are commonly set in a society based on medieval Europe. Learn how medieval English and French cuisine worked as a system. Topics will include medieval ingredients and preparation methods, the structure of medieval feasts, finding medieval recipes (or making them up), and common myths about medieval foods
09/29/2012, 5:00 PM

World Design - Food
Realistic food can add depth to a story, and can also reveal aspects about the climate and culture of a people. Learn how to create food and foodways that are exotic but still believable.
09/29/2012, 10:00 PM

World Design - Language
Panelists will discuss methods that authors and game designers use for creating believable fictional languages.
09/30/2012, 12:00 PM

World Design - Geography
The physical world influences a society’s development. Learn how to let the environment shape your fictional culture.
09/30/2012, 2:00 PM

That's a lot in just two days, though I'm really looking forward to it. We'll see how it goes.

La Maison Rustique - September

From: L'agriculture et maison rustique, Charles Estienne (Rouen, 1658).

The works that the laborer should do for each month of the year.

(Chapter 10)

-=-=-

September

In September give the last working to the tilled ground scattered with wheat, maslin, rye and other similar grains.

Be on the lookout, beat down the nuts, mow the meadows that are late for being renewed, gather the thatch to cover the stables, and for heating the furnace the whole year.

Cut the branches of the madder, and collect the seed for planting at the beginning of the next March.

Collect the leaves of dyers woad, and dress them so that they are reduced into bundles, and will dry in the sun, or by a fire that is not too hot, cut the rice and millet.

AAAARGH! (Time Machine Chefs edition)

This does not fill me with confidence.

 (found in this article about the new TV show, "Time Machine Chefs")

La Maison Rustique - August

From: L'agriculture et maison rustique, Charles Estienne (Rouen, 1658).

The works that the laborer should do for each month of the year.

(Chapter 10)

-=-=-

August

In August, pull up the flax and the hemp by the roots, gather the fruits from the tree tops for storing.

Remove the leaves around the late grapes, to the end that they receive the most warmth from the sun, make verjuice, dig the earth to make wells, or find sources for the springs.

If there is a need, think of preparing barrels, and other things necessary for the harvest.

La Maison Rustique - July

From: L'agriculture et maison rustique, Charles Estienne (Rouen, 1658).

The works that the laborer should do for each month of the year.

(Chapter 10)

-=-=-

July

In July reap the wheat, and soup grains. It will make the grass that one calls the plaster.

Gather the fruit of the apple and pear trees, edible apples and pears, and those that load the tree too much.

Dig the vines for the second time, and root out hereunto the grass, commonly called dog-tooth.

Level and smooth the earth that will be watered so that the sun does not scorch long before the vine.

Cut the wood for heating all year round.

AAAARGH!

(original source)

La Maison Rustique - June

From: L'agriculture et maison rustique, Charles Estienne (Rouen, 1658).

The works that the laborer should do for each month of the year.

(Chapter 10)

-=-=-

June

In June prepare the area, and clean it well of any straw, hay, and dust.

Mow the meadows.

Harvest the barley.

Prune the vines.

Beat the wheat for planting when it's time to sow.

Madeleine and the Mad Cow

Sacred Cow, Mad Cow: A History of Food Fears
Madeleine Ferrières
Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231131925
I haven't had much time to read lately (or post on the blog, for that matter), but if you're curious about what kind of book I keep on the nightstand (and who isn't?) this is it. Yes, I know I'm a geek.

The really cool thing about this book (so far) is that in just the first two chapters, Madeleine Ferrières manages to completely destroy the Moldy Meat Myth™. She does this not through menus or recipes, nor through logic or reasoning. Instead she references several surviving medieval laws and charters.

Some of these laws explicitly forbid the sale of spoiled meat. Others establish an inspection process that rivals that of the USDA. However the laws that most effectively debunk the myth are those that prohibit the sale of meat that was slaughtered the previous day.

So here's a brief recap of medieval meat consumption:

1. On average, urban residents ate three to five pounds of meat each week.
2. Butchers were forbidden to sell day-old meat for human consumption.
3. Livestock was brought into the town alive.
4. Livestock and butchered meat were both inspected for wholesomeness.
5. Butchers were forbidden to sell cooked meat, and cooks were forbidden to slaughter livestock.
6. Meat was a lot cheaper than spices.

So, as the myth would have it, butchers would bring in the huge quantity of livestock needed, butcher it all right away, let it sit around for days, hide it from the inspectors, sell it illegally, and hope that the spice merchants can convince the customers to use £10 worth of spices on a 2p piece of meat.

Yeah, sure.

La Maison Rustique - May

From: L'agriculture et maison rustique, Charles Estienne (Rouen, 1658).

The works that the laborer should do for each month of the year.

(Chapter 10)

-=-=-

May

In May water the newly planted trees, shear the sheep, refill the wines, amass great quantities of butter, and make strong cheese, castrate the calf, begin to take care of the honey bees, and silk worms, which will increase in number.

Weed the wheat, and hoe the vines for the second time, your shoes on the neighboring ground, so that the heat does not offend them, while clearing all the branches and overgrowth which have no fruit.

Clear the unnecessary twigs from the trees, graft the olive trees that need buds grafted and covered.

Gen Con 2012 Schedule

Gen Con is about three months away and I'm trying to get things ready. Unfortunately I'm not part of the Writer's Symposium panels this year, but I'm sure I'll find plenty to keep me busy. As in past years, I'm giving a two hour talk on Thursday evening.

Gen Con Indy 2012 - August 16-19

SEM1229781 - Medieval Travelling Food: The Theory and Practice of Hard Rations
Learn about what medieval soldiers and travelers ate when they were in the wilds, and see what you can do as a game master or writer to make things just that much more believable.
08/16/2012, 8:00 PM, ICC : Rm 243

Additionally, I've scheduled two events for Blackspoon Press.

SEM1229782 - How to Cook Like a Dwarf
How do you write a cookbook for a culture that never existed but everyone knows? The authors of The Dwarven Cookbook talk about the origins of the recipes in their cookbooks.
08/18/2012, 3:00 PM, Crowne Plaza : Victoria Stn A/B

SEM1229783 - Build Your Own Language
This workshop will guide you in creating your own language. With minimal materials and two hours of time, you will have the core a language suitable for adding color to a game or novel background.
08/17/2012, 8:00 PM, ICC : Rm 243

This last one is the most challenging for me to prepare. I want the participants to walk away with something usable and unique, but I don't want to delve too deeply into linguistics (after all, this isn't a college course). What's more, it's a free seminar (as are the others) so any handouts I provide will be paid for out of my own pocket. We'll see how many sign up during early registration.

On the whole, I expect this year to be a lot of fun.

Origins Game Fair

I'm pleased to announce that I'll be at Origins Game Fair this year as part of their new program for writers, The Library.

May 30-June 3, 2012

Greater Columbus Convention Center

Columbus, Ohio, 43215, USA

I'll be taking part on a number of panels, and will have a table with the other authors where I can sell copies of the books. In the remaining time I'll be gaming, schmoozing, and stalking Wil Wheaton and Felicia Day.

I expect the whole thing to be a total blast.

---

Here's the schedule for the seminars I'm participating in:


Thursday

Speak Up! (1:00 p.m.)
Sheeeoot! How ya gonna git yer folks ta talk so’s readers kin understand ‘em ‘n cobble onto jest wut they’s sposed ta sound like? Dialogs, dialects, slang, and more add color and round-out your characters, settings, and stories. Learn how to use them to best effect without making your readers scratch their heads or toss your book across the room in frustration.

What’s in Your Basement? (2:00 p.m.)
From creepy caverns to haunted subways, the underground is a terrific playground for your fiction. What makes the belly of the world ripe for fantasy and horror tales? Why is Hell always below? What monsters lurk in your basement? Panelists discuss their favorite underground settings and how to use caves, tunnels, and more to best effect.


Friday

What’s in Your Literary Kitchen? (Noon)
Origins is proud to host author and medieval chef Daniel Myers. He’ll teach you how to properly feed your characters . . . which in turn will fatten your manuscript into something rich and believable. Characters have to eat, don’t they? What you feed them tells a lot about your fictional society. James Bond liked his martinis shaken, not stirred. Kojak had his lollipops. Tolkien’s hobbits had . . . well anything they could stuff in their mouths. You get the idea.

The Art of the Short Story (1:00 p.m.)
There’s a big difference between writing a short story and a novel . . . and we’re not talking word count. It’s in the approach, the pacing, and character development—or lack thereof. A good short story is a work of art. Our panelists discuss the elements of short fiction and the markets.


Saturday

Setting Your Stage (Noon)
The landscape for your fiction has a personality. It’s a compelling stage for your characters to dance on. It doesn’t matter whether you pepper it with ruins, castles, caves, or soaring cities, you have to choose what details to put in and what to leave out. Our panelists, expert world-builders all, discuss the elements of crafting vibrant settings.

Well-Read Undead (1:00 p.m.)
Vampires are still hot, zombies, too. What is the fascination with corpses-as-characters? How can you pull off a good “dead” tale that isn’t a retread of what’s already out there? Our panelists discuss how to handle undead heroes and villains and where to market your “dead end” fiction.

La Maison Rustique - April

From: L'agriculture et maison rustique, Charles Estienne (Rouen, 1658).

The works that the laborer should do for each month of the year.

(Chapter 10)

-=-=-

April

In April around St. George's day, put out to air the lemons and oranges like all other trees that have been shut up since St. Martins day, in which you will stirr up the earth at the bottom, remove the superficial roots there, and the superfluous branches, and don't allow a single branch to pass another, either in width or height.

Plant, if you did not already plant them, olive trees, pomegranate trees, lemons, and myrtles, and thoroughly clean them.

Enter the fig tree, chestnut, cherry and orange, cut the new vines: for in those days she endures cutting slightly more.

Be careful to give food to the pigeons, because by that time there is little in the fields.

Mate horses, asses, sheep, with their females: clean the hives of honey bees, and kill the butterflies, which abound on the mallow blooms.

The Measure of a Cook

Having recently watched the movie "Today's Special" (2009, Aasif Mandvi), I noticed a recurring theme that I've seen in a number of cooking-related films: the idea that a cook should "cook from the heart".

In the movie, the cook is repeatedly told that he over-thinks his cooking, that his work has no fire, that he needs to stop measuring, and that he should listen to his heart and gut. I don't think it's much of a spoiler to say that in the end, when he throws caution to the wind, his food turns out to be fantastic and the customers are happy and everything is right in the world.

The same basic theme pops up in "The Ramen Girl" (2008, Brittany Murphy).

Here the main character is told to cook from the heart, and to put her feelings into the ramen soup.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed watching both of these movies. They're both light-hearted romantic comedies that involve food - fun to watch, easy to forget afterwards. That being said, I think they reinforce a belief about cooking that is inaccurate and that can discourage novice cooks: good cooks never measure.

It may be that some good cooks don't need to measure out precise quantities of ingredients, but they are always measuring. They evaluate the smell, taste, color, texture, and consistency of a dish almost constantly while they work. They have a built-in knowledge of the size of a teaspoon of spice, a tablespoon of oil, or a cup of milk. They weren't born with this knowledge though. They gained it by making the same or similar recipes over and over, hundreds of times, until each bit of information was permanently ingrained.

Because they have internalized all that information, they know which ingredients to be precise over, and which ones allow lots of leeway. To an outside observer, it may look like the cook is just throwing ingredients into the pot haphazardly, but with each one there's a mental note of "That seems about right." That's where the "heart" and "soul" come into cooking.

If an inexperienced cook tried to work the same way, the results would likely be less than ideal. They may get lucky, but sooner or later they'll end up with an inedible mess. Therefore it's vitally important for new cooks (or even old cooks trying new dishes) to follow a recipe. This gives them a basis for comparison, which they can then change as their skills and experience allow.

Unsurprisingly, this also applies to cooks who try recipes from medieval sources. To make the challenge more difficult, such sources typically not only lack measurements for quantities or temperatures or times, but they can even lack the common basis of experience that a cook can use to measure these things. The cook must rely on their modern experiences and constantly question their assumptions. Sometimes it works and the dish turns out well. Sometimes not, and the cook has to dig in to figure out where it went wrong. In those cases it really helps if they've measured the ingredients.

Most importantly, if the cook has measured, they can write the recipe down and share it so that others can learn.

La Maison Rustique - March

From: L'agriculture et maison rustique, Charles Estienne (Rouen, 1658).

The works that the laborer should do for each month of the year.

(Chapter 10)

-=-=-

March

In March sow in the first days the flax, dyers woad (if it was not sown in February), oats, barley, millet, fleabane, hemp, peas, lentils, bitter vetch, lupins, small corn, vetch, beans, and other similar marks.

Give a second work to the fallow grounds, which are well rested, and smoke that which are prepared for sowing.

Weed the corn, take the grafts to fasten when the trees are in sap, and before the buds emerge. Plant the fruits of chestnuts, almonds, hazelnuts and filberts, and the stones of olives, and apricots, and diverse other fruits.

Draw up several seed plots of apples, pears, mulberries, and other similar fruits: Plant the plants of foot herbs, like asparagus, artichokes, required cardoons, sage, lavander, rosemary, strawberries, gooseberries, roses and lillies, gourds, cucumbers, mellons and pumpkins.

Dress all the gardens, as well kitchen gardens in beds, and sow there the necessary seeds: prune and bear the roots of the vines and fruit trees, so that they bear more fruit: saw away the tree roots: gather together the branches for heating.

Hoodwinked

As an example of how far behind I am on things, last night I watched the 2010 movie version of Robin Hood. I'm generally a big fan of movies set in the middle ages (no surprise there), and since the film had Ridley Scott for a director I was expecting something impressive.

By the end of the film I was just sitting there thinking, "Wha?"

I thought Russell Crowe and Cate Blanchett were both too old for their parts, but I was willing to ignore that; they're big-named stars, after all. The acting was passable, the dialogue was decent, and the sets and costuming were much better that what Hollywood usually foists off on the unsuspecting public. I could even tolerate the fight scenes - though every time I see a film that uses the high-speed, choppy style of editing for fight scenes I find myself thinking, "Pity they couldn't afford a fight choreographer and had to cover it up by shaking the camera a lot."

The real problem was the incoherent story. It wasn't just the historical inaccuracies. The whole film seemed to be doing things at random. It's hard to evaluate how well the writer and director accomplished their goals when I can't even tell what they were trying to do in the first place. This suggested trouble with the film on a whole different level, so I turned to IMDB for clues.

The answer came pretty quickly: there were five writers. Here's a note from IMDB about the original story:

"Ethan Reiff and Cyrus Voris's original script "Nottingham" turned the traditional story on its head by portraying the Sheriff of Nottingham in a more sympathetic light and Robin Hood as more of a villain." [IMDB]

Right there is the first problem. Note for writers and producers: if you're going to turn a well-loved story "on its head", then you're writing an artsy film and not a summer blockbuster. Universal ignored this and tried to find a director who could make it into a blockbuster anyways, looking at Bryan Singer, Sam Raimi, and Jon Turteltaub before finally betting on Scott to make it work. They'd have done better if they'd gone with a much lower budget film, some new and edgy director, and a limited art-house release.

"The script was extensively re-written by Brian Helgeland because director Ridley Scott wanted the Sheriff of Nottingham to be a more conflicted character." [IMDB]

In the new story where Robin is the villain and the Sheriff is the hero, the Sheriff wasn't interesting enough? Maybe likable enough? It's hard to tell because in the final version of the film the Sheriff is hardly there at all. That is probably due to subsequent rewrites.

"New rewrites were done by British playwright Paul Webb ..."

The rest of the sentence is the real kicker:

"... and later by Tom Stoppard, who reworked the story while the movie was already being filmed." [IMDB]

Somewhere along the line they scrapped the whole premise that Robin was the villain and tried to go back to a more traditional Robin Hood story, but it still wasn't working so they hired a big-gun like Stoppard to fix the script while they were shooting. I think if I were a writer called in to work on it, I would have asked that my name not be associated with the film.

Now for those interested in action scenes, the film isn't bad. I'm not sorry I saw it but at the same time, when the closing credits started to roll, I found myself thinking that I'd like to see a movie about Robin Hood.

La Maison Rustique - February

From: L'agriculture et maison rustique, Charles Estienne (Rouen, 1658).

The works that the laborer should do for each month of the year.

(Chapter 10)

-=-=-

February

In February, in the crescent moon, transplant the vines of two or three years, which will thus take root, and do not touch those of a year, which do not wish to be shaken, for they have little vigor yet.

Maintain the hay fields, vineyards, meadows and gardens.

Make the pits to plant new vines: cut out the roots of vines, and equip them with stakes, prune and weed trees of all superfluities, clean of worms, dirt and worm-eaten material that is found in dry leaves.

Prepare the soil of the gardens to sow and plant all kinds of herbs.

Give the second working to the earth to receive beans, barley, oats, hemp, millet and other similar seed in March.

Visit the vines, especially those that are known to be weak and delicate.

Dress the hedges of the gardens: build the beds of the gardens with hay.

Plant the woods for great trees and forest.

Plant also the shoots of olive trees, pomegranates, quince trees, fig trees, poplars, dwarf willows, elms, osiers, and other trees, as well wild fruit trees that will root.

Clean the dove cote, hen house, and the retreat of the peacocks and gees: because these beasts at the end of the month begin to sit to hatch.

Visit the warren to repopulate it and there re-run the burrows.

Buy honey bees, thoroughly clean their hives and kill their kings.

Buy hawks, sparrowhawks, and other birds of prey: which at the end of this month will moult.

Food Fads

This post may put some people off, but sometimes you’ve just got to speak out.

People often assume that because I’m a food geek then I’m all over the latest food trends. The thing is that in addition to food geek, I’m also a food snob and a bit of a food luddite. I feel that traditional foods exist for a reason – they fill a need for a given culture, and they fill it well. This means that when a food fad becomes too prominent and is given far more exposure than it’s worth (in my opinion, of course) I start to become … irritated.

So here are the food-related trends I’m sick of – in no particular order:

Grilling
Yes, with enough work and specialized widgets you can probably prepare anything on a grill. I think I had enough of grilling many years back when I tried grilled lobster. It had that great, smokey flavor you get with a barbecue. The problem was the one thing I couldn’t taste – lobster.

Single-Use Appliances
Panini grills, juicers, veg-o-matics, ice cream makers, dehydrators, infusers, a thousand new things every year to spend money on to "save time in the kitchen." Most of the time there is a multi-purpose tool which will achieve the same end and take up a lot less space. The multi-purpose tools are usually easier to clean as well.

Bacon
I like bacon, really I do, but I like things that don’t taste like bacon too. I don’t want to hear about bacon salt, bacon ice cream, bacon clothing, chocolate-covered bacon, bacon mayo, baconsicles, bacon soda, etc. If I want a dish to taste like bacon then I’ll add bacon, but most of the time I’ll skip it.

Deep Frying
Twinkies, Oreos, Mars bars, macaroni and cheese, butter – this one’s almost as bad as the bacon (in fact, people are batter-coating and deep frying bacon as well). Look, it’s nice to have something fried now and then. The frying process makes things crispy, adds the fat that people naturally crave, and even caramelizes natural sugars in foods. However, like grilling, it can also obliterate subtle flavors. What’s more, too much of this stuff will turn you into the Pillsbury Dough Boy.

Superfoods
Like clockwork, some agricultural collective will fund a health study which ends up showing that their product is packed full of something that conclusively reduces risks of somesuch or helps promote someother. Then for the next year or so that product is put into everything from floor wax to dessert toppings … until another study comes out and shows that the product works almost as well as a sugar pill.

Molecular Gastronomy
I suspect this term appears in a scientific dictionary and is defined as "overprocessed and overpriced". I suppose it could be considered to be edible art, but it also could be considered as food porn.

Dinner-in-a-Bowl
A biscuit, covered in mashed-potatoes, sprinkled with fried meat, gravy, and a ton of cheese. I’ve seen ads for all sorts of these from a variety of restaurants. Most (all?) of the time they’ve just taken the ingredients they already had on hand and plopped them down in a heap. I suppose they could just give us a trough or feed bag.

"Foodie"
I simply hate this word. It just screams "dweeb".

La Maison Rustique - January

From: L'agriculture et maison rustique, Charles Estienne (Rouen, 1658).

The works that the laborer should do for each month of the year.

(Chapter 10)

-=-=-

January

As of January, mainly at the end, cut the wood he would like to dedicate to framing or other work, when the moon is under the earth: for the moonlight makes the wood softer, and wood to be cut this will last a long time without being corrupted.

Smoke the trees that bear fruits, without affecting their roots.

Among the trees and shrubs that flourish early: such as roses, damask plums, avant-peaches, plums and others; in cold and wet country during the first two quarters of the Moon; cut the vine in good weather and sunny, plow the land dry, light and white, slender, sandy, full of tall grass and roots, which will not be plowed until October: second will be to work to the salt land and spread straw on top of beans, or wheat and barley.

Cut poles of willow for vines and hedges; prepare good stakes to support the vines; cut and prune the trees, the Moon being waning; turn upside down all the manure made from St. Martin's day, so that is cooked when it will be spread on the field, and the like: mend make new the chariots, wagons, plows, and other instruments necessary for cultivation, provide sufficient irons for pruning and clearing trees and vines.

Throughout will be no seed, because the earth is still too rare, heavy, full of steam, and similar to badly carded wool.

TV Interview

Last week I had a brief interview with "Goodday Sacramento" on the Sacramento CBS affiliate.  The fact that this was my first TV appearance meant that I had no idea what to expect.  It turns out that for morning news shows the operating word is "fast" - I don't think I was on the air for more than a minute.  Obviously that's not enough time to go into any significant depth on a subject (and I know I can get awfully wordy), so I thought I'd take some time to give more leisurely answers here for the questions I was asked.

The first question was along the lines of "Why cook medieval recipes?"  My answer was that one could just as easily ask, "Why cook Chinese recipes?" or "Why cook Indian?"  Medieval European cuisine is a unique style of cooking, with its own balance of flavors.  I also noted that the flavors of Medieval English cooking are surprisingly similar to those of modern Indian, leaving out the capsicum peppers.

In medieval England - especially in the 14th and 15th centuries - spices like cinnamon, ginger, cumin, and saffron were used, especially in meat dishes.  The combinations of these spices gives a flavor that is very similar to that in modern cooking in the Mediterranean and India.  On a side note, the word "curry" itself comes from Middle-English, and means "cook".

I was then asked about how hard it is to find recipes.  I said that when I started researching, 20 years ago, it was very difficult.  You needed to be near the right library or know the right people.  Now many of the texts are freely available online, and I have a list of links for them on the website.

This has really changed medieval cooking research an incredible amount.  Not only are libraries now putting images of the original manuscripts online, but researchers (both amateur and professional) are transcribing and translating the documents into multiple languages.  In just the past five years the number of medieval recipe books that are readily accessible to the average geek has gone from a handful to hundreds.  Medieval English and French cookbooks have even been translated into languages like Russian and Japanese.

Finally, I was asked about Thanksgiving dinner.  Given that they didn't celebrate Thanksgiving in medieval Europe (for the most part they still don't, but I've heard that's changing), what medieval foods could be served in it's place?  I responding with a menu that most would find surprising:  honey mustard barbecue chicken, macaroni and cheese, collard greens, and peach pie.

I unintentionally described this as a "traditional menu", but it's more accurately a "menu of traditional foods".  No, I have no record of any medieval cook serving exactly that meal, but all those foods can clearly be traced to England in the 14th century.  I often use that fact to pull people out of the mindset that medieval food was all about huge chunks of roast meat and tankards of wine.  The recipes we have from back then are surprisingly sophisticated and exhibit a wide range of flavors.

There is a copy of the video online.

From a technical viewpoint, I have a few observations.  First is that I look and sound like a total goob.  I'd like to think that it's the fault of the camera angle and the cheap microphone built into the computer - please don't tell me otherwise and ruin my happy delusion.  If I should end up with another interview via Skype, I'll make sure the ambient lighting is better.  The room was fairly well lit about 15 minutes before the start of the interview, but it then clouded up outside and things got too dark.

Levels of Medievalness

Whether it is dinner at a "medieval-themed" restaurant, a feast held by a historic recreation group, or a home-cooked dinner made for a school project (or even just for the fun of it), a question that might arise is "How medieval is this meal?"

Really, it's a very tricky thing to work out. There's all sorts of things that can enter into it, including such diverse elements as the type and source of the ingredients, the atmosphere (both ambiance and air quality) of the dining area, and even the time of year in relation to the foods served. In fact, considering all the extended variables, I suspect the answer to "How medieval is this meal?" is "Not very."

However, there are some aspects that are more easily controlled and which have a much larger impact on the ... medievalness? ... medievalosity? ... medievalery? ... ok, authenticity.  Let's look at them in order from least medieval to most medieval.

1. Medieval Ingredients

There are a number of foods that weren't available in medieval Europe. Some are things from the Americas (e.g. turkey, potatoes, capsicum peppers, peanuts, vanilla, chocolate) and weren't imported into Europe until after 1500.  Some are from other places (e.g. bananas, tea, coffee, yams), but were still not in common use in Europe.  Some are things that were invented well after 1500 (e.g. baking powder, mayonnaise).

The presence of any of these marks a meal as being modern.  It doesn't matter what recipe was used or how the food was cooked, they're simply not medieval.

2. Real Recipes

Even if all the ingredients used to make the meal were available in medieval Europe, that doesn't mean the resulting dishes would have been familiar to a medieval European.  Bread, ground beef, cheese, lettuce, and pickles are all reasonably medieval foods, but there's no account of any medieval cook ever making a cheeseburger (or any other type of sandwich, for that matter).

Fortunately there are a large number of medieval European cookbooks available, both in print and for free online. What's more, many have been translated into several different languages (for the benefit of those who don't read Middle-French or whatever), and there are even recipes that have been worked out with modern measurements and instructions.

3. Menu Consistency

Given both medieval ingredients and recipes, the consistency of the menu becomes an issue. By this I don't mean that the menu is too runny or somesuch, but rather that the individual dishes on the menu make sense to be served together.

While a World Fusion dinner can be fun, most people would be confused to be served a dinner menu of curried beef, Szechuan vegetables, tamales, poi, and hot chocolate. It's too strange a mix of cultures and cuisines.  The differences within regions and time periods in medieval European cultures can be very subtle, but they are there.  Twelfth century English food is very different from sixteenth century German.

Sometimes there are menus along with the recipes in many of the medieval cookbooks, which makes this part a lot easier. However there is still a lot of uncertainty to this aspect, and it's a great area for research.

It is only when the ingredients are medieval, the recipes are medieval, and the menu is medieval, that other aspects become important (like the apple variety, the quality of the spices, the shape of the serving vessel, the way the food is served, the color of the walls).

It's also important to work things in the above order.  Using non-medieval ingredients or modern recipes is kind of like building a ten-million dollar home and skimping on the quality of the materials or workmanship.  The final product simply won't hold together.