Monday, October 19, 2009

Mystery Things?

I'm going to jump topics for a moment here, but I promise to get back to the discussion on the quiz posts soon.


I just came across a post on the blog "This is why you're fat" that caught my eye. It's an image of a dish from the Republic of Georgia - essentially a sort of custard or quiche cooked in a bread crust.


The reason I note this is that it looks an awful lot like some unidentifiable (to me) things in a Dutch painting from 1559 that I posted about some time ago (look in the lower right portion of the painting, on top of the basket of birds).


I don't know if they're in any way related to this dish, but I find the similarity of shapes interesting.

It's one more bit of information in the quest of the Mysterious Football-Shaped Things®.





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5 comments:

  1. ArgyleOctober 19, 2009 at 3:50 PM

    Holy carp -- is that a whole stick of butter melting on top of that?? Wow.

    Reminds me of some of the Guter Speise recipes, the ones that seem to have a filling spread on a flat "leaf" of bread or pastry.

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  2. Andreas Klumpp M.A.October 19, 2009 at 4:56 PM

    Hi Doc,

    I found another picture where you can see the mysterious object better.
    It has no ressemblance with the Georgian dish. I think it is some kind of small bread or roll or a loaf of butter.It could also be a lightly smoked cheese similar to scamorzine.

    http://www.foodnews.ch/allerlei/30_kultur/galerie/markt/pages/Aersten_Marktfrau_Gem_.htm

    Greetings, Andreas

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  3. Nom de BlogOctober 19, 2009 at 6:46 PM

    I thought the ones in the painting looked like dried fish fillets. Aren't there fish shaped like that?

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  4. DocOctober 20, 2009 at 1:15 PM

    No they're not fish. Given its placement near the loaves of bread in the painting Andreas linked to (I forgot about it being in that one - thanks!) makes me think it's a bread product all the more.

    I wonder if the objects in the 16th century paintings could be some sort of stuffed or filled loaf. I think the little nubbins on the ends are an artifact of the shaping process - which could have a parallel in how that modern Georgian recipe is made.

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  5. Andreas Klumpp M.A.October 20, 2009 at 7:12 PM

    Hi Doc,

    if you look at both pictures again, you will see, that the objects are the only ones placed in a wooden bowl or on a Fayence plate. I think it must bee something sticky or greasy. I would interpret it as a loaf of butter, the shape deriving from the last step in buttermaking: squeezing the remaining liquids out of it.

    Greetings,

    Andreas

    ReplyDelete