Recipes from the Wagstaff Miscellany - 80 Blaunch mortruys of fisch

Recipes from the Wagstaff Miscellany (Beinecke MS 163)

This manuscript is dated about 1460.

The 200 (approx.) recipes in the Wagstaff miscellany are on pages 56r through 76v.

Images of the original manuscript are freely available on the Yale University Library website.

I have done my best to provide an accurate, but readable transcription. Common abbreviations have been expanded, the letters thorn and yogh have been replaced with their modern equivalents, and some minor punctuation has been added.

Copyright © 2013 by Daniel Myers, MedievalCookery.com

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80. Blaunch mortruys of fisch
Take haddok codlyng or thornebak sodyn pyke out the bonys do a way the skyn grynd the fisch make a mylke of almonds y blaunchyd & temper up the fisch ther with take payndemayn gratyd & sigure ther withe set hit on the fyre whan hit boyleth loke hit be ston messe hit forth & strew on blaunch poudyr.

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As with Wagstaff recipe 78 (Moretruys of wresch fysch), this recipe is also similar to recipe 25 in A Noble Boke off Cookry, though it calls for rice flour that the Wagstaff omits.

To mak mortins of fyshe tak codlinge haddok whiting or thornbak and sethe it and pik out the bones and pull of the skyne then bet the fishe in a mortair with the lever of the same fysche and temper it up with almond mylk or cow creme and put it in a clene pot and let it boile and put ther to sugur and hony and alay thy potage with fleur of rise draw with milk through a strein and stirr it well and mak it stondinge then drese v or vi lesks in a dyshe and cast on pouder guingyur mellid with sugur and serue it.  [A Noble Boke off Cookry (England, 1468)]

There are several other recipes similarly titled, in the contemporary cookbooks, but none are close matches.