My last day at Hampton...sadness... Alternate Title: day 11

I am greeting you with sadness, this will be my last post for this trip. :(

Today was my final day at Hampton with the amazing team working there. Jeff was off on his own today, so I made the last trek on my own. It was a beautiful day and they had the Prudential Ride London today, so if I was coming in by car, I would probably have cursed. LOL but I was on the train again. It is a really nice ride.

When I arrived the street was blocked and a lot of cyclists were coming around the corner there. It was really exciting to watch.

Cyclists for the Prudential Ride London @ Hampton.

Walking to the palace I was struck with how wonderful it really is, and that this would be my last time for a while. I was sad. So I took a selfie! LOL

I think the Palace was smiling. ;)

I was excited to see everyone again. I popped into registration and waited to be picked up. This morning it was Barry who came and got me. We chatted about yesterday and what I wanted to today, I explained I would like to maybe do a couple of the audio tours and of course do some more stuff in the kitchen.  We said good morning to everyone and Barry walked with me to get my audio guide. I love talking with him, so much knowledge and great tidbits. I wish I could be there longer to get ALL the information from them. OK, it's and excuse to want to sponge all the information.

So I decided to do the Henry VIII apartment tour. They had the actors in, and I would always seem to get stuck when they would be doing a scene. I video taped some of the music bits for Marie again. :) (I hope they are of use for you, Marie).

The great hall - amazing tapestries

I have more pictures on my real camera, so you will have to wait for those. I will create a nice picture gallery when I get home. I went to see the Chapel again (sorry no pictures allowed). Once I finished the tour, I headed back to the kitchens, excited to start my day.

As I entered, Marc told me there were SCAdians from Canada at the table, so of course we introduced ourselves and chatted. They were curious about how I came to be cooking here. It was fun to meet fellow Canadians AND Scadians!

Once they moved on, Marc was working on the Pudding of an ox again, so this time I helped mix the items together, so I almost did the whole recipe. What I didn't do was prepare the blood, chop the bacon fat, measure out the oatmeal or spices. It was really fun AND I got to taste it from yesterday. They had sliced it and fried it in bacon fat...Yum, it was quite tasty, and with an egg it would have been even better. I like it when I am surprised on the taste of something.

It is so easy to get distracted by the people coming through. Everyone was saying really if they finished a recipe it was great, but the main purpose was to engage the visitors and let the food facilitate the interaction. It was a lot of fun explaining what I was doing.

When there was a bit of a lull, Richard had me work with Robin on a recipe called Ryschewys close and fryez. Which is basically a paste pouch with minced dried fruit and spices, fried. Really delicious. So the first thing we needed to make was the paste (or pasta). I opted to have saffron in it, so it would be a really nice yellow colour. The first thing we needed to do was to grind the saffron, the once it was ground we added water to it, which was a lovely yellow colour. So we put flour in a bowl, add sea salt to it (it helps with the gluten in the dough), mixed it with my hands, then I made a small well in the flour and added the saffron water to it. We mixed it until it started to form a dough. We then had to kneed it until it no longer stretched or bounced back. This is so we can get it as thin as possible. For me with no muscles and little hands was really hard to do. Robin would take over and get it going really well. He said that it should take about 20 min to get the right feel to it.

The dough waiting to be rolled. Under a damp cloth

While that was resting, we had to get the filling together, so robin had my cut some dates, figs and raisins. Putting it into the big mortar, add a little bit of red wine to give it a bit of liquid, I needed to make a paste with it. This was also really hard, as I have no muscles or muscle memory. Poor Robin had to take over to help wimpy me. :p

Fruit paste coming along.

Once it was the right consistency, it was time to decide on the spices. Now I was really nervous here as I have never tried some of these spices. Robin was very patient with me and explained what they had, how it tasted (and gave me tastings) and how it smelled. One I had never seen was cubeb. Robin crushed it and had me smell it. It had a floral note to it and a little bit of heat when you tasted it. Really a nice spice. You don't need much either. So, I decided on this mixture: cubeb, long pepper, black pepper, cannelle buds (Cassia buds). I ground them up, Robin suggested I give it a sniff and see if it smelled ok. So I did and I said it was missing something....maybe cinnamon. So he shaved some and put it in the mortar for me to grind. When I smelt it again, I announced it was perfect. He said, if it smelt good it would taste good. :) Into the fruit it went. I have to say I was really nervous that it would taste awful. I felt so out of my league.

spiced have been added

We then rolled out the paste, it needed to be paper thin, so that when fried it would crisp nicely. I loved the rolling pin I was using. It wasn't as long as a French pin and it was a lot thicker, about 3" diameter and about 1.5' long. Really awesome pin. Then I needed to cut out circles in the paste to form the packets. we used the very technical top of a mug. :) I cut out about a dozen circles, then Robin showed me how to stuff them, and try not to rip the dough. also we needed to get all the air out too.

Frying them up

We couldn't have a full fryer on site, so we made due. This was really cool as you can control the heat of the oil on the fire really well, and just take it off when it was too hot. While it was cooling you could add another one in.

The final product:

waiting to be eaten. 

These were so delicious! delicate, crunchy and gooey. Really nice. Thanks Robin for all the time on this one. :)

I realized that it was soon time to head back to London, as I had to meet Jeff at the Globe for Measure for Measure. We were going to be groundlings, I was very excited.

I made my way around, saying my goodbyes to Richard, Jorge, Marc, Robin and Barry. They were so nice and amazing to work with. I can see why these guys have been together for so long, they are the well oiled machine. I hope I didn't disrupt too much, but I am very grateful for all the time they spent me Jeff and I.

I wasn't able to get a picture with everyone, but here is one of Richard, me and Jorge - taken by Barry. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Richard, Erin and Jorge (Barry behind the camera)
Missing was Marc and Robin.

I left Hampton Court Palace with a lot of new ideas and concepts. It was amazing watching these guys cook and interact with the visitors. I would love to work with them again. They are very inspiring!

Now to stand for 2.5 hrs watching Shakespeare...can it get any better? Jeff was waiting in line for us, so I could be close to the stage. The only problem with being short. This show was amazing and being a groundling...I felt I could be a little more rowdy. Lots of sexual innuendos (that's how I like my Shakespeare) and lots of laughs too. Really amazing and I would be a groundling again any time.

Well time to pack!

Night!

~Erin

I have made the pilgrimage to Hampton! Alternate Title: Day 10

EDIT: I made an error in one of the historian's name, it was not Oliver but Robin. My apologies.

I have made it! Greetings Tudor fanatics!

Soooo....this day was long and coming and I don't know if this post will do it justice. I will try, but man there was so much info.

The day started out beautiful, Jeff was coming with me, so he made sure we had a good breakfast before we headed out. To be honest, I was not hungry. I was just too nervous to eat, but I made sure I stuffed my face. lol

Jeff decided he was going to video tape our ride to Hampton. When he is done with it, I will post it. It should be awesome.  We decided to walk to Canada Water tube station since it was so nice, then hoped on the Jubilee line to Waterloo station. From Waterloo station we took the train to Hampton, which is about a half hour ride. I can't say how amazing it was outside...and of course I am going to be in a kitchen all day. In fact, I think this weekends weather will be the best since we have been in London. Figures!

Main gates - 500th anniversary of Hampton Court Palace

Starting the walk up the drive!

Amazing Palace

Our instructions were to go to the reception office and Richard Fitch was going to meet us there. So at the reception desk, we had to get special name tags to wear.

Very official!

An excited Erin...or really nervous, hard to tell

Richard came and got us and brought us through to the main building and had us do the audio guide till they were ready to help us get started. I was so nervous, my stomach was doing flips. We had done this before, but there was some new stuff added since we were there last. Since they are celebrating the 500th anniversary, there are special activities happening till the end of august. We made our way to the main court to see the Henry VIII come in with his courtiers.

Singing and dancing Tudors

I am not sure how accurate this singing and dancing Tudors are, but it was fun to watch and listen to. Marie, maybe we can find something like this for the choir. Jeff has some video! 

I think this is Henry...they really didn't say! lol

It was a fun thing to watch, but I think anyone who has to do protocol work for Royalty would be kinda offended. lol

Heading back to the kitchens, we watched Robin (My mistake yesterday - it was not Oliver - I apologize for that.) & Zak working the roasting meat. The great thing is that anyone can have a go at it. In fact, they encourage it. Richard had us start with Jorge who was playing the kitchen clerk. His specialty is period handwriting and manners. we watched him chat with all the visitors and get them to sign the visitor book they were creating. He even created a nice Tudor letter for our visit and sealed it with his personal seal.

Our personal letter from Jorge

His amazing handwriting

Jeff had a go at creating a ledger list.

Jeff's ledger

Jorge was telling us all about the paper and that it was important to have this linen paper as they had examples that are well over 2000 years old. Modern paper is just not the same, it is too acidic and won't keep like historical parchment. We talked about inks and how cheap it was to make, and sealing wax. I really want to learn how to write like this. :) He then had us help him set up a Tudor table to talk about table manners. He explained how strict they were in Tudor time and how the table was set and the dishes used. This is very interesting!

A Tudor table setting

The table linen is better quality than the linen smocks I own. Sigh, my standards need to go up I think.

Once we were done with learning with Jorge, Richard had us come back to the kitchen area and work on some recipes. First up was Pudding of an Ox (or blood/black pudding) with Marc. Now I missed the messy part of making it, but I was there to stuff them. :)

Getting instruction on using the horn to stuff the pudding.

getting ready to stuff

poking in the stuffing

pushing the stuffing down, making sure no air is in there.

Pleased with my sausage. :)

The second dish I was working on was Sorge (sp?)

This dish was really easy and Jeff and I completed it together. First was the chicken Richard had been boiling for some time. Then we needed to get some hard-boiled eggs going.

Richard checking the chicken

getting the spices ready

So the recipe calls for eggs whites and egg yolks, chicken, vinegar (vine, ale or cider) sage, galangal, ginger and cloves. A very simple recipe. Jeff placing the very heavy bronze pot on the fire with the eggs inside.

Jeff putting on the water for the eggs

Eggs are on

 Jeff and I worked together to get the spices ready. The ginger and galangal were dry so we had to shave it before placing it in the brass mortar and pestle. We started with the ginger, then ground it fine in the brass M&P. Once it was a nice consistency, we dumped it into the very large marble mortar with a wooden pestle. We did 2 cloves next, it was recommended to chop the clove a bit before using the mortar. The last one was the galangal, we also shaved this before putting it in the M&P as it was very fibrous and like a dried mushroom (which it is not). Once all the spices were done, they were placed in the large mortar and pestle and the fresh sage was added. the technique to get the fresh sage to mix was really interesting. Richard showed me the proper technique and it had a unique sound, when done right. I need one of these!

The herb and spice mixture

When the eggs were done, we needed to peel them (damn eggs are just like that lunch we did), then we needed to separate the yolks and whites. the yolks were then added to the large mortar and mixed together with the spices. Once it was well mixed, we added malt vinegar to the mixture to get a wet consistency (like a deviled egg). It was quite a bit of vinegar, but the flavour was really nice. Then I shredded the whites into the mortar as Jeff stirred it with a spoon. I then placed the mixture into the bottom of the bowl. Richard recommended that I smooth out the top before placing the shredded chicken on top.

The egg mixture going into the bowl

Below is the final dish, this recipe is served cold and boy was it delicious!

chicken on top - the final dish

This ends day 1 of my Tudor adventure. All I can say is that this is all I have ever wanted to do, I am in heaven!

~Erin

July 20 Update

Sorry for the blog updates...it seems I didn't have the blog updating when I was updating the campaign site. Sigh...

Well so now this will be all updated for when I leave in 2 days! 2 DAYS! OMG!

I am so excited, airbnb has been booked, flights booked, travel in and around secured, visits planned and finally the basic itinerary for Hampton!

So the itinerary is like this:

July 22nd: Fly to London (red eye)
July 23rd: land - head to accomodations.
July 23rd to 25th: be london bums (lol I haven't decided which museums we will hit)
July 25-26th: visit with friends before they head back to Canada. (and an 80's bday party)
July 26-27th: back to London
July 27-28th: The Mary Rose Museum in Portsmouth and Weald & Downland Open Air Museum in Singleton (Where they filmed the Tudor Monastery Farm)
July 28-August 3rd: London.
August 3rd: Fly back to Ottawa.

Lucky me I get to go to Kew Palace on the 31st for some historical cooking and then 2 days at Hampton (August 1-2).

I am so excited. Museums I want to go to while visiting: National Portrait Gallery, London Museum, British Museum, National Gallery, Westminster Cathedral, Buckingham Palace, Hampton Court Palace, Kew Palace/Gardens, Mary Rose Museum and Weald & Downland Open Air Museum.

It will be busy, but so much fun!

My goal will be to post something everyday for you!

Hampton, here I come!

~Erin

July 11 Update

The sheath has been won! YAY! See who the winner is here:

And the winner is....

~Erin

July 6 Update

So we are now 2 weeks out from when I fly to London! :) I am so excited! I just have a couple of things I need to plan, like what sightseeing pass I need to get and money to pay for food. :) With Airbnb I have access to kitchens so I hope to eat breakfast and pack lunches as much as possible. That way if I find something really neat, I can get it! :)

Thank you everyone for the donations. I really appreciate it!

If anyone was planning on donating, please contact me offline, as now it will take too long for Paypal to get the funds in my account for me to exchange. But I can still get your donation on this site if you want.

Thank you again, I can't believe we are almost at the end for fundraising, but the beginning of the adventure!

~Erin

June 20 Update (yes this is late, lol)

Hi Everyone!

I know it has been quite quiet here, but I have been busy planning, but I wanted to let you all know that I have booked my flight and accommodations! I will be flying out of Ottawa on the 22nd with an overnight flight. Thankfully the funds you all donated helped my buy my plane ticket (and boy was it expensive!) I will be cooking on August 1st at Hampton, and meeting some of the historians on July 31st.

If anyone is still thinking about donating, your donation will go towards my accommodations that I have just booked (or my travel card when I am in London). Thank you so much for helping me get there!

I can't wait to start cooking! :) If you have any questions please email/Facebook me.

Erin

March 25th Update - D is for Dinner

I was very lucky in March to be invited by Alan Neal from CBC's Radio One program All in a Day to cook something Tudor for their "D is for Dinner" segment.

I decided to cook 2 recipes for the show. I made a Tarte Owte of Lent (cheese tart) a recipe from Hampton Court and Gyngerbrede (gingerbread).

Here is my Twitter pic before going into the studio on the 25th. You can follow me @emeloteofcalais on twitter.

 

Here is the picture of the tart in question. :)

Tarte Owte of Lent (cheese tart) a recipe from Hampton Court

The recipe called for Cheshire cheese which I had never had before. I found it in the cheese section at Farm Boy in Cornwall. What I found really interesting is that it had a similar consistency as feta cheese.

So it was a lot of fun being on the radio. Here is the sound bite, if you want to hear the segment.

All in a Day - D is for Dinner - Sound Clip

Article with Recipes

I was really nervous that it would turn out...there are always things I would want to do to change adjust the recipe, but all in all I was happy with the results.

:)

~Erin

March 18 Update Part 2

So I was very lucky, Fundrazr asked to feature me in their blog. Here is the blog article for the fundraiser!

~Erin

Erin Is Cooking And Crowdfunding Her Way To England

March 18 Update

So spring is trying to make its way to Ottawa, and it always busy at this time of year at work. I have been busy working on some Arts and Sciences classes for Practicum in February. I did my first embroidery in the Bayeaux Tapestry stitch, so I have been a bit busy.

Here is my Redditgifts Medieval exchange gift that went to New Zealand. I hope she liked it. :)

Inspiration image - Bayeux Tapestry

My outlining work

The finished piece

Framed.

But with all that I was featured on the Fundrazr blog this past week. It is very exciting as it gets the word out to a larger audience.

Read it here: Erin is cooking and crowdfunding her way to England

I am still waiting to hear back from Hampton Court about the date I selected in August. Once confirmation happens then I can start looking into flights.

The donations are still coming in, so thank you to all who decided to donate. If you can please forward my fundraiser to your social media. The more people know the better it is.

Thank you everyone for your support!

Skirret: the forgotten Tudor vegetable

It has been a bit busy here at home. I have a couple of projects that are due in April, so I will be focusing on those. I will post some cool tidbits I am finding out about Tudor cooking.

As always, if you can share this page it would be appreciated. :)

Today's cool fact: Skirret: The forgotten Tudor vegetable

~Erin

February 26th Update - Important!

Hi everyone, sorry it has been a bit quiet here, but I have been busy finding out ways to save money. I also have been trying to promote this as well. I had some really great feedback about this campaign especially since I am asking for more than I originally fundraised.

So I cam up with hopefully a solution to this, any funds that I don't need after all my expenses (whether or not at goal) will go directly back to the Ottawa Food bank.

So if it only costs me $2500 and I raised over that, then the extra will go to the food bank. So they benefit as well.

So far I have a few leads on cheap accommodation, travel and flights. So this is excellent. If anyone has ideas for sponsors please sens me a message

So when I have a change I will update my main page to reflect that change.

~Erin

February 16th Update

Wow, it is hard to believe we have already done 2 weeks! We are almost at a quarter of the goal. It has been wonderful to see such support.

I was approached by Fundrazr to do an interview for a future blog post. I am excited about that, hopefully it will help the campaign get more reach to more donors on this site. I will let you know when that is live.

Made some progress for flights - my friend Sue suggested a couple of ways to find cheaper flights as she goes to visit family often in England. YAY!

I am still waiting for sound bites to finish my video. :P I am slow but I have been working on my Reddit gifts Medieval Secret Santa gift. I finished it yesterday, so now I need to frame it and send it to New Zealand!

As always, please share this campaign to get the word out.

Thank you already for all the support!

~Erin

February 12th Update

We are getting closer to the weekend and Jeff had made a great discovery for me on accommodations! if that works out, then we will have a few cheaper options. Super excited about that! So a few housekeeping items I have to do, I need to send the email out to confirm I would like to be at the first weekend in August's demo. Along with questions as to what I will be doing or what I will be able to get involved in.

Everything is progressing well, I also have a line on possibly a good airfare. Fingers crossed on that! :)

If everything works out, then I will modify what I need for this trip.

Thanks for the donations so far, and please if you can share this campaign!

Hugs,
~Erin

February 10th Update

Well with the start of our second week of campaigning we have reached 21%! How awesome is that!

I am currently looking into flights, it is possible I will need to fly into Paris and take the train to London, might be quite a bit cheaper.

If anyone knows a travel agency that would be willing to donate a flight, that would be excellent. I would be able to put up their logo and contact information on my blog.

Please share these post on your Facebook or twitter pages, the more people see it, the more likely donations will come it.

I appreciate all the donations so far, thank you! And a thanks to Jane Allen for offering her home. :) Hopefully we can coordinate.

~E

PS. Happy Valentine's week! XOXOXO

February 5th Update

WOW Everyone! I can't believe we cracked $1,000 yesterday! With all the donations this campaign has moved to the first page of the Arts & Creative section, and yesterday I was on page 2 of the Trending section, but this morning we are on page 6. Boo! So lets see if we can get back on the 2nd page (or even the first). Please consider sharing this campaign on your social network pages. :)

We have had some great movement on this fundraiser. Thank you to everyone who has contributed or shared it. The more people can hear about it the better!I want to send a special thank you to David Gotlieb (aka Dafydd ap Alan) for his amazing offer for our Society of Creative Anachronism (SCA) friends! He is offering up one of his leather rapier sheaths as a fundraising prize! Attached is a picture of the rapier sheath for Baroness Keresteken Janzdochtere on the occasion of her elevation to the order of the Pelican. If you are interested in one (and they are amazing!) read up on his blog for more information:

Leather Goods for the Discerning Kraken

As some readers may know, Lady Emelote participated in a CBC fundraiser for the Ottawa Food Bank last year and as part of the program was granted her food wish of cooking at Hampton Court in the Tudor Kitchen.

Leather Goods for the Discerning Kraken - Win a custom rapier sheath - Fundraiser for a research trip for Lady Emelote

Elevation Rapier Sheath by David Gotlieb

I am in the works to put together a few fundraising ideas and events. If you have some ideas, please let me know.

I am not sure if people are aware, but if you are not comfortable in donating online, I will take them in person as well. I will even put it up here and it will show in the total. As you can see by my donation from Santa (thanks Mom and Dad!).

Please spread the word.

~Erin/Emelote

February 4th Update

Well last night was really beautiful, with the temperature changing, I had the opportunity to do some snowshoeing (and Spa) in Chelsea, QC. The full moon was out and the park quiet. While I was enjoying the weather, you guys have been busy sending in donations! HOW AWESOME IS THAT!?! I would get a notification on my phone.

Local Québec cider before snowshoeing

A snack from the restaurant at Le Nordique Spa

I am so excited and humbled at my friends, family and strangers who are donating to my cause. I am so excited about this project and hope that I can fundraise enough to maybe even bring my husband. :) Please pass this information along to others who may be interested in helping me out.

Thank you everyone! :)

~E

It has begun!

I have received my first donation. YAY! *applauds* I am so excited that this has started. I hope that I can get some traction and sharing happening. I am waiting to hear back from CBC as to when they will talk about this fundraiser. :) It is very exciting.

I posted on the campaign site that I have selected my weekend to go. (Still need to let Chris know, lol) but I want to head there for the first weekend of August. It will be the best time, I will be able to watch the demo they have and hopefully participate in the experimental part as well.

There is still lots of logistics that need to happen, and I want to clarify what exactly I will be able to do at HCP, but it takes time.

On another note, I have been very lucky to be corresponding back in forth with Tudor Tailor guru Jane about some items we talked about at the workshop in Chicago. When I have more information, I will let you know. Maybe I can try and meet up with them at their shop when I am in the UK. Sigh...it would be wonderful!

Just a quick update, I am hoping to have a video up by the weekend to help promote the fundraiser. 

Thank you everyone!

~Erin

The Reason I am Here!

FINDING FUNDS TO FULFILL MY FEAST FOOD FANTASY

I raised $3310 for the Ottawa Food Bank in 12 days! In return, I’ve been invited to fulfill my dream of cooking at England’s historic Hampton Court Palace this summer. Please help me raise the money I need to get there.

Read below about how I met CBC Radio’s Food Fantasy Challenge, and the fundraising I did for the Ottawa Food Bank. It’s a great cause, but my new challenge is raising the money needed to accept the palace’s special invitation.

I will need a budget of $5000 to travel to Hampton Court. This will cover the economy flight and train tickets from London to Hampton Court, and basic accommodation/food.

In my current situation I could not possibly afford this dream trip on my own. It will be necessary to raise all the funds I need to travel to Hampton Court.

Help me make my fantasy a reality. Please make a contribution—any amount, no matter how small, is welcome and deeply appreciated. Each donation brings me closer to my goal.

I will give good karma back into the universe in return for this unique experience. (that is what this blog is for!)

I believe it’s important to give back. To show my gratitude for your support I will:

• Write to this blog about my journey that contributors can follow and stay in the loop
• Share my favourite recipes and pictures of my trip online for all
• Teach a class in my community (and beyond perhaps!) about the experience and what I learned, possibly with a hands on cooking demonstration
• Apply what I have learned at Hampton Court Palace by cooking a Tudor feast for my community sometime in the year following my travel
• Encourage my community and my contributors to continue their support of the Ottawa Food Bank (see link the button on the right side) and the many people who rely on their generosity. I will do this by promoting the Food Bank on my blog, at my classes and at my feast

Please help me make my dream come true! 

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