I love reading historical cooking manuscripts (or transcriptions or translations). I find it fascinating that I can still see the familiar recipes from 400, 500 or 1000 years ago. As we journey through time reading and redacting recipes, you will be able to see the humble beginnings of some of your favorite foods, some just barely recognizable and others with almost no changes.

I am not sure where, or should I say when to start our journey. I have been redacting historical recipes for almost 20 years now. Some are really good, so good that every time I serve them I’m asked for the recipes. Some definitely need tweaking to make them palatable for a modern diner. The oldest manuscript I have used is Apicius who died in 40AD; the most recent is “The Opera of Bartolomeo Scappi 1573”.

I have sucked my husband into my crazy! I have shown him some things I know about baking and he has surpassed my knowledge. I am happy to have him as my “doughboy” (he has named himself this).