Chicken Carcass In An Apple Cider?

[King Brown]

"cock ale: take a cock of half a year old, kill him and truss him well, and put into a cask 12 gallons of ale to which add 4lbs raisins of the sun well picked, stoned, washed and dryed; dates 1/2lb; nutmeggs and mace 2oz. Infuse the dates and spices in a quart of canary 24 hours, then boil the cock in a manner of jelly, till a gallon of water is reduced to two quarts: then press the body of him extremely well, and put the liquor in to the cask where the ale is, with the spices and fruit, adding a few blades of mace: then put to it a pint of new ale yeast, let it work well for a day, and, in two days you may broach it for use, or, in hot weather the second day; and if it proves too strong, you may add more plain ale to palliate this restorative drink which contributes much to the invigorating of nature."

Taken from a collection of old english recipes from 1580 to 1850, mostly for food dishes but the book also has recipes for metheglin (spiced mead) and Wassail (neither of which contain any cock!)

 

[bconnery]

" Infuse the dates and spices in a quart of canary 24 hours,

Canaries are pretty small aren't they?. Wouldn't you need quite a few for a quart?

 

[brettprevans]

i dont beleive this thread is still going. ok so some stuff in history is worth taking note of in brewing. some stuff we should disregard. like this disgusting line of thinking. i mean really.... dead animals in beer :icon_vomit: they used to burn people at the stake, drink water thru lead pipes, etc etc that doesnt mean we should do it now.

im all for ressurecting old brewing methods, ingredients etc (I love Radical Brewing by Mosher) but only when it makes sense.

 

[Muggus]

I'm not too suprised about chicken being used in beer.
How about isinglass? People seem happy enough to chuck that in their beer!

 

[King Brown]

I would say it would have helped to fine the beer, and possibly it was some old tonic that blurred the line between an ale and a hearty meat broth... Im wouldnt actually want to try it, but it is interesting to read up on some of these very archaic brewing practices.

 

[manticle]

Slight thread ressurection but I just read a section in 'making the best apple cider' by Annie Proulx which talks about an old habit of throwing meat into cider.

She recommends against it but suggests the reason it was done was it is a supply of nitrogen which helped the yeast with nutrients. She suggests it was usually done to kick off a stalled fermentation and that proper yeast nutrient is a much better, healthier source.

 

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This was doing the rounds in the Sydney Morning Herald's Column8 a couple of months back. I can't remember the outcome of it though