Medieval Cream of Wheat!

I found a recipe that is not exactly cream of wheat but it has about the same look to it. The amandelye or cream of almond, really, is quite good. It's supposed to be a sauce for fish but it looked good enough for breakfast as well. ;-) I'm going to play with the measurements since it was a bit watery and needed more pepper. Here's the translated original:




[8] For an amandeleye within the fasting time. Take almonds, [9] cinnamon, ginger, a little pepper and a little bread therewith [10] and pass it through a strainer. But it must [11] be well ground up with hot water. One simmers this all together [12] over the fire until it is thick enough and let pot sugar [13] boil with it. When it is off the fire add it [14] and loaf sugar then stir and let cool. In this [15] one lays and serves fried/roast fish. Over [16] this one strews cinnamon powder or white sugar.


What I used:

1 cup of almond flour
1/2 a cup of finely ground plain bread crumbs
1 tablespoon of cinnamon
1/2~ a tablespoon of ginger
1/8~ a teaspoon of pepper
about 1/4 of a cup of brown sugar
1/4 of a cup of white sugar

I brought two cups of water to a boil and then added all the stirred up all the ingredients except the white sugar to the water. I probably could have used a cup and a half of water but it was okay. It looks really watery at first but thickens up nicely after a few minutes. You need to stir this every few minutes until it gets to your desired thickeness. Just like cream of wheat, it clumps.

A note, I have no idea what "pot sugar" is. I have some idea of what loaf sugar is and I know exactly what white sugar is. I used brown sugar but my guess is that pot sugar is really raw sugar. Loaf is probably light brown sugar and white is well, what I use in tea! I'll do more research on this but I'm really not sure. Since I didn't have any raw sugar (something I'll go get later today as I need some vanilla almond milk anyway...and trash bags.) I used brown sugar.

Once you get it to something resembling cream of wheat, take it off the burner and add the white sugar. I ended up adding a bit more pepper and more cinnamon. I think it needs about 1/4 of a teaspoon pepper and 1 1/2 tablespoons of cinnamon. It tasted much better.

Right now, I'm waiting for it to cool but I wanted to write this down so I'd remember later! And yes, though it's a sauce, it's still period and sounded yummy enough to try. ;-)


EDIT: Add raisins. It's delicious.