What food would people eat on special occasions in medieval times?

Answer 1

Got milk? In medieval times there was plenty of cheese. Some people may disagree, but for the purpose of this answer, the tune Greensleeves, supposedly written by King Henry VIII, is pure cheese. His wife Anne Boleyn, the poems she used to read to her husband...cheese. Many of the cottages during medieval times, especially during Christmas time, were pure cheese as in cottage cheese. Unfortunately for King Henry VIII and all those other people that liked to go medieval all over your....well, they had no Velveeta, American cheese or not even any macaroni and cheese, but in terms of dairy products it would appear they did have cheese.

It appears so because after extensive research the best this answer could come up with was a term paper written by an Italian graduate student named Irma Nasso called Formaggi del medioevo, la Summa Laticiniorium di Pantelaone da Confienza, whatever that means. It is unfortunate indeed, but this answer doesn't understand Italian so more research was required. Next, a French culinary historian, whatever that is, wrote an article in Une histoire culinaire du moyen age, entitled; Du Brehemont et D'autres frommages renommes au XV seicle. This was written by a man named Bruno Laurioux, and what he said, assuming the French was translated properly, that the cheeses of medieval times were just about the same as modern times, except the records on cheese and cheese making weren't so hot, so we don't know if the cheese was made from cows milk, goat milk or even sheep. Baaaa! That's moo in French.

The best answer for what cheese in medieval times might have been like is from a book called Food and Feast in Medieval England, mostly because it was written in English so much easier to read. Here then is a sample of what that book had to say:

"Cheese was available in four main varieties: hard (probably of a cheddar type), soft (or cream cheese), green cheese (a very new soft cheese [basically a brick of compressed curds]) and 'spermyse' (cream cheese flavoured with herbs)."

Spermyse? No thank-you, got milk?

Answer 2

1st Answer:

Cheese has been around for centuries and the Romans were great cheese makers, but when the Roman Empire fell in 410 AD much of the cheese making fell away. A few farmers in the mountain areas kept making cheese and the monks did some innovations in cheese that we still have today. Yet, because of the movement of people, the lack of services, and the chaos of the time cheese was something that fell away and there was little progress in making cheese. Edam and Gouda were made in the Netherlands and France had some of the soft cheeses, but other than that it wasn't in use. By the end of the middle ages it was considered unhealthy.

2nd Answer:

According to the very short article a the link below, the collapse of the West Roman Empire was a period in which there was a reduction in transportation of cheeses, and so the types of cheese produced in most areas became more diverse. The British Cheese Board claims there were 700 kinds of cheese in Britain of the Middle Ages, and probably another 400 each in France and Italy.

The time of reduced transportation ended about the time of the end of the Age of Migrations, at about 700 AD, and for the rest of the Middle Ages there was a general increase in trade.

Cheese was one of the most stable food products of the time, and could be stored for extended periods of time, providing and excellent form of protein. It was favored for most of the Middle Ages for that reason, and was widely eaten by people of all classes.

Some cheeses of the Middle Ages were very much as they are today. A cheese described as Swiss cheese would be was being produced in Switzerland in ancient times, and clearly continued to be produced since. Soft cheeses were produced, probably much like brie. Cheddar is believed to be pretty much as it was. I have seen references to cheese that had mold grown on it, as blue cheese does, from old texts. The fact that cheese was produced locally by small makers probably meant that every imaginable sort of cheese was available in most places.

Answer 3

what did people eat on spechal occations in the middle ages