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 "What is it with witches and cannibalism?"
(Sabrina Spellman)


What's a coven to do?






Read more]]> (Steven Posch) Culture Blogs Fri, 11 Jan 2019 07:27:08 -0800
Riddle Me This



This is why there were so many reforms!

But I'm getting away from riddles. Riddles were amusing but they also offer lessons for seeing beyond the surface to the true nature of things. Avoid distraction by discerning with wisdom. Here's Riddle 74 in a translation by Paull Franklin Baum (you can see the original text here). I'll put the answer in a comment. What do you think it is? ;-)

I’m a wonderful thing,     a joy to women,
to neighbors useful.     I injure no one
who lives in a village     save only my slayer.
I stand up high     and steep over the bed;
underneath I’m shaggy.     Sometimes ventures
a young and handsome     peasant’s daughter,
a maiden proud,     to lay hold on me.
She seizes me, red,     plunders my head,
fixes on me fast,     feels straightway
what meeting me means     when she thus approaches,
a curly-haired woman.     Wet is that eye.

Read more]]> (Kate Laity) Studies Blogs Tue, 29 May 2018 03:31:05 -0700
If Pagans Had a Food Taboo, What Would It Be?






Read more]]> (Steven Posch) Culture Blogs Sat, 12 May 2018 05:43:33 -0700
Rediscovering Cinco De Mayo



        4 ears corn
        1/2 cup mayonnaise
        1 1/2 cups sour cream
        1/4 cup freshly chopped cilantro leaves
        1 cup freshly grated Parmesan
        1 lime, juiced
        Red chili powder, to taste
       2 limes cut into wedges, for garnish
    (Recipe from Tyler Florence)





Read more]]> (Colleen DuVall) Culture Blogs Sat, 05 May 2018 13:48:29 -0700

My festive First-Day-of-Spring breakfast:

  • Steamed asparagus
  • Toasted sesame egg bread
  • Fresh farmer's cheese with garden chives
  • Ostara eggs with hot sauce
  • Fresh strawberries

Read more]]> (Steven Posch) Culture Blogs Tue, 20 Mar 2018 07:25:08 -0700
Food and Cooking in Minoan Crete



Crete is an island, so obviously fish and seafood were (and still are) a valued food source. The lovely Minoan fisherman above, from a fresco found in Akrotiri, is holding a large catch of mahi-mahi, also known as dolphinfish (yes, Minoan art is so accurate, we can identify the species of animals and plants the artists painted). In addition to fresh and salted fish, the Minoans ate octopus, squid, and shellfish like mussels and limpets.

The interesting thing is, eventually fish and seafood came to be seen as "poor people's food" and other meats became status symbols. The Minoans had large livestock herds, both privately owned and belonging to the temples in the big cities. From these they got beef, goat, mutton/lamb, and pork. They also hunted deer, grouse, and rabbit and ate snails, though we don't know whether the snails were farmed like they do in France today or simply collected from the wild. Bear in mind, meat was an expensive food that not everyone could afford.

Now, don't panic - the Minoans didn't survive on just meat. They also ate fruits and vegetables, lots of them. Chickpeas, fava beans, and lentils provided the base for soups and stews (you might have heard the term pottage - along with bread, this was a staple food in the ancient Mediterranean and Near East). They grew leeks, garlic, and onions and harvested olives from their groves. They also gathered wild mushrooms and wild greens of all sorts as well as wild asparagus and artichokes. Those wild greens, known as horta, are still popular and available in local markets on Crete.

As for fruit, the Minoans had access to the same assortment that the rest of the people around the Mediterranean ate: dates, figs, grapes, pomegranates, and quinces. They ate all of these both fresh and dried. They also enjoyed almonds, pine nuts, and sesame seeds.

As I mentioned above, bread was a staple not just for the Minoans but for everyone in that region and time period. For a shepherd in the hills of Crete, it might be the main source of everyday meals, perhaps with a bit of salt fish and a flask of diluted wine. The Minoans grew barley, rye, and three varieties of wheat, so they had choices in terms of bread, which would have been flattish loaves similar to pita bread or naan. Their bread would have been whole grain, so it would have been quite nutritious.

Dairy was also a big part of Minoan culinary life. Their huge herds provided milk not just from cows but also from goats and sheep. They drank milk, sometimes with herbs steeped in it, and made soft, uncured cheeses from it as well, much like you find in Crete even today.

For seasoning they had olive oil, of course, and wine vinegar. They boiled down seawater for salt - an easy source for an island culture. And for the sweet things in life they had not just honey but also boiled-down grape juice. They may also have made date sugar the way the Egyptians did.

Speaking of seasoning, the Minoans had a huge variety of herbs available for their cooking and seasoning pleasure: anise, bay laurel, coriander, cumin, dill, dittany, fennel, lavender, marjoram, myrtle, oregano, parsley, poppyseed, rosemary, rue, saffron, sage, thyme, and verbena. That makes for quite a nice spice cabinet, don't you think?

What have I forgotten? Oh, drinks. I suspect that, like much of the Bronze Age world, the Minoans avoided drinking plain water since it wasn't necessarily safe. Instead, they had quite a few beverages to choose from. We know they made beer, mead, and wine, and there's evidence that they added resins to their wine to make the ancient precursor to retsina. They probably drank their wine diluted just like everyone else in that time period and region. They also drank milk, as I noted above, and made tea from the various herbs they had available.

If you look at the Minoan diet as a whole, it doesn't look a whole lot different from the way the people in rural areas of Crete eat today - though they now have the newer imports from the Americas like potatoes and tomatoes, foods that were unknown in the Bronze Age Mediterranean. It's a very healthy way of eating, and quite delicious, too.

In the name of the bee,

And of the butterfly,

And of the breeze, amen.


Read more]]> (Laura Perry) Paths Blogs Tue, 23 Jan 2018 04:56:23 -0800
Minoan Cooking: A taste of the ancient world



First of all, one thing the Minoans didn't have was hearths. When we think of ancient societies, or even people during the Middle Ages, we tend to think of large fireplaces or at least hearths (without the chimney) where the cooking was done. But Crete, where the Minoans lived, has a warm climate most of the year so heating wasn't a high priority for the Minoans. In fact, keeping cool during the long, hot summer was pretty important to them, just as it is now to the people who live there. They didn't have hearths in their homes or in the larger buildings like the temple complexes. So how did the Minoans cook? With braziers and portable ovens.

UPDATE: It turns out, the Minoans did indeed have hearths, but only in domestic homes. For a long time, archaeologists thought the Minoans didn't have hearths because there was no evidence of them in any of the temple complexes. This remains true; apparently heating in the temples was done via portable braziers, and the kitchens also used braziers - and may even have been separate outbuildings that have long since decomposed (having the kitchen be a separate building helps to reduce fire hazard). But the ordinary people in ancient Crete did have small, chimney-less hearths in their homes. They appear to have used these for heat and for some amount of cooking, though they also used portable braziers for indoor cooking as well as cooking over coals outdoors, perhaps in the garden areas that appear to have flanked most homes.

The terracotta oven/brazier combo pictured at the top of this post is from Akrotiri. To use it, you would pile some coals into the opening and let it heat up. Then you could cook on the top by setting a pot on it or putting your flatbreads directly on the terracotta. Or you could bake food near the coals in the oven - say, a few small birds or fish or perhaps a loaf of bread.

The Minoans also made what we might call kebabs: pieces of meat and vegetables on skewers, roasted over coals. Here's a nifty little kebab grill thingy from Akrotiri:


Minoan grill from Akrotiri


It's easy to see how they could have piled coals between the two pieces then grilled food above the heat source. I like the handles on the sides - that would make it easy to pick the pieces up and store them when they're not in use, without getting soot on your hands. The air holes would also keep your coals from dying out.

During the heat of the summer, the Minoans (like many ancient people) probably cooked outdoors to keep from heating up their homes. For this kind of cooking, they used footed terracotta pots that look an awful lot like ancient versions of the familiar iron cauldron. You can see this kind of cooking in action in the modern world via Minoan Tastes, a group of archaeologists, potters, and cooks who re-create Minoan food and cooking for the public as an educational activity. I'm hoping that one day this awesome group will publish a cookbook so those of us who can't attend their events will still be able to sample Minoan cooking.

Would you like to cook on a brazier like this? Bear in mind, food cooks in the same length of time whether you're doing it on a gas or electric cooktop or a brazier; it's the "extra" chores like chopping the firewood that take so much more time. The entire world cooked over coals in one way or another until just a century or two ago, and in some places they still do. So this is a bit of ancient history that stretches all the way up into our world.

In the name of the bee,

And of the butterfly,

And of the breeze, amen.



Read more]]> (Laura Perry) Paths Blogs Tue, 05 Sep 2017 05:13:42 -0700