bucellatum

[Anonymous]

I was reading on Matt's site his recipe for hardtack and was wondering where he found the recipe.<br>
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www.larp.com/legioxx/messgear.html<br>
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Medieval hardtack or biscuit was "twice baked" - hence the word "biscuit". You take regular bread and grind it into powder; add water, and sometimes salt and oil; and form it into cakes before baking again. Gibbon reckons that the Romans used this double-baking method and the Byzantine <em>voukellon</em> was also apparently double-baked. I was wondering how likely it was that bucellatum was also double-baked.<br>
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[aitor iriarte]

Well, my second attempt with Matt's recipe worked better, maybe it was the experience or maybe it was because I baked it twice....<br>
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Aitor <p></p><i></i>

[Matthew Amt]

Avete!<br>
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Hoo boy, got me on the spot again. There IS a basic description (if not exactly a recipe) for making bucellatum somewhere, though my memory is hazy at best, today. Maybe Pliny? I think it was not one of the regular military commentators. But through the haze what I recall is that it was pretty much flour and water, baked hard. I don't remember any suggestion that it was twice baked or made from regular bread.<br>
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I'll fall back on my favorite cop-out: "Find out and let us know, eh?" Then I can add a nice primary reference to my page!<br>
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"When in charge, delegate. When in doubt, mumble."<br>
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Valetemumble,<br>
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Matthew/Quintus <p></p><i></i>

[Anonymous]

I can't find anything useful in Apicius and Gibbon doesn't give his sources. I have discovered that double-baking has a pasturising effect on bread. <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p200.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showUserPublicProfile?gid=danielraymondhoward>Daniel Raymond Howard</A> at: 8/8/04 7:34 pm<br></i>

[derek forrest]

Sorry cannot help with the recipe its too late. However We have been providing bucellati at all our events this year. I thought we could keep on trotting out the same old ones like a museum exhibit but no they disappear. Into the stew to give it body. Into the mouth to suck on like a pebble or even chomped whole by those with good teeth. Suggestions to soften them with wine are ignored. We still manage the odd joke about the lesser of 2 weevils. They don;t though go as fast as other innovation this year fried parsnips. A classsical student introduced them saying they were the favourate of Cato the elder. They are delicious!!! Who needs potatoes. <p></p><i></i>

[Tita Iuventia Martia]

AVETE,
I also tried to bake this popular roman legionaries food :-) ) I used the recipe, which I found on Leg XX web pages - great pages, nice work! I applaud to all members of this Roman group.


I used: flour, olive oil, water and perhaps a pinch of salt - I am not sure about it, because I am a bit sclerotic ;-) ) When I had a dought ready, I made small biscuits (in agreement with pictures and photographs). After that, I putt it in to the electric oven. It backed quite long.

I have to say that i really like this biscuits, especialy when I am on Roman event :-) D He portrays an auxiliary soldier in our group, So he is not so Romanised yet 8)

My comrades from our legion also tasted and they were excited ;-) ) Mostly, they said something about: "It is great, but my teeth.."

So these are my experience about bucelatum :-) )

vale and regards

[Mithras]

The Roman army certainly twice baked its bread, or was supposed to. Procopius tells us that the pernicious praetorian prefect John, to save costs and skim some profit (a Late Roman Army tradition), only had his troop's bread baked once, instead of the customary twice. This meant it went off faster and was already rotten when issued to the troops (who still had to eat it). Some died, others were very sick hock:

Procopus 3.13.12-20

[arklore70]

The Leg XX and Leg VI recipe definitely both work.

It was about as hard as a brick and lasted for nine months until I finished eating the last piece at an event. I am betting it would have lasted a lot longer much like American Civil War Hard Tac, which is similar to my understanding.

To make it taste a bit better, you can always not add the salt and add a bit of honey to it instead; about 4 tablespoons of honey to 4 cups of flour; definitely not as authentic, but it is a bit softer and will last at least a 4 weeks for an event experience has shown.

V/r

[Tita Iuventia Martia]

The Roman army certainly twice baked its bread, or was supposed to. Procopius tells us that the pernicious praetorian prefect John, to save costs and skim some profit (a Late Roman Army tradition), only had his troop's bread baked once, instead of the customary twice. This meant it went off faster and was already rotten when issued to the troops (who still had to eat it). Some died, others were very sick hock:

Procopus 3.13.12-20

Did you mean military bread (panis militare) or biscuits (bucellatum). As far as I know, bread was indeed baked twice, while biscuits were simply baked for a long time (several hours). And of course the biscuits were longer-lasting than the bread.

[Mithras]

I was looking at an English translation, so cannot say which the author meant.

I bake my buccellatum for a very long time, once.

[Dan Howard]

biscuit literally means "twice baked". It seems illogical to claim that bread was baked twice while biscuits were only baked once. The whole point of the second baking was to remove any last traces of moisture and extend the "shelf life" of the product for long marches and voyages.

[A_Volpe]

My first attempt last year at [Leg XX's] recipe was OK...Although the hardtack seemed to have absorbed the 'taste' of a vase of flowers that was near where I mixed the dough at the time - And then having sat in my loculus for...months...acquired the taste of that leather...NASTY.

So...Maybe will try again in the future...

Or, might go with Bent's cookie factory https://www.bentscookiefactory.com/
which continues to make traditional hardtack from the American Civil War.

8)