22 — North Shore News - Friday, November 3, 2000 «Dishing i ambic penta AS they stood on the floor of the Globe Theatre, it’s probable that many in the audi- ence watching Titus Andronicus would have had a pasty for lunch. “Pies were very popular then,” said Sonia Zyvatkauskas. “So you can imagine that when Titus Andronicus talked about grinding up the bones of his enemies for flour, and using the blood to mix it and make a Faste for the pies, and then baking their heads into them and serving it to their mothers, it would really resonate with them.” File it under “Things You Would Never Think About.” Fortunately for us, Sonia and her sister Betty Zyvatkauskas did think about it, and about lots more along the same lines. The printed and bound outcome of their thoughts is the fun and funny Eating Shakespeare: : Recipes and More From the Bard’s Kitchen. It’s a cookbook, based on the meat, veg- etable and sweet dishes consumed by Britons ia the 16th and 17ch centuries, But it’s even more than that. Each recipe appears in its original ver- sion and a modern interpretation. It’s accompa- nied by a suitable quote from one of Shakespeare’s works, and entertaining tales and tips fill the margins. _. For example: “To hash or boil Rabits divers wayes, either in quarters or slices, or cut like small dice, or whole or minced,” becomes ' “Rabbit in Wine Sauce,” is prefaced with a quote from As You Like It, and is accompanied by a list of 16th Century table manners. Apparently, carving up the table with your knife, using it to pick your teeth and wiping it on the tablecloth all fall under the “Don’t” cat- egory. Who'd have thought it? The idea for the book was “kind of sponta- neous,” said Betty. “We thought: ‘What if there were cookbooks back in Shakespeare’s ime?* ” - ~ “And there were tons of them ... rons of them,” said Sonia. The Ontario sibs were in town this week to promote the book, and stopped by News offices on Monday. “The printing press had just been invented,” “said B Betty of the Teagues of books they found. “It was like the Internet is now, there were no coy rights, nobody cared if what they said was true or not — - some had recipes and then at the end it would say: “This has yet to be proved.” The idea was just to get a book out.” But some of the ancient tomes they uncovered had merit. Robert May, for exam- pie, was a professional cook, and, say the Zyvatkauskases, was one of the few authors who actually used measurements in his recipes. “Most said things like ‘use a goodly amount,” ” said Berty. After submitting a detailed proposal to pub- lisher Prentice Hail, the two spent about a year and a half working on the book — Sonia in the library and Betty in the kitchen, working on the modern interpretations. Both are established writers and Betty also studied the culinary arts at George Brown College. Recreating the recipes to meet the accep- tance of modern palates was an interesting chal- lenge, she said. “It really got me thinking about using spices in different ways. I'd get things to a place where I thought it was just right, and then I'd just want to resist adding these other ingredients. With the Veal and Chicken Stew — I thought it might be strange to add cinnamon and sugar, but it’s delicious. It adds a real brightness of flavour.” At times, it was a challenge even to figure out exactly what the ingredients in a recipe were, “One recipe had food colouring and it said ‘to make food blue, use bluebortles.’ I thought it meant flies,” said Sonia. “I thought | would have to see if I could find a handful of bluebor- tle flies and try microwaving them.” Fortunately bluebortles turned out to be flow- crs. Most interesting, said Sonia was the com- myonalities she discovered while doing the research. “If anything, | realized in a lot of ways we haven’t traversed such a great distance since then.” “it's humbling,” agreed Berty. “In history you're standing on someone else's shoulders. and looking down at things. It makes you won- der what people in 400 years will think of the way we do things now.” Deana caster Counter Culture BETTY and Sonia Zyvatkauskas (left to right) researched the recipes of. Shakespeare’s cay and put them together in a nighly entertaining volume. ; “$" icons denote che approximate range of 2 restaurant's entree prices. Restaurants may offer ssme entrees above or below the price Fange indicated. $- $5 w $0 $4- $9 t0 $12 SSS - $10 to $25 SSSS - $13 10 $30 Seuleh PRE Nando’ 's Chickenland 1301 Lonsdale Me, WY 990-: 1530 s Ambleside Chinese Restaurant 1579 Bellevue Ave. WY 926-7371 § Bamboo Gardens 138 W. léth St, MY 984-8888 §$ C-Wok Chinese 1195 Marine Or. 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