Manx Viking Kitchen: Foods

When considering a Manx Norse kitchen, I think it's plausible that most foods found in Viking context in Dublin or York would be readily available on the Isle of Man. With that in mind, here are some preliminary lists of foods that might be found in a Manx Viking household (Or encampment! I'm quite looking forward to tourney season).

My sources for this initial round of research include Jennifer Baker's What Were Vikings Eating As Food and the Viking Answer Lady's Viking Foods. (Also, The Viking Food Guy is one of the best resources for Norse foods that I know of, and he is in my home kingdom of An Tir, as is Meistara Kaðlin in Stórráða.)

These are foods that have been documented to Viking context on the Isle of Man*, Northumbria and Scotland, or Ireland:

Proteins:
Beef*, pork, mutton, poultry*, seafoods including cod*, herring*, mussels and salmon. Also hares,* extinct around 1000 CE and then reintroduced (but I don't eat lagomorphs, thank you, Richard Adams).

Dairy:
Milk, butter, cheese, cream, skyr.

Grains/Legumes:
Barley*, fava beans, oats*, garden peas, wheat, emmer* and spelt*.

Fruits:
Apples/crabapples*, blackberries, cherries, elderberries, raspberries, rose hips, sloes, strawberries.

Figs and grapes may have been imported.

Nuts:
Hazelnuts*, pine nuts (imported from Scotland), walnuts.

Vegetables:
Beets, cabbage*, carrots/wild carrots*, celery, turnips

Herbs & Seasonings
Specific to my area: Calendula, coriander/cilantro, dandelions, dill, fennel, mint, nettles*, winter savory*. Black mustard, sea salt, poppyseed. Honey.

Herbs and seasonings would have been easy to import from more distant parts of the Viking world, so I'll include watercress, cumin, mustard, and horseradish,  lovage, parsley, thyme, marjoram, wild caraway, juniper berries, and garlic as other plausibilities.

*Found specifically on Man. 

At some point, I'd really like to get my hands on whatever archaeological reports are available for Manx Viking sites. What I've presented above is very much my preliminary research, relying on the wonderful efforts of others, to whom I extend my gratitude for their hard work and willingness to share.

Sources:

Baker, Jennifer: What Were Vikings Eating As Food. Web resource.

Manx Wildlife Trust: http://www.manxwt.org.uk/manx-wildlife/manx-mammals

Ward, Christie: Viking Foods. Web resource.

Where Did The Summer Go?

Prize bag I made for Egils.

Well, that went fast.

Summer zipped by like a shearwater skimming over the waves. We went to five events over the course of tourney season: Summits Spring Coronet, Egils, AnTir/West War, September Crown and Summits Fall Coronet. Despite my aspirations to make all the things, I did not get in a lot of crafting time between the start and end of the season. It was still great, though. Gwyn got a new linen tunic in time for Egils, I made an embellished satchel for one of the prizes at the event, and I've been steadily (slowly) working on a pair of nalbound socks. Oh, and a hand-stitched hood and some leather stab-bound journals and some pincushions. And a bit of scroll-painting. Ok, maybe a bit more than I first thought.

For next year, we want to work on adding a canvas tent to our gear. We have a yurt that we haven't set up yet; it needs a new khana and additional rafters. Having had a yurt in the past and knowing how much work it can be to set one up, I'd like to get an additional canvas tent that will set up more easily for smaller events. Gwyn isn't wildly enamored of long tents/wedges, so it might be a wall tent. We shall see.

From there, we're going to work on additional camp furnishings. We have a couple of good, wooden camp chairs. I have all my old slant-sided tourney chests, but as those take up more room in the van, Gwyn is going to make some six-board chests. We've got camp tables and fairly decent lighting. More lighting would be very nice. With the fire season we just had, we had to rely on battery/solar powered lighting an awful lot.

With bedding, we are just about done with the foam camping pads on the ground. Next year, we're going to try memory foam over an air mattress, possibly with a rope or slat bed to support it. I dislike air mattresses, but the memory foam might mitigate most of what I don't like about them. Otherwise, our bedding is excellent. Flannel sheets and a down quilt with wool blankets on top have kept us warm through several very cold evenings. I'd like to make an embellished wool bedspread for next year, so the bed will be both warm and pretty.

For personal kit, we both need more garb, especially Gwyn. He needs a good wool coat, cold weather gear, and a few more pairs of pants and tunics. Also, shoes and a decent satchel. I could use a few more apron dresses and a new coat (I've got some great brown diamond-pattern wool for this). We both could use some nicer garb for court. For him, I'm thinking black pants, white tunic, red overtunic or lapped coat. For myself, I'd like a black apron dress, white underdress and something in forest green to go over the top. Maybe some kind of coat.

Anyway, so, a ton of projects for the short days and long months of the coming seasons. I'm already looking forward to camping under the stars again when the sun returns in spring.