Medieval Meals: Chickpea Soup

When I walk into a grocery store, I am met with a plethora of protein choices.

Chicken, beef, pork, turkey- you name it, I bet it could find it somewhere.

Peasants in the Middle Ages were a little less fortunate.
Animals were spendy and killing one tended to leave you bereft of whatever economic benefit they were producing for you and your family.

Enter Legumes: The Medieval Protein Staple.

Legumes of all kinds were easy to produce, lent needed nutrients back to the soil, and were a solid source of vegetable protein. Medieval cooks of this time period had both red and white chickpeas to choose from, and once dried, these legumes would last for a long time.

Fortunately for me, I can get a can of chickpeas and skip the step of soaking them to restore them to their natural suppleness. I love technology.

So if you are sitting there, wondering what to make on a chilly winter night and wishing you could be both trendy (vegetarian seems to be in right now) and historical (Hurray! Chickpeas!),

Chickpea Soup is the meal for you!

Here it is. Hearty, homey, healthy. Heavens!

Enough Hs?

Here's our band of soup brothers: Chickpeas, flour, olive oil, black peppercorns, cinnamon, sage, parsley, carrots, and salt.

Do you feel like the cinnamon is the odd man out? 

Me too.

Whisk together the flour, oil, pepper, and cinnamon in a soup pot.
Such a pretty autumn color.

Drain the chickpeas and add them to the pot. Mix with your hands.

We are really getting back to basics with this one.

Add cold water to cover and bring to a boil.

Add sage, the leaves and roots of a handful of parsley, a diced root vegetable.
The recipe suggested a parsnip, but I decided on carrots.
There's something about bright colors in my food that gets me every time.

Though this and the picture about it look very similar, I can assure you that they are from two distinct time periods.

The second picture was taken after the soup had simmered for about an hour, allowing the flavors to mingle.

Salt to taste.

Serve and enjoy.

Side note: I found the cinnamon to be a disconcerting flavor in this soup. While my other taste-testers didn't mind, I kept expecting something like basil instead. Therefore, if desired, feel free to replace the cinnamon with whatever spice you like better. (Just know, this will void you from the self-righteousness gained from saying you made a hundreds of years old recipe.)

Chickpea Soup
Primary source from:
Maestro Martino, Libro de arte coquinaria, in Arte della cucina, Libri di recette: Testi sopra lo scalo, il trinciante e i vini dal XIV al XiX secolo, ed. Emilio Faccioli (Milan: Il Polifiol, 1966), 1: 115-204. 

Modern recipe from: Odile Redon, Francoise Sabban, and Silvano Serventi, The Medieval Kitchen: Recipes from France and Italy, trans. Edward Schneider (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1998), 56-57.

Primary Source: Translated


Grodo of red chickpeas. To make eight platefuls: take a libra [1 libra - about 10 1/2 ounces (300 g)] and a half of chickpeas and wash them in hot water, drain them, then put them in the pot in which they will be cooked. Add half an oncia [1 oncia = about 1 ounce (30 g)] of flour, i.e., "flower" [of wheat], a little good oil, a little salt and about twenty crushed peppercorns and a little ground cinnamon, then thoroughly mix all these things together with your hands. Then add three measures of water, a little sage, rosemary, and parsley roots. Boil until it is reduced to the quantity of eight platefuls. And when they are nearly cooked, pour in a little oil. And if you prepare this soup for invalids, add neither oil nor spices.

Modern Recipe
Ingredients

1 1/4 cups dried chickpeas (or one can of wet)

1 tablespoon flour

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

10 peppercorns, coarsely crushed

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

fresh sage

parsley or parsnip (I used a handful of parsley and one carrot)

salt

Preparation Instructions

Try to get chickpeas that are no more than a year old. The day before, pick through the chickpeas for stones and debris, and wash them. Soak them in warm water over night. (Skip this step if you have canned chickpeas.)

The next day, whisk together the flour, oil, pepper, and cinnamon in your soup pot. Drain the chickpeas and add them to the pot; mix well with your hands. Add cold water to cover. Bring to a boil, skimming away any gray scum that may rise to the surface of the water.

Add a generous sprig of sage (ground works as well), a branch of rosemary, and a handful of parsley or one parsnip, diced. Simmer for 2 hours over very low heat, until the chickpeas are very tender. When done, add salt to taste. It is hard to predict how long the soup will take to cook; much depends on the quality and freshness of the chickpeas.