Brigitte Webster is a culinary historian with a teaching degree in history & cookery. Four years ago she finally followed her dream of sharing Tudor history with like-minded people and swapped the classroom for her home, which she spent sixteen years into turning into a private Tudor heaven. There she welcomes small groups to experience Tudor history through material culture and actual home-made Tudor food in an all authentic Tudor residence.
Brigitte has devoted the last four years to the re-creation of late medieval-circa 1700 recipes from England, France, Italy, Germany, Austria and Spain. Each re-created dish was photographed and given to visitors to taste. Some recipes had modern measurements and cooking instructions added.
When Brigitte began to share her re-creations on social media, she noticed that there was a genuine demand for recipes. People started asking for a cook book. Finally, popular Tudor Janet Wertman, author of The Seymour Saga who, while visiting Brigitte and experiencing her food, encouraged Brigitte to collate recipes into a book.
A Banquet at the Old Hall is a hardback, limited edition recipe collection by Brigitte and invites Tudor history fans to participate in 16th century cooking. Hopefully it will inspire readers to create the recipes and in doing so, connect with people from the past as well as Brigitte and family at the Old Hall! The book features 21 recipes, each one showing a picture of the finished dish, and also gives the reader an insight in what the banqueting course entailed. Some recipes have their original text displayed to help the reader appreciate the challenges in following an 16th century recipe which regularly assumes certain steps. Each modernized recipe also gives the details of the original source.
According to Brigitte, “With this book, it is hoped that even total beginners and not very keen cooks are tempted to re-create a little bit of Tudor history for the forthcoming festivities.”
Brigitte also offers Tudor cooking classes on days and weekends, and is always happy to give advice from a distance for those who get a bit stuck in the depth of Tudor recipes.
At the moment she is busy translating an exciting 16th century royal Austrian recipe collection into English and further recipe books are in the pipe line. For the autumn of 2020, YouTube Tudor cookery clips are planned.
The cook books are only available directly from Brigitte at brigittewebster@tudorexperience.com and retail at $50 plus shipping. Each book is signed and can include any message of your choice.
