Armored Turnips
Layers of baked turnip, cheese, butter, and spices
City/Region: Italy
Time Period: 15th Century
Da Vinci was perhaps a vegetarian, but was definitely a gourmand. He even owned a copy of the cookbook where this recipe comes from: De honesta voluptate et validudine (On honorable pleasure and health) by Bartolomeo Sacchi AKA Platina.
These armored turnips are kind of like a medieval version of potatoes au gratin. The addition of powder douce, a mixture of spices, contributes a very medieval flair to the familiar combination of root vegetable, butter, and cheese. What kind of cheese you pick is important, as it’s the main flavor that comes through in the dish. Choose something that you like that melts well and is flavorful, but not overpowering (a blue cheese would be too strong for this).
“Cut up boiled or ash roasted turnips; do the same with rich cheese, not too ripe, but make the cheese pieces thinner than the turnip. In a pan greased with butter or other fat, make a layer of cheese first, then one of turnips; repeat, pouring in spice and butter from time to time. It should be quickly cooked and quickly eaten.”
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2 lbs (700 g) turnips, washed and peeled
- 3/4 lb (340 g) cheese, flavorful but not too strong, I used Fontina and Taleggio
- 1 stick (110 g) salted butter, melted
- Powder douce*
*See notes below.
Instructions:
- Preheat the oven to 400°F (205°C).
- Roast or boil the turnips. I cut mine in half because they were rather large, and boiled them for 15 minutes. Whether you roast or boil the turnips, don’t overcook them because they’ll get cooked more in a little bit. Let the turnips cool.
- Slice the turnips “as thin as the spine of a knife”, and slice the cheese a bit thinner than that, as best you can.
- Coat the bottom and sides of a small casserole dish with a little of the melted butter.
- Place a layer of sliced cheese on the bottom of the dish, cover that with a layer of sliced turnip, then sprinkle a large pinch of the spice mixture over it and drizzle some of the melted butter over that. Repeat the layers of cheese, turnips, spice, then butter until the dish is full, and finish it off with a layer of cheese on top.
- Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, or until the cheese is fully melted and starting to bubble around the sides.
- Let it cool for 5 minutes, then serve it forth.
Notes
- Powder douce, or sweet powder, is a spice mixture that changed slightly from person to person. It typically was made of spices like clove, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and sometimes sugar. I use a little bit of everything for my powder douce.