'Naught but yellow and white'
My Week 41 of WolfCrawl
The best page
On the table this week
The best page of the book of the Trilogy
We don't need to debate this at all, it's as clear as day: it's page 437. Thurston is back! Healthy and lively, still a little weak, the food doesn't seem to have been very good on the war campaign.
Why do I like Thurston so much? Because he has been a friend to Cromwell for all these long years and I want to believe that Thurston will stay at his side until the bitter end. However, I think that Cromwell does not want to drag anyone from his closest circle into his downfall and will let his most loyal followers go in time. The other two I want to believe will stay loyal to Cromwell are Rafe Sadler and Christophe (I'm leaving out Richard and Gregory Cromwell as family members, I'm pretty sure about them).
We WolfCrawlers don't have much to celebrate, but Thurston's return deserves to be celebrated, so fill your glasses and shake a leg!
Say, say, 1540-40, party over
Oops, out of time
So tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1537
The Bean King by Jacob Jordaens, between 1635 and 1655
‘Naught but yellow and white’
Lent is not for Thurston, he is an English man and not German or French, who can also easily live off plants and grass in his opinion. And Fish is not good for an English brain (the salt water!), meat is the way to go. He has his sources where you can get good meat even during Lent, but Cromwell doesn't want to know anything about it. Thurston is not comforted by the fact that the king allows eggs and cheese during Lent. But Chapuys sent them good olive oil. With a piece of bread it is a delicious little snack when you're already sick of fish.
‘I have no strength to beat anybody. I want a rib of beef. I could kill Christ for a taste of bacon’. Thurston during Lent 1537Still Life with Eggs by Luis Melendez, around 1760/16701
‘God forgive me, but I wonder why he ever made pike?’
So there’s plenty of fish this week: Pike with rosemary and fried onions for supper with Call-me and cod with garlic, saffron and fennel for supper with Richard Riche. At the end of the meal with Call-Me there is almonds, dried fruit, figs and cheese.
I noticed a few things: Call-Me and Richard Riche seem to be taking on more of a life of their own, seeming to become more important players at court, and this was the first time either of them had been asked to Cromwell's table individually. That seems to reflect their changing role? And I don't trust either of them.
The other was that Cromwell has been able to draw on the full range of culinary delights again since Thurston has been back (even in Lent). The supper invitations and his plan to give the king a huge marzipan cake with gilded balls on top . All possible because the chef is back again!
Still Life with Fish by Clara Peeters, between 1612 and 1621
‘The boy who carried the asparagus, that was my boy. The boy who sliced the apricots was mine too.’ Cromwell to Margaret Pole2 I thought of these lines again because I realised this week that Christophe is always the one who serves the food at Cromwell's house. At dinner with Chapuys recently and again this week at the suppers. This shows how much Cromwell trusts Christopher, but also that he is aware that his opponents could resort to similar tricks and have infiltrated him with personnel.
‘I like to see a woman show her appetite’
Jane craves cherries, peas and quails during her pregnancy, which is an unusual combination, but as long as she likes it, why not? The quails are rubbed in spices, basted with honey and then roasted.
Still Life with Cherries and Cheese by Georg Flegel, 1635
Culinary side notes this week:
Fish and ale is scarce in Calais
The king stuffs himself with sugar (according to Thurston)
Wine and wafers at the christening of Edward Seymour’s girl
The return of Gardiner would be like hemlock in a salad
Cromwell has finally his own wine store at the Tower
The King getting roasted dottrels for dinner and
Mary betting her breakfast on a game of bowls.
The painting is from a later time than I usually use here, but the only one I found with mainly eggs and cheese.
Wolf Hall, Chapter Devil’s Spit, Page 521
Party like it's 1537 baby!
& that's a great observation about Christophe serving the food as a way for Cromwell to protect himself from anyone trying to use his own methods against him.
I do love a good Andrea Week!
Two things jumped out at me, slightly off-piste…
Good for Clara Peeters painting those fish because lord knows that they must have smelt like by them time she’d finished .
And I misread your last line as ‘a game of bowels’, which is probably down to the nurse in me, but then again quite likely after eating that lot.