bochet
bochet
Probably the best known historical mead recipe is one for ‘bochet’ from ‘Le Menagier de Paris’, a 1393 book of advice from a gentleman to his young wife. The original recipe contains an evocative description of caramelizing the honey to achieve “small globules which burst, and in bursting throw a little black smoke”. Caramelizing honey provides many new flavors, and the inherently risky process of working with boiling sugar probably adds to its appeal. This recipe has captured the imaginations of modern mead makers and is widely made including many variations based on the degree of caramelization of the honey, use of caramelization for a portion or all the honey, and addition of other flavorings.
Given the interest in this recipe, I became interested in seeing what could be found out about bochet in its historical context.
A search for related recipes failed. The core recipe remains unique among historical mead recipes in relying on caramelized honey for fermentation sugars. I have found a recipe with multiple appearances in 16th through 18th century German books, as well as one in Dutch and English texts of the 16th to 17th centuries, that each use caramelized honey to color a mead. These recipes note the coloring effect but not any change in flavor. And in these recipes the caramelized honey is used in relatively small amounts.The use of the term ‘bochet’ for this mead seemed like another route of investigation. But the term is derived from the Latin for beekeeper, a bocher/bocherus, which is confirmed by use of Bochet as a general term for mead in the enormously popular 13th century encyclopedia written by Bartholomaeus Anglicus.
The body of evidence is definitive that ‘bochet’ is a general term, much like ‘mead’, and has no specificity to ‘mead made with carmelized honey’. It is interesting to note that a 1611 French-English dictionary translates ‘bochet’ as either hydromel (mead) or a drink from water sweetened with cinnamon and sugar. This second definition did come in the 17th century to mean this latter spiced drink.
The medicinal context of this later spiced but non-mead bochet is interesting because the 14th century Menagier bochet recipe appears in the portion of the text dedicated to the sick room, and also may be made with spices. There very well may be a direct link between the early spiced mead medicinal recipe made with caramelized honey and the later non-mead medicinal where sugar has replaced the honey.
All that said, bochet is commonly accepted in the mead-making world as a term for mead made with carmelized honey. This seems a perfectly good use for this otherwise obsolete word, and continues the long history of the meanings of words adapting and changing over time.
As for the mead.
I made trials of both the spiced and unspiced versions. The OG was 1.053 using one available deifintion of the size of a sester compared to a pint. Both the size of a pint and a sester varied through the Middle Ages, and other interpretations are plausible.The resulting meads were dry, low alcohol, and had a relatively weak mouth feel. The spiced versions was reasonably well balanced in flavor.
I expect to continue to investigate this.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Da Brescia, Albertano, Jean Bruyant. 1846. Le Menagier de Paris: Traite de morale et d’economie domestique compose vers 1393. Volume 2. Paris. https://archive.org/stream/lemnagierdepari03renagoog
Power, Eileen. 1928. The Goodman of Paris (Le Menagier de Paris): A Treatise on Moral and domestic economy by a Citizen of Paris. Routledge. English translation of the French. Last updated August 16, 2023
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