Occasional miscellany: The black broth of Sparta.

The putative recipe appears in The Cook’s Oracle William Kitchiner, who styled himself ‘Dr.’ Despite  the absence of any medical or other degree. Both ‘doctor’ and book are eccentric, delightfully so, in the extreme. A modern critic of Dr. Kitchiner, who in an act of great mercy will go unnamed, cites the satire as an example of a recipe from the Oracle that will not work. The ‘criticism’ is true enough, and imbecilic.

The BLACK BROTH of Lacedæmon will long continue to excite the wonder of the philosopher, and the disgust of the epicure. What the ingredients of this sable composition were, we cannot exactly ascertain. Jul. Pollux says, the Lacedæmonian black broth was blood, thickened in a certain way: Dr. Lister (in Apicium) supposes it to have been hog’s blood; if so, this celebrated Spartan dish bore no very distant resemblance to the black-puddings of our days. It could not be a very alluring mess, since a citizen of Sybaris having tasted it, declared it was no longer a matter of astonishment with him, why the Spartans were so fearless of death, since any one in his senses would much rather die, than exist on such execrable food.--Vide Athenæum, lib. iv. c. 3. When Dionysius the tyrant had tasted the black broth, he exclaimed against it as miserable stuff; the cook replied--“It was no wonder, for the sauce was wanting.” “What sauce?” says Dionysius. The answer was,--“Labour and exercise, hunger and thirst, these are the sauces we Lacedæmonians use,” and they make the coarsest fare agreeable.--Cicero, 3 Tuscul.