425-788-8624
Tues-Sun 5-8 pm, by reservation.
See website for scheduled banquets: www.camlann.org/ feasts_festivals.htm.
If only I could eat like a wench, or a noblewoman, for that matter. In truth, I'm so attached to the roles I've been playing for 30-odd years now that I shudder at the thought of abandoning myself to yet another, even for a single night of medieval-style feasting. I hold historical role-players in a sort of comic awe. I'm charmed by their devotion to their era, and at the same time apprehensive about any attempts to pull me into it--I won't soon forget the girl who was ostracized by my seventh-grade class for going to one too many Renaissance Faires.
So it was with some trepidation on my part (and even more on the part of my husband) that we drove east to Camlann, a simulated 14th-century village perched on a hilltop in Carnation. There we would join in the Mid-Lenten medieval banquet ($40 per person), a many-coursed meat- and dairy-free meal, cooked according to 500- to 600-year-old recipes.
Amid a handful of wattle and daub buildings stands the Bors Hede, Camlann's restaurant. "Greetings travelers!" said a man with a trilling Monty Python accent as we entered. His gray hair limped down to his shoulders, and his shoes' toes curled up a good four inches above the ground. "Dinner will begin in a quarter of an hour. Please feel free to visit the clothier's shop, should you wish to dress yourself in festive attire." Around the corner, the little shop was filled with tunics and gowns, most of them rendered in decidedly unmedieval synthetics. We were tempted to rent outfits, if only to stand out less among the costumed diners, but not for $25. Parsimony, a medieval value if ever there was one, won the day.
We felt like lurkers in our modern-day dress, but as we seated ourselves around the horseshoe-shaped banquet table, we found ourselves bookended by couples who showed some familiarity with the medieval world (a peasant shirt here, an SCA membership there), but who weren't immersed in character. Those people sat across the table from us: three generations of one family dressed in courtly costumes, and next to them an attention-seeking woman in a laced red bodice--accompanied by a husband in full Robin Hood garb--who made fatuous pronouncements in a wavering accent. "It takes a woman's touch to get a fire going," she said as the hearth's fire dimmed and sputtered.
Our curly-toed greeter turned out to be Roger Shell, cofounder and impresario of Camlann village's meals, festivals, and village-life demonstrations. He explained that a servant would help us wash our hands (no forks in the 14th century!); that we would eat off of fat slices of bread called trenchers. As we ate, he played his lute and sang a duet, a half-forgotten song to welcome spring.
Perhaps because it was a fishy Lenten repast, there was a certain monotony to the meal. We ate vinegared shrimp, and tender roasted halibut with a crown of vinegared bread crumbs; there was not too much vinegar in the lightly dressed, herby salad, but the sweet and sour fish egerduse was seasoned strongly with vinegar and cloves. As a break from the tart, winy flavors, there were sweet fruity tastes, mostly dried fruit, since spring's fruit has not yet ripened. There were none of our contemporary boundaries between sweet and savory: pears and pine nuts were served alongside a roast salmon, which clasped a radish in its spiny-toothed grin; one tart mixed fish and fruit in its pastry shell. Throughout the meal were the strong sweet flavors of clove, cinnamon, galingale, ginger, and mace, sweet spices that, in olden tymes, served as seasoning and medicine at once.
What was infectious was Shell's own enthusiasm for his calling, escorting guests through his open-hearthed kitchen and his imagined world, singing ancient songs, re-creating 14th- and 15th-century recipes. Although he and his collaborators keep things historically appropriate, it was less a medieval world that I glimpsed than that strange and somehow touching American world of simulation that Civil War reenactors and Lewis and Clark followers and early-music purists all tap into. For our part, Andrew and I stopped for pretzels at a quickie mart on the way home. by Sara Dickerman
