"In addition to sugar itself in its different forms, there were also sweet confections and preserves. A group of these — signalled by the suffix -ade — originated from the Mediterranean and arrived in England already in boxes and pots. Among them were pinionade (a confection made with pinenuts), festucade (made with pistachio nuts), citrinade, ‘gingerbrade', that is, gingerbread (found made with green ginger and with white ginger), pomade (made with apples) and succade — simply a confection made with sugar. Dame Katherine de Norwich acquired boxes of pinionade, festucade and gingerbrade in 1336-7. Citrinade appears towards the end of the fourteenth century, at a great price: 2 lbs. bought for Henry, Earl of Derby, cost 56s.; and it also appears, along with pomade, succade and coinade, a quince preserve, bought for the household of Thomas of Lancaster, Duke of Clarence, in 1418-21. By the mid-fifteenth century, citrinade was used as a cosmetic as well, as a sweet-scented powder, possibly also for the colour it gave. This transition in use was also to be made by pomade.
Preserves were made in England, as well as imported, by the mid-fifteenth century. In the first instance the confections were prepared using honey, which was more abundant than sugar: ‘char de quince', preserved quince flesh, sometimes mixed with that of warden pears, was made in this way. Comfits, prepared sweetmeats (although sometimes simply a sweet sauce), and compotes were never common, but they began to establish themselves in ways that suggest they had a distinctive place in food culture. On the one hand these might appear, like electuaries, as palliative medicines; but they also featured in dining, among the foods that might come with spice plates at the conclusion to a meal, or for distribution on special occasions, such as funerals. John Grandisson, Bishop of Exeter, in his will of 1368, instructed that there should not be a drinking with spices around his body in the choir, but allowed that it might happen in the chapter house or elsewhere. When the body of the Duke of Clarence was brought back to England for burial in 1421, his household spent £1.00 GBP 3s. 3d. in London on confections for the day of his burial.
Spices, sugars and preserves were of great importance for the food culture of medieval England. They connected individuals to commodities that had travelled half-way round the globe, commodities that were fabulous in their reputation and price; they fuelled the literary imagination and the vocabulary of sensory devotion; and they brought exotic tastes — and a passion for them — to the country. It is perhaps no wonder that moralists saw them as symbolic of exaggerated expenditure, as a harbinger of perdition; but they also saw in them heavenly qualities, qualities that inspired religious imagination…"
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