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The main body of ''Compendium Ferculorum'' (''A Collection of Dishes'') by Stanisław Czerniecki (pronounced: {{pron|stah|nee|swahf}} {{pron|chehR|nyets|kee}}), the cookbook that Mickiewicz loved to read while pining for Polish grub, follows a well-thought-out structure. It is divided into three chapters, each containing one hundred recipes recipës (more or less; the author did cheat with the numbering a little), respectively, for meat dishes, fish dishes, and dairy and other dishes. At the end of each chapter, Czerniecki added ten bonus recipesrecipës, as well as one "master chef's secret".

These three "secrets" were recipes recipës that required the highest level of culinary expertise, attainable only by the most skilled of chefs. Czerniecki divulges them as a sort of present for his readers. The first of these secrets is a recipe recipë for a capon in a bottle. The trick was to carefully skin the capon (a well-fattened castrated rooster), put the skin inside a bottle, fill it with a mixture of milk and eggs, and sew it up, then plug the bottle and plunge into boiling water. As the mixture expanded in heat, it made the skin swell and stiffen, producing an illusion of a whole capon fit inside a bottle. The bird's flesh could have been cooked and served separately, but it wasn't about the meat. It was all about the deception, the surprise and making sure that the guests would "not be without great astonishment".<ref>S. Czerniecki, ''op. cit.'', s.&nbsp;44</ref> Mickiewicz made no use of this particular idea in his poem, but we will come back to the two other secrets later on.

So by now we know where the second line of the aforecited excerpt is coming from. What about the next two? It seems that the idea for these "tragacanths, brignoles and pinoli" came not from any specific recipesrecipës, but from the "General Memorandum for the Preparation of a Banquet" that Czerniecki included at the beginning of his book. It was a checklist of things and people that you should have at your disposal before you start preparing a big lordly feast. It opens with a list of various kinds of meat, followed by sundry dairy products, cereals, fruits, vegetables, spices, preserves, different kinds of fish and sugar, as well as kitchen utensils and jobs (including, for example, floor-sweepers equipped with brooms, shovels and wheelbarrows, because, you know, if there's going to be plenty of food, then there's also going to be plenty of leavings). As for the spices, the list covered, among others, the following:

: This word appears in ''Compendium'' only once, that is, in the "Memorandum", but not in any of the recipesrecipës, so it's hard to tell what Czerniecki meant by it. It could possibly refer to civet, a kind of fragrance fixative obtained from the glands found near the anus of an African weasel-like animal; or to Muscat-of-Alexandria raisins, known in Italian as ''zibibbo''; or to cubeb pepper.

Into which, by a secret old reciperecipë, threw

}}, own translation</ref> The problem is that if you do try and decipher them (and this is exactly what we're about to do), then this patriotic vision of two soups in Poland's national colours will fall apart like a house of cards. Let's begin with the "royal borscht" and see if it was really red. As it happens, it's the first recipe recipë in the third chapter of ''Compendium Ferculorum''.

And what about the other soup? The mention of a gold coin, pearls and "a secret old reciperecipë" leaves no doubt that it's Czerniecki's third master chef's secret. But if you read the recipe recipë carefully, you will see that it's no so much a banquet dish, but another concoction for the ill.

Into which, by a secret old reciperecipë, threw

For the purpose of our reconstruction, though, I suggest we take another of Czerniecki's broth recipesrecipës. A good dinner broth. Just like the one that opens the first chapter of the ''Compendium''.

Now, this is the kind of broth that you can still see on many a Polish table every Sunday! This recipe recipë seems quite modern in that, unlike many other Old Polish dishes, it's quite moderate in terms of exotic spices (only mace and pepper!), while making use of familiar herbs, like parsley, dill and rosemary. The one thing that does seem to be missing are the now-mandatory noodles. But noodles aren't the only possible soup garnish and as we already know that there were meatballs on the menu, then why not serve them together with the broth? So now let's see a recipe recipë for the ''figatelle''.

Obviously, that's the second "secret" from the ''Compendium''. This one, for a "whole, uncut fish, cooked in three ways", except that in Czerniecki's actual recipe recipë it was the middle that was boiled, the head was fried and the tail, roasted.<ref>S. Czerniecki, ''op. cit.'', [https://polona.pl/item/compendium-fercvlorvm-albo-zebranie-potraw,MzQ5MDIzMw/78 s.&nbsp;67]</ref> Not just any fish will do here. It must be both appropriately dignified and long, which means a mature pike is the best choice. The trick is rather simple: all you need to do is to spit-roast the fish over low-burning coals. The part that's meant to be boiled must be wrapped in cloth that is constantly doused with salted water with vinegar. The part that's supposed to be fried is basted with oil and sprinkled with flour. And the part that's meant to be roasted is roasted. And here's the full recipe recipë as written by Czerniecki:

Mickiewicz only used the pike in saffron sauce in a similë, without paying any more attention to it, but in Old Polish times it was one of the nobility's favourite fish-based specialities. And saffron, in general, was one of their fave seasonings; Czerniecki even described Polish cookery as "saffrony and peppery".<ref>S. Czerniecki, ''op. cit.'', [https://polona.pl/item/compendium-fercvlorvm-albo-zebranie-potraw,MzQ5MDIzMw/20 s.&nbsp;9]</ref> But since we've already used the pike in the previous dish, let's now have salmon instead, which – again, according to Czerniecki – "is in our Poland of the most subtle flavour." Salmon in "royal saffron sauce" is the opening recipe recipë of the ''Compendium'''s second chapter.

And for the third fish dish, let's take that one of Czerniecki's recipes recipës that will allow us to use up the carp and the pine nuts that we already have in store.

As you can see, most of this flesh was roasted. What's interesting, Czerniecki included almost no instructions for roasting in his cookbook. He must have thought the procedure too simple to even bother writing about; you just stick the animal on a spit and turn it over a flame, that's all. Most of his recipes recipës are, in fact, for boiled or stewed meats. But we're lucky to have ten recipes recipës from his addendum to the first chapter, all for roast condiments. The author proposes condiments, or rather sauces, made from mushrooms, garlic, mustard seeds, juniper berries, cauliflower, capers, limes, anchovies, oysters… But let's pick the one that is the simplest to make and also the most typically Polish – the onion condiment.

[[File:Pieczeń po huzarsku.jpg|thumb|"''Others, huge roasts onto enormous spits drag…''"<ref>A. Mickiewicz, ''op. cit.'', Book XI, verses 138–139</ref><br>Hussar-style roast beef as made by Ms. Monika Śmigielska, author of the blog [http://www.kuchennykredens.pl/gwozdz-odswietnego-obiadu-wojna-zapomniana-pieczen-huzarska/ "Kuchenny Kredens",] where you can find a more up-to-date recipe recipë (in Polish).]]

We know from the poem that poultry was also served. And we haven't yet made any use of the caviar that we know was there. As it turns out, roast capon goes perfectly with caviar, at least if we're to believe Czerniecki. Here's the last recipe recipë from the first chapter of his cookbook:

And finally, to use up the prunes, let's have a dish of stewed meat, let's say veal. This is Czerniecki's recipe recipë for a prune stew:

Czerniecki doesn't mention it in this reciperecipë, but if you want to make sure the jelly will settle, you may want to stiffen it with a little tragacanth.

We're still keeping with the rule that for each recipe recipë that isn't lean, we're also having one that is. So now let's make some blancmange, which would be purely vegan, if not for the presence of the aforementioned musk (which is added to make sure the aroma doesn't fade away).

By the way, Czerniecki also suggests another recipe recipë for lean (but non-vegan) blancmange, which is settled with fish aspic!

A winter landscape made out of "sugary foams", that is, sweetened whipped cream, is yet another Baroque idea for a culinary illusion taken from Czerniecki's ''Compendium''. In the original version the whipped cream was supposed to be poured on a rosemary bush surrounded with wafer cream rolls. The whole thing was meant to look like an evergreen tree covered with heavy snow with cones lying on the ground. And here's the reciperecipë:

After some time, this foam would trickle down from the bush, producing the illusion of thaw. Winter was gone, spring and summer were here. The foam would also uncover a dark forest made of fruit preserves, fields of buckwheat made from chocolate, apple and pear trees made from, I don't know, some apple-and-pear mousse? And saffron wheat fields, which I suppose doesn't mean naked saffron threads imitating ears of wheat, but rather some kind of paste dyed yellow with saffron. And if soon afterwards "the grain, painted gold, slowly melt[ed] while absorbing the warmth of the hall",<ref>A. Mickiewicz, ''op. cit.'', Book XII, verses 174–175</ref> then it surely must have been saffron ice cream. That would have been a truly Baroque twist: snow imitated by lukewarm cream "foam" followed by summer crops made from ice cream! Sadly, Czerniecki provides no ice cream recipe recipë in his book. But I do know that you can get delicious saffron ice cream (with ground orchid tubers, which give it a peculiar fudgy texture) at [https://gothic.com.pl/ Gothic Restaurant] in the Malbork Castle. I'd say this treat alone would be a good enough reason to visit Malbork, even if the largest brick Gothic castle in the world wasn't in itself a worthy tourist destination.