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I took the recipës from ''Compendium Ferculorum'' (''A Collection of Dishes'') by Stanisław Czerniecki,{{czyt|Stanisław Czerniecki}}, first published in 1682. I wrote then that it was the oldest cookbook ever printed in Polish. Well, that’s no longer true. Polish and Ukrainian historians have recently confirmed that an even older Polish-language cookery book was published a century and a half before ''Compendium Ferculorum''. Not a single volume of that older book has survived to our times, but now we know for sure that it did exist. Some clues about its possible existence in the past had been know earlier, but as the surviving fragments could be suspected of being some 19th-century hoaxes, there was no certainty. Until now. So let’s follow the fascinating history of this new oldest Polish printed cookbook and how it was rediscoveed. And then, let’s pick a recipë out of it to try out – one for beginners, of course.

}}</ref> And even these were most likely copied from even older tablets, now lost to time. Because the thing with recipës is that they’re much more likely to be copied than written from scratch. You can even see it in the Polish word for “recipë”, ''“przepis”'',{{czyt|przepis}}, which literally means “something that is rewritten”. Oftentimes, the copyist would add something to the recipë, or perhaps makes some abridgements, redactions or modifications – thus allowing the recipë to evolve. In pre-Internet times, culinary recipës were probably some of the best examples of memes, or units of cultural evolution.<ref>Many people think of memes as nothing but silly pictures shared on the Internet, but they are, in fact, as old as human culture itself. The Internet is only a&nbsp;new medium for memes to spread in, faster than ever before. The notion of memes, as cultural equivalents of genes, was coined by the famous biologist Prof. Richard Dawkins in 1976 (when the Interent was still in its infancy), who wanted to show that you can also study evolution outside of biology ({{Cyt

Naturally, copying books by hand was labour-intensive and, therefore, costly (even despite relatively low labour costs in the past). Besides, few people could read anyway, so cookbooks (just like any books for that matter) were a&nbsp;rare luxury. This began to change once Johannes Gutenberg{{czyt|Johannes Gutenberg}} invented the movable-type printing press. He used his invention to publish the first printed book (a&nbsp;Bible, obviously) in 1455. It was only 15 years later in Rome that the first ever cookbook was published in print. It was ''De honesta voluptate et valetudine'' (''Of Honest Pleasure and Good Health'') by Bartolomeo Sacchi{{czyt|Bartolomeo Sacchi}} (1421–1481), better known as Platina, who served as a&nbsp;papal secretary and librarian. In fact, Platina copied most of the recipës from Martin do Como’s handwritten ''Libro de arte coquinaria'' (''Book of Culinary Arts''). It took another 15 years for the first cookbook printed in a&nbsp;vernacular language to come out, namely the German ''Küchenmeisterei''{{czyt|Küchenmeisterei}} published by Peter Wagner.{{czyt|Peter Wagner}}. The 15th century also saw the first printed cookbooks in French, Italian and English, and the first half of the 16th century, in Dutch, Catalan, Spanish and Czech. The latter book, entitled ''Kuchařstvi''{{czyt|Kuchařstvi}} and published by Pavel Severýn{{czyt|Pavel Severýn}} in 1535, in Prague, was a&nbsp;translation of the aforementioned German text. Both titles can be translated as ''Cooking Mastery''.

Wolski found the sheets only a&nbsp;year after Artur Benis{{czyt|Artur Benis}} (1865–1932), a&nbsp;historian at the Jagiellonian University in Cracow who was busy researching the history of book printing in Poland, had published his work on inventories of Cracow’s mid-16th-century print shops. Such inventories were typically made for the purposes of inheritance proceedings and contained lists of books which a&nbsp;print shop owner had printed, but died before he could sell them. And so, in an inventory made in 1555, after the death of Helena Unglerowa,{{czyt|Helena Unglerowa}}, the widow of Florian Ungler{{czyt|Florian Ungler}} (d.&nbsp;1536), who had been the first person to print books entirely in Polish, there was a&nbsp;mention of 100 unbound copies of a&nbsp;book whose rather unpronounceable title (to anyone who isn’t Polish) was ''Kuchmistrzosthwo''{{czyt|Kuchmistrzostwo}} (''Cooking Mastery'').<ref>{{Cyt

There are other clues, too, which confirm that the author of the manuscript had access to the same printed cookbook of which only the three sheets survive today. One is that the manuscript contains the modified title of one of the recipës that we already saw on the sheet found at the Jagiellonian Library: “buffalo, bison or other game which is uncommon in Polish lands, but only in foreign countries”. Another is a&nbsp;word incorrectly written the letter “t” where one would expect the letter “k”. It looks like the 18th-century copyist had trouble reading the 16th-century typeface, in which the k’s and the t’s do indeed look quite similar. See for yourselves: can your make out the word written in pricture below?<ref>The correct answer is: ''“kotła”''.{{czyt|kotła}}.</ref> So if the copyist misspelled a&nbsp;word because he misread a&nbsp;printed letter, then he must have been copying a&nbsp;printed text – and this means the printed text must have existed in the first place!

Both recipës for squirrels – in their Czech-language version – were tried out by a&nbsp;group of Czechs: food writer Roman Vaněk{{czyt|Roman Vaněk}} and chef Pavel Mencl,{{czyt|Pavel Mencl}}, with the help of historian Martin Franc,{{czyt|Martin Franc}}, in an episode of the Czech-language TV show ''Zmlsané dějiny''{{czyt|Zmlsané dějiny}} (''Hungry for History''). Obtaining the principal raw material proved to be difficult as red squirrels, which are native to Europe, are protected by law. They ended up importing some grey squirrels from Britain, where they are trapped and killed as an invasive species. The culinary reënactors were quite satisfied with the end result, except that the colours weren’t as bright as they had expected: rather than yellow and black, the sauces came out in different shades of brown. But this only shows that colours were perceived differently by people back when no aritificial food colouring was available.

The next chapter is devoted to fish dishes, that is, something to eat during Catholic fasting days, such as Fridays. Here you will find many recipës for carp, pike, stockfish (dried cod), as well as salmon, eel, weatherfish, lampreys and crayfish. A&nbsp;large portion of the chapter covers various kinds of aspic dishes. One particualry elaborate recipë is for carp in ''kisielica'',{{czyt|kisielica}}, or a&nbsp;kind of jelly made from fermented rye flour and divided into four parts, each in a&nbsp;different colour: black (with blod), brown (with cinnamon), green (with parsley) or white (with cream). But this is one is definitely for more advanced cooks, too.

The third chapter has recipës for “Saturday food”, which means food allowed by the Catholic Church on the milder fasting days, such as Saturday. The milder version of fasting still excluded the meat of land-dwelling animals, but allowed the consumption of dairy and eggs. This chapter abounds in recipës for various kinds of dumplings, porridges and yolk-thickened soups. At the very end, in an implicit fourth chapter, we can find the vinegar recipës, some of which we already know. But let’s stick to the porridges. The Polish word for “porridge”, ''“kasza”'',{{czyt|kasza}}, had a&nbsp;boader meaning in the past than it has today and referred not only to boiled cereal grains, but to any kind of food with porridge-like consistency. For example, you could cut some apples into chunks, fry them up and then pass through a&nbsp;sieve to obtain “apple porridge”.