My God: the Cockentrices are starting to seem almost mundane, compared with some of the other recipes to be found on Gode Cookery. They have a charming, if strange, page of Illusion Foods, food got up to look like other foods. Lent was apparently the justification for at least some of these creations; layered white and yellow almond paste inserted in a blown out eggshell would have been fun to know about six weeks ago (Canterbury Creme Eyroun, what?). But as clever as Nowmbyls of Muskyls, shellfish made into mock viscera, sound, I think I have better things to do with my muscles. But there's plenty more:

Furhes aus arbais-- Vegetarian "pepper roast" served with a hare's head made of bread.

Gefult pleter aus ayern-- Stuffed omelettes made into flowers.

Igel von mandel-- An almond hedgehog.

Oua Trutae Condita Vt Pisa Credantur-- Trout eggs prepared so that people think they are peas.

Yet we remain on fairly tame culinary ground. Incredible Foods, Solteties, & Entremets lists many dishes strange enough to have originated on other planets, or in some cases, perhaps in Hell. Imagine:

How to make roast hens in six different colors.

Coqz Heaumez-- A roast chicken, dressed in helmet, shield, and lance, rides upon a pig.

Jungen hirs horn-- Young deer antler soup.

Puddyng of purpaysse-- A recipe for porpoise haggis.

A Goose roasted [and served] alive [a most hasty, agitated meal, as Patrick O'Brian once put it].

"...into each pastry put three or four chicken quarters in which to plant the banners of France and of the lords who will be present..."

Redressed Peacocks which Seem Living; and How to Make them Breathe Fire through their Mouth.

To cook a Pigeon and make it be without bones.

To Make that Chicken Sing when it is dead and roasted.

To Make Two Pigeons of One.

A fish is cooked in 3 different ways: the tail is boiled, the middle is roasted, and the head is fried; the mouth is made to breathe flames.

That flesh may look bloody and full of Worms, and so be rejected By Smell-feasts [unwelcome guests].

And

Trojan Hog [which makes Tur-Duck-Hen seems woefully unambitious by comparison].

I am also reminded of Andrew Stuttaford's post some time back on archaic butchering terms:

"Each creature would not merely be carved — you had to rear a goose; spoil a hen; unlace a coney; untache a curlew; disfigure a peacock [quite apt, see above]; culpon a trout; and splatte a pike.”

I expect to find wonders, and today has certainly not disappointed.