As Sally Grainger says, this recipe has a modern Christmassy feel. You can purchase mulsum online from the roman-shop site here.Д«ecause I love chicken, for the main course ( primae mensae) I chose to cook pullum (chicken) with ApiciusвЂ™ hazelnuts sauce Aliter Ius in Avibus (Another Sauce for Fowl) from De Re Coquinaria. Mulsum was a freshly made mixture of wine and honey with and a certain number of plants and spices (pepper, bay leaf, saffron) which was often served with the gustatio or before the meal as an aperitif. These sweet cakes should be accompanied with m ulsum. Mustacei (Must rolls), Cato, De Agricultura 121 Mustacei (Must rolls), served with date paste and Mulsum Serve warm with a spoonful of date paste ( Mark Grant recommends vegetable pur Г©e). Mustacei (Must rolls), Cato, De Agricultura 121 Place each cake on a bay leaf and bake them at 180 вЊ for 30-40 minutes. A pastry cutter about 5 cm in diameter can be used to make the individual cakes.

Place the ball of dough on the board and use a rolling pin to roll out the dough until it is 1 cm thick. Now brush a baking tray with olive oil and position the bay leaves on it at 5 cm intervals. Knead for 5 minutes until you have a supple dough and roll into a ball.

Pour on the grape juice and yeast mixture. Add the grated cheese and lard/vegetable fat and work them into the flour until it has the consistency of bread crumbs. Put the flour into a missing bowl and stir in the ground cumin and aniseed. Dissolve the yeast in the grape juice and leave to froth a few minutes. Pour the grape juice into a pan and warm it to body temperature.

60g pastry lard (cooken) or hard vegetable fat (I used cooken).

60gВ cheddar or pecorino cheese, grated (I used pecorino).

200ml red or white grape juice (I used red grape juice).

Ingredients: Mustacei (Must rolls), Cato, De Agricultura 121 When you have made them into cakes, put bay leaves under them, and bake. Moisten 1В modius of wheat flour with must add anise, cumin, 2В pounds of lard, 1В pound of cheese, and the bark of a laurel twig. II, casei libram, et de virga lauri deradito, eodem addito, et ubi definxeris, lauri folia subtus addito, cum coques. Farinae siligineae modium unum musto conspargito.

Mustacei recipe in Latin (from LacusCurtius ):Д¬atoвЂ™s De Agricultura 121: Mustaceos sic facito. Sally Grainger believes that CatoвЂ™s cook experts would have expected the cakes to rise. The recipe I used is taken from Mark GrantвЂ™s Roman Cookery as well as Sally GraingerвЂ™s The Classical Cookbook with some slight modifications.В The recipe is slightly adapted using modern ingredients like yeast as the must of the Romans would have fermented. Once again, everything was delicious! My Saturnalia feast menuДЇor the appetizer ( gustatio) I chose to bake Mustacei, must (grape juice) cakes from Cato The ElderвЂ™s De Agricultura. I absolutely love ancient Roman food and for this banquet I tried a few more ancient recipes. As mentioned in a previous post (see here), I organised a small banquet at home on the occasion of the Saturnalia festival.

Roman saturnalia