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The entire experience of eating a fancy
meal these days is no longer just about

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the food itself. For decades,
chefs like Heston Blumenthal have been creating entire

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culinary experiences to delight all of your
senses at once, pairing sounds, smells,

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and textures along with the already delicious
flavors of their food. But while

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this trend has taken off again more
recently, this is by no means a

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modern practice. In fact, as
far back as the early sixteen hundreds,

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an innovative chef by the name of
Robert May was creating similar sensory dining experiences

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all around Elizabethan, England. Today
we'll discover just who this man was and

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how he went about revolutionizing banquets into
what would come to be called his spectacle

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feasts. These are the bizarre but
true stories from history and in some way

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involved food. I'm Nick Charlie Key, and this is the fantastic history of

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food. I wanted to say a
huge thank you to all of my supporters

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on Patreon. You help me out
immensely in getting this show made, and

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we're just one supporter away from reaching
fitty supporters. If you would like to

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be that person. You too can
support the show in the same way.

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It costs just two dollars a month, and when you sign up, you'll

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have your name mentioned in an episode, just like you've heard in previous ones,

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and you'll get your name forever etched
into the supporter's Wall of fame on

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our website at Foodhistory podcast dot com. But please, as always, this

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is absolutely pressure free. More than
anything, I just love that you listen

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to the show and you get some
enjoyment out of it, and that's the

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reason why I keep doing what I'm
doing. Now back to the episode.

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Robert May was born in a small
village in one of England's more southerly counties,

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namely Buckinghamshire. Now we already know
the line of work that Robert May

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would end up in, and maybe
it's no surprise that he would rise as

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high as he did, considering that
he had the same head start in life

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like another well known prodigy, Wolfgang
Amadeus Mozart. And what I mean by

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this is, if you subscribe to
the ten thousand hours theory of practicing something

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enough until it leads to mastery,
well, then maybe it's no coincidence that

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Mozart was writing symphonies at a young
age. You see, he just happened

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to be the son of Leopold Mozart, who was at the time not just

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an un acclaimed violinist, but also
one of Europe's foremost music teachers and composers.

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So when most other three year olds
were outside digging in the door or

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climbing trees, Mozart was already being
instructed in piano playing and music theory.

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Now, please don't think I'm in
any way diminishing the fact that Mozart was

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clearly a genius, but he also
had a far superior advantage with a literal

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live in teacher. And I mentioned
the story as it closely mirrors the situation

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of Robert May, who was himself
born into a home whereby his father worked

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full time as a private chef to
an array of English nobility. It was

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then, perhaps no surprise that he
spent so much of his childhood in and

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around his father's kitchen, learning initially
just by watching and then eventually assisting his

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father in the very specific preparation of
food that wealthy people enjoyed eating. This

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was no traditional pub lunch fair with
plates piled high and drenched in gravy,

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but rather delicately prepared venison, quails, and rabbit. Alongside the precision creation

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of beautifully crafted desserts and enormous towering
jelly creations, they would produce their own

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fruit compots, sauces, dressings,
and intricately layered salads. Before long,

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it was evident that the young Robert
had an inherent talent for the craft of

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cooking, and so because of this, one of the noble families for which

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his father worked paid for him to
attend a culinary school in Paris. When

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he arrived in the French capital,
he was still merely a teenager and couldn't

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speak a word of French. But
for the next five years he diligently studied

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and experimented as much as he could
with all manner of European cuisines and cooking

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techniques. This was obviously long before
the advent of Google Translate, and so

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in order to better broaden his education, he would need to read and study

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cookery books from all across the continent, and not content to read secondhand accounts

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of these books, he poured himself
into his language studies, mastering not only

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French but also Italian and Spanish.
In order to fully comprehend the nuances of

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these continental cuisines straight from the source, he would spend hours page through foreign

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language recipe manuscripts or printed cookbooks wherever
he could get his hands on them,

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and through his diligence he continuously honed
his skills as well as his palate.

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Now when the five years abroad concluded, he returned home to England and in

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sixteen o nine celebrated his twenty first
birthday. And this was a pivotal moment

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in his life, as from this
point onwards he dedicated himself to becoming the

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very best chef he could be,
and his career truly took off in earnest

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He was soon hired to work in
the kitchens of some local nobility, presumably

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through a mix of his own reputation
as well as his father's connections. He

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would spend a few years working for
a family before moving on somewhere else when

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a better opportunity presented itself. From
earls and countesses to knights, lords and

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ladies, he slowly but surely perfected
the art of banquets, feasts and fine

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dining before his career came to an
end. He would spend the next fifty

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years working across thirteen different kitchens that
spanned the country, from London to Yorkshire

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and multiple places in between. As
his talents grew, he began experimenting with

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creating his own so called spectacle feasts. This followed a long history in England

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of fantastical dining experiences that sought to
enthrall and captivate guests beyond merely delicious cuisine.

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He wanted to take his guests and
patrons back to these nostalgic times,

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recreating in his own way a form
of dinner theater last seen in medieval times,

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where vast banquet halls were filled with
singers, dancers, acrobats and the

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like, all performing for the assembled
guests, while towering platters arranged in intricate

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designs were paraded around the room before
being set upon the tables. Later in

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life, somewhere around sixteen sixty,
he would produce a cookbook written predominantly for

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other chefs to reference. It was
called The Accomplished Cook and that's accomplished spelt

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with a tea on end rather than
an eed. In this book he would

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write about his earlier culinary adventures,
and it was in this book that he

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shed more light upon his thinking,
planning, and methodologies for just how he

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would recreate these forgotten, opulent feasts. He wrote of how he wanted nothing

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more than to ensure the admiration of
the beholders, and that by the end

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of each feasts the guests would leave
with much delight and contentment. He would

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begin experimenting with the concept by focusing
on special holiday meals or festive occasions,

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preparing elaborate edible centerpieces that he would
call triumphs and trophies of cookery. And

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we are talking about just intricately arranged
meals in pleasing shapes and angles. No

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Robert May would create miniature castles and
warships completely out of pastry and then deck

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them out with flags and streamers to
enhance the visual appeal. His larger castles

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would even feature full on battlements,
portcullisses, gates, and even work king

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drawbridges. On Board the ships,
he would have miniature cannons poking out of

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the portholes and would pack them with
real gunpowder. He would then announce to

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all assembled that he and his kitchen
staff would now perform for them a mock

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battle between the fleet of warships and
the somewhat imposing castle. The gunpowder in

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the cannons would be lit and the
pastries would explode in a cloud of smoke.

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This was both a visual delight as
well as an odorous one, as

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May believed that, as he called
it, the stink of the gunpowder would

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both delight and disgust the old factory
senses of all assembled at another one of

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his spectacle feasts, he rarely wanted
to take it up a level, including

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the guests themselves in the action.
Before the feast began, he had his

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kitchen staff poke tiny holes into egg
shells and have them blow out all of

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the contents until they were empty.
They would then carefully clean out any remaining

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residue with fresh water, and then
fill the now hollow eggshells with rosewin before

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sealing the tiny holes closed. Each
guest was presented with their own rose water

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filled eggshell, and at the beginning
of the feast instructed to break it however

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they saw fit. Some guests playfully
tossed them at one another, broke them

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on the tables, or simply hurled
them at the walls. At this point,

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still unaware that anything other than the
expected egg yolks would emerge. As

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the shells either cracked or exploded upon
impact, the room was suddenly filled with

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the perfume of rose water, setting
the scene for a fantastic feast to come.

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He became rather widely sought after,
and even began to achieve a level

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of celebrity among the upper classes.
Poems were even written about his feasts.

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Who can in pace direct of finest
flour, a complete fort, a castle

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or tower, to candy to preserve, to soft to pickle, to make

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rare sauces, both to please and
tickle. As he refined these banquets,

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he he would inevitably strive to up
the antea each time, until he eventually

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struck upon a centerpiece so all inspiring
that it would become his signature dish.

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And for his masterpiece he crafted a
truly spectacular creation. As guests filed into

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the dining room, the table would
have already been laid and set, and

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instead of having the dishes arrive with
fanfare once they were all seated, May's

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masterpiece was already waiting for them,
sprawled out across the main table. There,

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in all its glory, lay a
life sized deer, almost made out

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of pastry, of course, but
it had been made to look as if

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this deer had been felled by a
hunter, as it lay on its side

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with a number of arrows protruding outwards. As the guests approached the table,

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one of them grabbed an arrow and, with a flourish yanked it free from

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the pastry animal's side. All of
a sudden, a dark red liquid gushed

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out of the opening, surprising,
in hot, horrifying all in attendance in

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equal measure, until one brave soul
dared to taste it and loudly announced that

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it was nothing more than red wine, which now flowed freely as more and

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more arrows were plucked out of the
deer's side. Needless to say, the

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evening was off to a flying start. In May's never ending quest to delight

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his patrons and their guests, he
would experiment with ever more shocking and humorous

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tricks. In a few instances,
he and his staff would blind bake a

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few pie crusts and pie top crusts
separately. Then, just before dinner was

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ready to be served and the pie
crusts had cooled sufficiently, they would place

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handfuls of live frogs into the bottom
of the pie, and then carefully cover

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it with the top crusts, giving
the appearance of a regular pie when it

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was placed upon the table. As
soon as they retreated back to the kitchens,

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the pies would inevitably start jiggling a
little, catching the attention of the

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assembled guests, before all at once, the top crust would explode outwards as

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dozens of frogs burst forth seeking freedom. Sometimes he would even combine this trick

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with even more pies, this time
filled with live birds, who would irrupt

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out of the pie pans, flapping
their collective wings so vigorously that they would

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end up extinguishing the candles on the
table, throwing the entire room into darkness.

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But as May reached his twilight years, he believed that both God and

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his own conscience would not allow him
to go to his grave without recording all

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that he had learnt during his illustrious
career, and as his seventy first birthday

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neared, he published his aforementioned book, The Accomplished Cook, which was part

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cook book, part autobiography, part
text book. It was filled with detailed

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instructions on how to cook almost anything, you could imagine at the time,

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and if it was ever in any
doubt as to his meticulous nature when learning

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and implementing new techniques. This book
even included twenty one different ways to cook

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an armlet. He had a portrait
of himself done for inside the cover,

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a practice usually only reserved for royalty
or nobleman, and in doing so he

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had become quite possibly the world's first
celebrity chef. His book was an instant

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hit he would continue to sell well
long after his death. In fact,

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they even had to reprint new copies
five times over the next twenty five years.

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And Robert May spent his life dreaming
up new ways to entertain and thrill

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his guests. He was a pioneer, a scholar, a wonderful chef of

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course, and at the end of
his life even an author. His book

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is still available to day in both
physical and digital copies, So if you

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have a dinner party planned in the
near future, why not grab a copy

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and let yourself be inspired to host
what would certainly be the most memorable dinner

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of your guest's lifetime. Create that
life size pastry deer, or re enact

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a famous sea battle with miniature pastry
boats. But I may be recommend though,

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just leave the live frogs and birds
to the professionals. This show is

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made entirely by me, Nick Charlie
Key, with our theme music having been

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made by the Enigma that is the
mysterious Breakmaster Cylinder. If you'd like to

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support the show, the simplest way
to do that is over on our Patreon

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account. There's just one option,
so for just two bucks a month,

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you'll help me keep producing this show, and in return, you'll get your

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name forever etched onto our supporter's Wall
of Fame over on our website, and

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00:14:48,159 --> 00:14:52,039
then maybe listen out for your name
in an upcoming episode. So until next

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time, bon apetite, n Y