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Starters and koji from Roman Italy

Roman barley-cake leaven (any season)fermentum

Pliny's any-season leaven. Barley meal and water are made into two-pound cakes, baked on a hot hearth or in an earthen dish under ash and charcoal until reddish, then shut in vessels until they sour. Soaked in water, they give a liquid leaven. This entry is a text-only reconstruction.

Fully documentedStarters and koji

Recipe

Amounts from a sourcePliny fixes only the weight of each cake, two Roman pounds.
Barley meal[lc-pliny][bostock-riley]
Water[lc-pliny][bostock-riley]
Barley cakes2 pounds (bilibres) each[lc-pliny][bostock-riley]
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What changes: Barley meal and water are made into cakes of two pounds each

Step 1 of 4
Make two-pound cakes of barley meal and water
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented

Output: raw barley cakes.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Pliny's any-season leaven. Barley meal and water are made into two-pound cakes, baked on a hot hearth or in an earthen dish under ash and charcoal until reddish, then shut in vessels until they sour. Soaked in water, they give a liquid leaven. This entry is a text-only reconstruction.

What makes this one different

The millet and bran leavens need fresh must and are made only at the vintage. This one needs only barley and water, so it can be made at any season.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Older vetch leaven for barley breadBarley bread was once leavened with meal of bitter vetch or chickling vetch, 2 pounds to 5 semodii (two and a half modii) of barley meal.
  • Leaven of Pliny's own daySome of the bread meal, kneaded before salting, boiled to a porridge and left to sour; or, most often, a piece of dough kept from the day before.

Safety

The WHO notes that the moulds that make mycotoxins grow on cereals, often in warm, damp conditions, and that most mycotoxins survive food processing. This leaven is shut in covered vessels until it sours and is then soaked in water, so a reconstruction from the text alone should not be treated as a tested or safe recipe.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

Pliny, Natural History 18.26 (§§ 103–104), c. 77 CE. He adds that bodies fed on leavened bread are stronger.

Starter
The sources we found do not say how its fermentation begins.
Microbes
No study we found names its microbes.
Process times
The sources we found give no figure for how long any of its steps take.
Temperature, salt and pH
The sources we found give no temperature, salt or pH figure for any of its steps.
  1. [lc-pliny] Pliny the Elder, Naturalis Historia (c. 77 CE), book 18, ch. 26 (§§ 102–104), Latin text of Mayhoff's Teubner edition as keyed by Bill Thayer, LacusCurtius, read 2026-10archive
  2. [bostock-riley] Pliny the Elder, The Natural History, translated by J. Bostock and H.T. Riley (1856), vol. 4, book 18, ch. 26 (The various kinds of leaven), Project Gutenberg ebook 61113book
  3. [who2023] World Health Organization 2023, Mycotoxins, fact sheet (2 October 2023) (general safety text only)gov