The Monster Duchess and Contract Princess - Ch. 30
- Thread starter MangaDex
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Author knows how to make a cute kid.
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Break all the deserving necks~
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Is cotton candy possible in the medieval era? You need a very fast spinny thing to make very thin cotton candy fibers right? I mean, they're not Senku...
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@DANDAN_THE_DANDAN
Spun candy snacks are actually very much possible in that particular tech level, though not with the same fineness or speed we have today. The manhua is right to call it a "rare" snack because it would've been time consuming to create with the techniques of the time.
Spun candy snacks are actually very much possible in that particular tech level, though not with the same fineness or speed we have today. The manhua is right to call it a "rare" snack because it would've been time consuming to create with the techniques of the time.
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@DANDAN_THE_DANDAN The oldest known surviving recipe detailing the use of spun sugar is from 1769, detailing a process of melting the sugar on a silver tray or pewter plate, and then when it runs molten ("like clear water") when you tip it, to use a knife to dip into it, lift up as much as you can, and then whip your hand around a china teapot or tin cover or similar as a mould around which you are spinning the sugar. Another similar one details a similar process, except you spread it over a cutting board or other large flat surface, to make "sheets of spun silver".
No matter the process, though, it was an incredibly labour intensive process, but it's so simple a process at the same time that there's little doubt in my mind that such a process would have been known from even older times, even though it would have been a, as @LGear noted, very rare snack. The primary reason for this is that chemically refined sugar, though it's been known about and made since 2,500 years ago in India, has been only made in small quantities and labour-intensively for most of history, treated more as a very rare spice similar in worth to salt or black pepper (which was also called "black gold" because it was literally worth its weight in gold, or more; peppercorns were actually used as currency, effectively, and any laborers that handled the spice were issued outfits without pockets or other places they could hide individual kernels). Now, if you combine the manual method with the concept of a textile spinning wheel or, more likely, a potter's wheel, you could make it much more easily, and more importantly for making cotton candy, spin it much faster than you can flick your wrist; you could also have a much larger container that was rotated by differential gears by a number of strong men, so it spins much faster than their ability to rotate the primary gear. As such, it'd be more than possible to even make modern quality cotton candy, just it'd be very difficult to produce.
Of course, all this doesn't really matter because the author just wanted to give Leslie a nice sweet treat that entrances children the world over.
No matter the process, though, it was an incredibly labour intensive process, but it's so simple a process at the same time that there's little doubt in my mind that such a process would have been known from even older times, even though it would have been a, as @LGear noted, very rare snack. The primary reason for this is that chemically refined sugar, though it's been known about and made since 2,500 years ago in India, has been only made in small quantities and labour-intensively for most of history, treated more as a very rare spice similar in worth to salt or black pepper (which was also called "black gold" because it was literally worth its weight in gold, or more; peppercorns were actually used as currency, effectively, and any laborers that handled the spice were issued outfits without pockets or other places they could hide individual kernels). Now, if you combine the manual method with the concept of a textile spinning wheel or, more likely, a potter's wheel, you could make it much more easily, and more importantly for making cotton candy, spin it much faster than you can flick your wrist; you could also have a much larger container that was rotated by differential gears by a number of strong men, so it spins much faster than their ability to rotate the primary gear. As such, it'd be more than possible to even make modern quality cotton candy, just it'd be very difficult to produce.
Of course, all this doesn't really matter because the author just wanted to give Leslie a nice sweet treat that entrances children the world over.
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Here's a quick factual note (I looked it up since I was curious): Cotton candy is not a modern invention. To be exact, while the modern form which looks like cotton or wool is indeed a modern innovation, the general category is much older. The two oldest forms are the Chinese dragon's beard candy and the European "spun sugar" — both were labour intensive and used a large quantity of sugar (which was expensive prior to modernity). Both are still made (the Chinese candy and its variants far more than the European one), mostly for major festivities, but since sugar is now much cheaper and since there are some machines we now have to assist, it isn't nearly as expensive.
As for the form of address, rather than "little Leslie," the best English equivalent would probably be "Miss Leslie" (since diminutives are less formal in most European languages, especially English).
As for the form of address, rather than "little Leslie," the best English equivalent would probably be "Miss Leslie" (since diminutives are less formal in most European languages, especially English).
