A perpetual stew, also known as forever soup, hunter's pot or hunter's stew, is a pot into which whatever foodstuffs one can find is placed and cooked. The pot is never or rarely emptied all the way, and ingredients and liquid are replenished as necessary. Such foods can continue cooking for decades or longer, if properly maintained. The concept is often a common element in descriptions of

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the Post-classical, post-classical period of World history (field), global history. It began with t ...

inns Inns are generally establishments or buildings where travelers can seek lodging, and usually, food and drink. Inns are typically located in the country or along a highway; before the advent of motorized transportation they also provided accommo ...

. Foods prepared in a perpetual

stew A stew is a combination of solid food ingredients that have been cooked in liquid and served in the resultant gravy. A stew needs to have raw ingredients added to the gravy. Ingredients in a stew can include any combination of vegetables and ...

have been described as being flavorful due to the manner in which the ingredients blend together.

Examples

Perpetual stews are speculated to have been common in medieval cuisine, often as pottage or pot-au-feu: Between August 2014 and April 2015, a New York restaurant served broth from the same perpetual stew (a master stock) for over eight months. A batch of pot-au-feu was claimed by one writer to be maintained as a perpetual stew in Perpignan from the 15th century until World War II, when it ran out of ingredients to keep the stew going due to the German occupation of France, German occupation. The tradition of perpetual stew is also kept alive in some Southern and Eastern Asian countries: Wattana Panich restaurant in Bangkok, Thailand, has continued to maintain the broth from the same perpetual stew for over years (). The food industry in Japan still maintains perpetual stews in certain traditional dishes, for instance in ramen and oden: Otafuku, one of the oldest oden restaurants in Japan, has been heating up the same batch of broth every day since 1945.

Ingredients

Various ingredients can be used in a perpetual stew, such as root vegetables and tubers (onion, carrot, garlic, parsnip, turnip, etc.) and various meats.

In popular culture

William Gibson references a perpetual stew served on the Bridge trilogy, Bridge in his novel ''Idoru''. In ''A Song of Ice and Fire'' by George R. R. Martin, Arya Stark, Arya eats from a perpetual stew, into which she contributes a pigeon, while in the slums of Kings Landing.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Perpetual Stew Medieval cuisine Stews

Examples

Ingredients

In popular culture

See also

References