Huile Qui Rend Tous Metaus Dous

This recipe comes from the celebrated 'Les secrets du seigneur Alexis Piemontois', first printed in 16th-century Antwerp by Christophe Plantin. In the Renaissance, such 'books of secrets' gave artisans and curious householders a treasure trove of practical recipes for everything from medicine to metallurgy. Far from a culinary delight, this recipe is actually a technical process drawn from the world of alchemy and early metallurgy, reflecting period interests in transmutation, material manipulation, and the pursuit of useful household secrets. Its inclusion alongside medical and culinary recipes shows how interconnected the domains of knowledge were at the time; the kitchen, laboratory, and atelier often overlapped.

This alchemical recipe would have required a furnace or open flame, a sturdy crucible for melting silver, metal tongs for handling hot vessels, various simple boiling pots for preparing the 'oil', and perhaps a mortar and pestle for grinding the crystalline substances. Also necessary would be some filtering apparatus (cloth or paper) for separating off the final oily residue. The overall setup resembles a small-scale metallurgical workshop of the Renaissance rather than a kitchen.