Le Viandier

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Le Viandier (often called Le Viandier de Taillevent) is a recipe collection largely credited to Guillaume Tirel, alias Taillevent. The earliest version of the book has been dated to around 1300, about 10 years before the birth of Tirel. The original author is unknown, but it was not uncommon for medieval and early modern recipe collections to be plagiarized, complemented with additional material and presented as the work of later authors.

There are four major versions of it. The oldest manuscript, published in 1395, at the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Somewhat later and slightly expanded is the Vatican Manuscript, which is better known because it was reprinted in 1892 by Jérôme Pichon and Georges Vicaire. There is yet another altered manuscript in the Bibliothèque Mazarine in Paris. In 1485, an edition was printed, considerably altered from the original manuscripts.

It is one of the earliest recipe collections of the Middle Ages. Among other things, it contains the first detailed description of an entremet.