Magnus the Stout, who is a great brewer and an amazing re-creator of period brewing, posted some great info about the milk of a red cow, a thing required in the Snail Water.
“So Aneleda’s got this snail water recipe that she wants to inflict on us. I applaud such efforts and eagerly await disgusting snail goop.
The recipe calls for “red cow’s milk,” and there’s some question as to what that means.
Well, here’s an interesting blog with a pamphlet from 1655 that includes a medicine with the same ingredient – the milk of a red cow.
This is for a smallpox treatment, so perhaps they thought red cows had some special healing properties.”
We’ll include this in our research as to why on earth this recipe is so.