This recipe may originally have been closer to a fondue than a casserole. I make it as a casserole to make it easier to transport and eat. I use both brie and cream cheese for the cheeses and, today, have made it with asparagus as called for in the original recipe. It is also very good with other green vegetables such as broccoli. (Green beans may seem like a tasty alternative, but remember, they’re not period.) I put the 'tosts' on the bottom to help sop up the juices, and use American bacon rather than slices of a more ham-like British gammon. I dispense with the "Fire-shovel".
The recipe is from Sir Kenelme Digbie's The Closet Opened printed in 1669 by Digbie's nephew and including his uncle's store of recipes used at the court of Elizabeth I.
Cut pieces of quick, fat, rich, well tasted cheese, (as the best of Brye, Cheshire, &c. or sharp thick Cream-Cheese) into a dish of thick beaten melted Butter, that hath served for Sparages or the like, or pease, or other boiled Sallet, or ragout of meat, or gravy of Mutton: and, if you will, Chop some of the Asparages among it, or slices of Gambon of Bacon, or fresh-collops, or Onions, or Sibboulets, or Anchovis, and set all this to melt upon a Chafing-dish of coals, and stir all well together, to Incorporate them; and when all is of an equal consistence, strew some gross White-pepper on it, and eat it with tosts or crusts of White-breat. You may scorch it at the top with a hot Fire-Shovel.
Sir Kenelme Digbie's The Closet Opened, 1669; Elaina de Sinistre, The Stewpot Period Culinary Guild (SCA)