It’s that time of year when everyone’s thoughts turn to cake: the art of sifting, mixing and icing in order to achieve that perfect bake.

However, following recipes in order to achieve a spectacular showstopper is nothing new, and I’ve been looking at a 600 year old handbook to discover the recipe for success for a stunning early Renaissance altarpiece painting.

Back in the 14th century, a painter’s studio must have looked a bit like a busy baker’s kitchen. There were no ready-made paints, ready-primed canvases or even pots of glue: everything had to be made from scratch, and artists needed to know about the best ingredients and methods.

In around 1395 the artist Cennino Cennini – perhaps the Mary Berry of 14th century Florence – published a handy guide book called ‘Il Libro dell’Arte’, which gave advice to apprentice painters on everything from the equipment you needed to instructions for preparing your wooden panel, gilding your picture and mixing your paints.

He even provided a bit of lifestyle guidance, suggesting “eating and drinking at least twice a day, electing digestible and wholesome dishes, and light wines” and warning against “indulging too much in the company of women” in case it proved a distraction.

1. Prepare your panel:

His instructions suggest that apprentices must have been quite skilled in the kitchen.
The first step was preparing the wooden panel by covering it with ‘gesso’ – a chalk-like substance that was mixed with glue and water “as if you were making a batter for pancakes, smoothly and deftly, so that you do not get it frothy…do not let it boil, for if it boiled it would be ruined.” You then apply it several times to your wood and scrape it smooth.

2. Add a dash of gold:

After outlining your design with charcoal, the next step was the gilding – the art of covering the panel with gold leaf. Cennino suggests buying your gold “from a good goldbeater, and if you find it rippling and matt, like goat parchment, then consider it good.” The gold leaf was stuck to the panel using ‘bole’ – a mixture of red clay and glue, that had to be whisked up “as if you were beating up spinach, or a puree” before being applied to the panel, with the gold leaf laid carefully on top.

Once the gold was on, you could decorate it using metal tools, like hole punches and tiny stamps to create complex ornamental patterns which should “sparkle like millet grains”.

3. Mix in some colour:

The final stage was the painting. Paint colours were totally organic – made from grinding up bits of plants, flower petals and even beetles and insects, and mixing these pigments with egg yolk. This produces a glossy, enamel-like paint. In some areas, paint would cover areas of gilding, and the artist would then scratch intricate patterns into the paint to reveal the shimmering gold beneath. This process, known as ‘sgraffito’, was perhaps the icing on the cake.

And there you have it – Cennino’s recipe for the perfect panel painting! A feast for the eyes, if not the stomach.