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maltatoday | SUNDAY • 16 MAY 2021 7 CULTURE The Inquisitor's historic cookalong sessions are back with a recipe fit for a pope HERITAGE Malta's Inquisitor's Cookalong Sessions will resume on Thursday 27th May with a webinar focusing on honey in 17th and 18th century Malta, and a recipe fit for a pope. The session is being held in conjunction with Taste His- tory and its multidisciplinary team of food historians, chefs and curators who have, in the past years, seen Heritage Mal- ta present unique historic cu- linary experiences. This sev- enth cookalong session will go online and will start with a short feature about the history of honey in Malta, followed by the actual recipe and then an opportunity for participants to ask questions to a panel of ex- perts. In the introductory feature, Dr Noel Buttigieg, who lectures on the heritage and culture of food at the University of Malta, and Mr Kenneth Cassar, Senior Curator for Ethnography and the Arts within Heritage Malta, will give a brief overview of the history of beekeeping in Malta and the various uses of honey along the centuries. Chef Jo- seph Cassar will then use an 18th century recipe to create Pan Papato, a sweet made with several luxurious ingredients for aristocratic tables, and pos- sibly the precursor of today's Christmas cake. All cookalong recipes are based on archives located in Malta and in this case a 1748 recipe manuscript was consulted. It is also known that Pope Alexander VII, for- merly Inquisitor Fabio Chigi residing at the Inquisitor's Pal- ace in Birgu, had a recipe book written by his chef during his papacy that included a Pan Pa- pato recipe. Following the rec- ipe, participants may put their questions to Dr Noel Buttigieg, Mr Kenneth Cassar and Chef Joseph Cassar. The cookalong session will be in English and starts at 7.00pm. Participants must register be- forehand via this link: https:// z o o m . u s / w e b i n a r / r e g i s t e r / WN_U_jBwCdASBCZTlIPm- f9cSA Hypogeum skulls exhibition extended till end of October UPON the reopening of Her- itage Malta sites and museums this week, the Ħal Saflieni Hy- pogeum skulls will remain dis- played at the National Museum of Archaeology in Valletta until the end of October. The skulls exhibition, entitled "Alien Headaches? The Hypo- geum Skulls Enigma", was in- augurated last December and generated great interest up till the closure of museums and sites due to Covid-19 mitiga- tion measures. The Hypoegum skulls have captured popular imagination since they were unearthed, largely due to the fact that Sir Temi Zammit de- scribed them as being "of the long-headed type" during ex- cavations at the Hypogeum in the first decade of the 20th century. Frequent requests are received to see the "elongated skulls" and several film crews have interwoven them into narratives which at times have included extra-terrestrial crea- tures.This exhibition presents a unique opportunity to observe the Hypogeum skulls closely, since they are usually kept in the reserve collection and had not been publicly exhibited since 1995. Innovative scientif- ic techniques are allowing the skulls to be studied from new perspectives which are leading to a richer and broader under- standing of Neolithic people within the context of an island environment. The exhibition shows how the skulls were ex- amined from an archaeological, osteological and medical point of view. The entrance fees for the exhibition are as follows: Heritage Malta members – free admission; Heritage Malta Children's Passport holders – free admission for holders, half price for accompanying adults; Heritage Malta Senior Passport holders – half price for hold- ers, normal price for compan- ions. All other visitors pay the normal admission fees for the National Museum of Archaeol- ogy. The museum is open from Thursday to Sunday between 10.00am and 4.30pm.