In 1679, a Franciscan apothecary recorded the recipe for a supposedly medicinal jam made not of fruit, sugar, and spice, but solely of human blood.The brother’s notes don’t say how much blood each batch of this macabre jam requires, or how to collect it. However, they are eerily specific about whom one ought to drain: “Persons of warm, moist temperament, such as those of a blotchy, red complexion and rather plump of build.” Fresh blood should be left out until it congeals into “a sticky mass,” the recipe explains, then…
