It helps to understand why Middle English is the way it is.
English started out as German. Old English, also called Anglo-Saxon, really is a foreign language, and requires serious study. I don’t think an anglophone can learn to read it with mere tricks.
Over the centuries Old English diverged from German. In 1066 the Normans invaded England and the English language got a thick layer of French applied on top. Middle English is that mashup of English and French. It’s still German underneath, but a lot of the spelling and vocabulary is Frenchified. This is good, because a lot of that Frenchification is still in Modern English, so it will be familiar.