Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches Part 44

COUNTRY SYLLABUB.

Mix half a pound of white sugar with a pint of fine sweet cider, or of white wine; and grate in a nutmeg. Prepare them in a large bowl, just before milking time. Then let it be taken to the cow, and have about three pints milked into it; stirring it occasionally with a spoon. Let it be eaten before the froth subsides. If you use cider, a little brandy will improve it.

A TRIFLE.

Place half a pound of maccaroons or Naples biscuits at the bottom of a large gla.s.s bowl. Pour on them as much white wine as will cover and dissolve them. Make a rich custard, flavoured with bitter almonds or peach leaves; and pour it when cold on the maccaroons; the custard may be either baked or boiled. Then add a layer of marmalade or jam. Take a quart of cream, mix with it a quarter of a pound of sugar, and half a pint of white wine, and whip it with rods to a stiff froth; laying the froth (as you proceed) on an inverted sieve, with a dish under it to catch the cream that drips through; which must be saved and whipped over again. Instead of rods you may use a little tin churn. Pile the frothed cream upon the marmalade in a high pyramid. To ornament it,--take preserved water-melon rind that has been cut into leaves or flowers; split them nicely to make them thinner and lighter; place a circle or wreath of them round the heap of frothed cream, interspersing them with spots of stiff red currant jelly. Stick on the top of the pyramid a sprig of real flowers.

FLOATING ISLAND.

Take a quart of rich cream, and divide it in half. Sweeten one pint of it with loaf-sugar, and stir into it sufficient currant jelly to colour it of a fine pink. Put it into a gla.s.s bowl, and place in the centre a pile of sliced almond-sponge cake, or of lady cake; every slice spread thickly with raspberry jam or marmalade, and laid evenly one on another. Have ready the other pint of cream, flavoured with a few drops of oil of lemon, and beaten with rods to a stiff froth. Heap it all over the pile of cake, so as entirely to cover it.

A RASPBERRY CHARLOTTE.

Take a dozen of the square or oblong sponge-cakes that are commonly called Naples biscuits. They should be quite fresh.

Spread over each a thick layer of raspberry jam, and place them in the bottom and round the sides of a gla.s.s bowl. Take the whites of six eggs, and mix with them six table-spoonfuls of raspberry or currant jelly. Beat the egg and jelly with rods till very light, and then fill up the bowl with it. For this purpose, cream (if you can conveniently procure it) is still better than white of egg.

You may make a charlotte with any sort of jam, marmalade, or fruit jelly. It can be prepared at a short notice, and is very generally liked.

A PLUM CHARLOTTE.

Stone a quart of ripe plums, and stew them with a pound of brown sugar. Cut slices of bread and b.u.t.ter and lay them in the bottom and round the sides of a large bowl or deep dish. Pour in the plums boiling hot, cover the bowl, and set it away to cool gradually. When, quite cold, send it to table, and eat it with cream.

CLOTTED CREAM.

Mix together a jill of rich milk, a large wine gla.s.s of rose water, and four ounces of white sugar. Add to it the beaten yolks of two eggs. Stir the mixture into a quart of the best cream; set it over hot coals, and let it just come to a boil, stirring it all the time. Then take it off, pour it into a gla.s.s bowl, and set it away to get cold. Eat it with fresh strawberries, raspberries, or with any sort of sweetmeats.

LEMON CREAM.

Beat well together a quart of thick cream and the yolks of eight eggs. Then gradually beat in half a pound of powdered loaf-sugar, and the grated rind of three large lemons. Put the mixture into a porcelain skillet, and set it on hot coals till it comes to a boil; then take it off, and stir it till nearly cold. Squeeze the juice of the lemons into a bowl; pour the cream upon it, and continue to stir it till quite cold. You may serve it up in a gla.s.s bowl, in gla.s.s cups, or in jelly gla.s.ses. Eat it with tarts or sweetmeats.

ORANGE CREAM.

Beat very light six eggs, omitting the whites of two. Have ready a pint of orange juice, and stir it gradually into the beaten egg, alternately with a pound of powdered loaf-sugar. Put into a porcelain skillet the yellow rind of one orange, pared very thin; pour the mixture upon it, and set it over a slow fire. Simmer it steadily, stirring it all the time; but when nearly ready to boil, take it off, remove the orange-peel, and put the mixture into gla.s.ses to get cold.

CURDS AND WHEY.

Take a piece of rennet about three inches square, and wash it in two or three cold waters to get off the salt; wipe it dry, and fasten a string to one corner of it. Have ready in a deep dish or pan, a quart of unskimmed milk that has been warmed but not boiled. Put the rennet into it, leaving the string hanging out over the side, that you may know where to find it. Cover the pan, and set it by the fire-side or in some other warm place. When the milk becomes a firm ma.s.s of curd, and the whey looks clear and greenish, remove the rennet as gently as possible, pulling it out by the string; and set the pan in ice, or in a very cold place.

Send to table with it a small pitcher of white wine, sugar and nutmeg mixed together; or a bowl of sweetened cream, with nutmeg grated over it.

You may keep rennet in white wine; cutting it in small pieces, and putting it into a gla.s.s jar with wine enough to cover it well.

Either the wine or the rennet will be found good for turning milk; but do not put in both together, or the curd will become so hard and tough, as to be uneatable.

Rennets properly prepared and dried, are sold constantly in the Philadelphia markets. The cost is trifling; and it is well to have one always in the house, in case of being wanted to make whey for sick persons. They will keep a year or more.

LEMON ICE CREAM.

Have ready two quarts of very rich thick cream, and take out a pint. Stir gradually into the pint, a pound of the best loaf-sugar powdered fine; and the grated rind and the juice of four ripe lemons of the largest size, or of five or six smaller ones. If you cannot procure the fruit, you may flavour the cream with essence or oil of lemon; a tea-spoonful or more, according to its strength. The strongest and best essence of lemon is the white or whitish; when tinged with green, it is comparatively weak, having been diluted with water; if quite green, a large tea-spoonful will not communicate as much flavour as five or six drops of the white.

After you have mixed the pint of cream with the sugar and lemon, beat it gradually and hard into the remaining cream, that is, the three pints. Cover it, and let it stand to infuse from half an hour to an hour. Then taste it, and if you think it necessary, stir in a little more lemon juice or a little more sugar. Strain it into the freezer through a fine strainer, (a tin one with small close holes is best,) to get rid of the grated lemon-peel, which if left in would prevent the cream from being smooth. Cover the freezer, and stand it in the ice cream tub, which should be filled with a mixture, in equal quant.i.ties, of coa.r.s.e salt, and ice broken up as small as possible, that it may lie close and compact round the freezer, and thus add to its coldness. Snow, when it can be procured, is still better than ice to mix with the salt. It should be packed closely into the tub, and pressed down hard. Keep turning the freezer about by the handle till the cream is frozen, which it will generally be in two hours. Occasionally open the lid and sc.r.a.pe down the cream from the sides with a long-handled tin spoon. Take care that no salt gets in, or the cream will be spoiled. When it is entirely frozen, take it out of the freezer and put it into your mould; set it again in the tub, (which must be filled with fresh ice and salt,) and leave it undisturbed till you want it for immediate use. This second freezing, however, should not continue longer than two hours, or the cream will become inconveniently and unpleasantly hard, and have much of the flavour frozen out of it. Place the mould in the ice tub, with the head downwards, and cover the tub with pieces of old carpet while the second freezing is going on. When it has arrived at the proper consistence, and it is time to serve it up, dip a cloth in hot water, and wrap it round the mould for a few moments, to loosen the cream and make it come out easily; setting the mould on a gla.s.s or china dish. If a pyramid or obelisk mould, lift it carefully off the top. If the mould or form represents doves, dolphins, lap-dogs, fruit baskets, &c. it will open down the middle, and must be taken off in that manner. Serve it up immediately lest it begin to melt. Send round sponge-cake with it, and wine or cordials immediately after.

If you have no moulds, but intend serving it up in a large bowl or in gla.s.ses, it must still be frozen twice over; otherwise it can have no smoothness, delicacy, or consistence, but will be rough and coa.r.s.e, and feel in the mouth like broken icicles. The second freezing (if you have no mould) must be done in the freezer, which should be washed out, and set again in the tub with fresh ice and salt. Cover it closely, and let the cream stand in it untouched, but not less than two hours. When you put it into gla.s.ses, heap it high on the top.

Begin to make ice cream about five or six hours before it is wanted for use. If you commence it too early, it may probably be injured by having to remain too long in the second freezing, as it must not be turned out till a few moments before it is served up.

In damp weather it requires a longer time to freeze.

If cream is scarce, mix with it an equal quant.i.ty of rich milk, and then add, for each quart, two table-spoonfuls of powdered arrow-root rubbed smooth in a little cold milk. Orange ice cream is made in the same manner as lemon.

STRAWBERRY ICE CREAM.

Take two quarts of ripe strawberries; hull them, and put them into a deep dish, strewing among them half a pound of powdered loaf-sugar.

Cover them, and let them stand an hour or two. Then mash them through a sieve till you have pressed out all the juice, and stir into it half a pound more of powdered sugar, or enough to make it very sweet, and like a thick syrup. Then mix it by degrees with two quarts of rich cream, beating it in very hard. Put it into a freezer, and proceed as in the foregoing receipt. In two hours, remove it to a mould, or take it out and return it again to the freezer with fresh salt and ice, that it may be frozen a second time. In two hours more, it should be ready to turn out.

RASPBERRY ICE CREAM.

Is made according to the preceding receipt.

PINE-APPLE ICE CREAM.

To each quart of cream allow a large ripe pine-apple, and a pound of powdered loaf-sugar. Pare the pine-apple, slice it very thin, and mince it small. Lay it in a deep dish and strew the sugar among it. Cover the dish, and let the pine-apple lie in the sugar for two or three hours. Then strain it through a sieve, mashing and pressing out all the juice. Stir the juice gradually into the cream, beating it hard. Put it into the freezer, and let it be twice frozen before it is served up.

VANILLA ICE CREAM.

Split up half a vanilla bean, and boil it slowly in half a pint of milk till all the flavour is drawn out, which you may know by tasting it. Then mix into the milk half a pound of powdered loaf-sugar, and stir it very hard into a quart of rich cream. Put it into the freezer, and proceed as directed in the receipt for Lemon Ice Cream; freezing it twice.

ALMOND ICE CREAM.

Take six ounces of bitter almonds, (sweet ones will not do,) blanch them, and pound them in a mortar, adding by degrees a little rose water. Then boil them gently in a pint of cream till you find that it is highly flavoured with them. Then pour the cream into a bowl, stir in a pound of powdered loaf-sugar, cover it, and set it away to cool gradually; when it is cold, strain it and then stir it gradually and hard into three pints of cream. Put it into the freezer, and proceed as directed in the first ice cream receipt. Freeze it twice. It will be found very fine.

Send round always with ice cream, sponge cake or Savoy biscuits.

Afterwards wine, and cordials, or liqueurs as they are now generally called.

ICE ORANGEADE.

Take a pint and a half of orange juice, and mix it with half a pint of clear or filtered water. Stir in half a pound of powdered loaf-sugar. Pare very thin the yellow rind of six deep-coloured oranges, cut in pieces, and lay it at the bottom of a bowl or tureen. Pour the orange juice and sugar upon it; cover it, and let it infuse an hour. Then strain the liquid into a freezer, and proceed as for ice cream. When it is frozen, put it into a mould, (it will look best in the form of a pine-apple,) and freeze it a second time. Serve it in gla.s.s cups, with any sort of very nice sweet cakes.