Read Fannie's Last Supper Online
Authors: Christopher Kimball
By the late 1890s, calf’s-foot gelatin was hopelessly outdated, as a tongue-in-cheek recipe published by the
Boston Daily Globe
on May 4, 1890, demonstrated: “Get [a Chicago] calf, cut off the calf, which can be used for making hash or chicken salad; wash the feet, having first removed all chillblains, thicken with glue, add a few molasses, strain through a cane-seated chair, pour into a blue bowl with red pictures on it, set in the shade to get tough. Then send it to a sick friend.” So when commercial manufacturers of instant gelatin (including Plymouth Rock, Junket, Crystal, Cox, and Knox) offered a simple, economical solution to setting up jellies and similar desserts, consumers immediately made the shift. In addition, home cooks no longer had to make their own natural food colorings for jellies; the food industry was doing the job for them. In 1856, Sir William Henry Perkin discovered the first synthetic organic dye, mauve, and the synthetic food coloring industry was born. Cheap food substitutes were coming on the market, and food coloring made these items appear either more natural, as in the case of margarine, which is pure white, not yellow; or more appealing, as in the case of soft drinks. Ordinary oranges were injected with red dye to make them look like the more expensive blood oranges. Old meat was dyed to make it appear fresh. Jams and jellies were tinted to make them look like they had more fruit than they actually did. This practice became so common that dye manufacturers offered their colorants with the following descriptions, “egg substitute,” “mustard color,” “beer,” “pie filling,” and “raspberry color.”
To make matters worse, some of these artificial colors were poisonous. According to Daniel Marmion in the
Handbook of U.S. Colorants
, “In 1820, Frederick Accum reported the demise of a woman who frequently ate pickles while at her hairdresser—pickles that had been colored green with copper sulfate. A survey taken in Boston in 1880 showed that 46% of all candy examined contained one or more mineral pigments, chiefly lead chromate. Perhaps the classic horror story of the time is that of the druggist who in 1860 gave a caterer copper arsenite to use for making a green pudding for a public dinner. Two people died as a result.” A headline in an 1884 edition of the
New York Times
cried out, “Poison in Every Cup of Coffee,” the reporter detailing two coffee mills in Brooklyn that had been using coloring agents containing arsenic and lead to make their beans look like Java.
It was Pearle Wait who thought up the notion of adding colors and flavors—raspberry, lemon, orange, and strawberry—to the granulated gelatins currently on the market. Jell-O was born. Sales reached $250,000 in 1902 and continued to climb quickly over the next decades, thanks in part to the printed color recipe booklets. So when food writers lament the decrease in quality cooking time spent in American kitchens, don’t forget our friends the Victorian cooks, who were more than happy to never have to look at another calf’s foot, piece of seaweed, or powdered, dried sturgeon bladder again.
Finally released from the drudgery of unwieldy thickeners, jellies and custards of all kinds, both wine and fruit, were now easy to make and therefore these recipes were printed in almost every cookbook. Orange pudding was made from segmented, seeded oranges covered with cold custard and topped with beaten egg whites. Snow pudding, for which there are endless recipes and flavors, is a molded dessert made from fruit juice, gelatin, and beaten egg whites. It was often served with a sauce that is similar to a crème anglaise. Here is a recipe from Fannie that we adjusted slightly to give you a good idea of the range of gelatin desserts enjoyed in her time.
ORANGE SNOW
Snow was a very popular dessert and had many variations. The
Boston Globe
was full of similar recipes throughout the 1890s. I prefer to make it with fresh-squeezed orange juice for a very light, refreshing dessert. Note that the egg whites will lose their shape and structure as they are gently whisked into the fruit juice. This is not a mistake.
2¾ cups fresh-squeezed chilled orange juice, plus 2 teaspoons zest
¼ cup lemon juice, plus ½ teaspoon zest
1 cup sugar, plus 1 teaspoon (for whipping egg whites)
½ ounce powdered gelatin (2 envelopes)
3 cups boiling water
2 egg whites, whipped to soft peaks
Pinch salt
8 to 10 wineglasses for serving
1. Combine citrus juice and zest with 1 cup sugar and whisk until sugar is almost completely dissolved. Sprinkle gelatin on top. Let stand 5 minutes. Add 3 cups boiling water and stir. Strain and chill to 45 degrees; mixture should just begin to set up.
2. Beat egg whites and salt until very soft peaks start to form (peaks should slowly lose shape when whisk is removed). Add 1 teaspoon sugar and continue to beat until soft peaks have formed (and hold their shape). Add egg white mixture to gelatin mixture and fold whites in gently with whisk until incorporated. Transfer to mold or wineglasses and chill.
Serves 8 to 10.
An updated recipe for prune pudding can be found at www.fannieslastsupper.com.
TO MAKE FANCY JELLIES FOR THE PARTY, WE HAD TO START WITH
molds, and these were originally made by the English out of tin-lined copper. Molds were made in the shape of royalty, pets, and even famous locations in London, including the Belgrave, the Savoy, and the Carlton. By the late 1800s, the Victorians had over a thousand mold designs to choose from. Here in the States, molds were made from steel, which was easy to bend and less expensive than copper. However, steel tended to rust over time and was a poor heat conductor—not a good thing when trying to produce a chilled dessert. These molds also tended to be simpler and plainer in design, mostly oval and round (the ubiquitous melon mold comes to mind), since odd shapes and projections were difficult to manufacture.
Layered Lemon Jelly
This gelatin mold is based on a basic lemon jelly which is then colored using natural ingredients to create multicolored layers. You can mix and match as you like, use a small mold or a large one, and play with the color combinations any number of ways. The design of the mold will determine how many colors you wish to use and how to use them. For example, the mold we used for the dinner party had a pineapple design on the bottom (the top when served), and therefore we used yellow-colored jelly for the pineapple, green for the leaves, etc. I have also provided two versions of this recipe. One uses homemade calf’s-foot gelatin; the other, easier version simply calls for powdered gelatin.
HOW TO MAKE NATURAL FOOD COLORINGS
Green:
Process 1 bag baby spinach in food processor. Sieve liquid, then pass through jelly bag.
Yellow:
Simmer ½ teaspoon of saffron in 2 cups water until liquid is reduced to about 1 ounce (2 tablespoons) and is vibrant in color. Pass through fine sieve.
Red:
Peel and grate three small beets. Place in medium saucepan and cover with cold water, about 3 cups. Bring to simmer over medium heat and simmer for 40 minutes. Drain beets, reserving liquid and discarding beets. Reduce liquid to ½ cup. Pass through jelly bag.
White:
Add 2 tablespoons heavy cream per pint of jelly.
HOMEMADE GELATIN FROM CALF’S FEET
This was a much less smelly and easier proposition than we had originally thought it would be. Yes, you do need to purchase split calf’s feet, but the good news is that this gelatin base can be used to thicken a great many jellies or puddings. We decided to use this gelatin in our lemon jelly but used regular powdered gelatin in the other two jelly molds. We did detect a slight aftertaste to the calf’s-foot gelatin, and did not want the flavor of the Spatlese or rhubarb jellies to be affected.
4 calf’s feet, split in two
1 tablespoon sugar
¼ cup lemon juice, from 2 lemons
1 cup white wine
Water
1. Soak split calf’s feet in cold water for 1 hour; drain. Transfer soaked feet to 17-quart stockpot, cover with water, and bring to boil for 10 minutes; drain. Return feet to stockpot, and add sugar, lemon juice, wine, and 6 quarts of water to cover. Bring to boil and reduce heat to maintain gentle simmer; simmer for 4 hours. Remove and discard feet, skim fat, and strain liquid through fine mesh strainer. Let cool to room temperature. Transfer to refrigerator and chill overnight.
2. When it firms up, remove any fat from the top and wash the surface with warm water to remove all traces of grease. Lift out the jelly without disturbing the sediment at the bottom. Use per recipe for Lemon Jelly Mold.
Yields about 3 quarts
LEMON JELLY USING POWDERED GELATIN
Lemon-flavored jellies were the most common base flavor for Victorian jellies. Using powdered gelatin, they are also very easy to make.
4½ cups water
7½ teaspoons powdered gelatin
¾ cup lemon juice
1¼ cups sugar
1. Measure ½ cup water into a small bowl. Sprinkle powdered gelatin on the surface of the water and set aside for 5 minutes to soften.
2. Meanwhile, combine lemon juice, 1 cup water, and sugar in a small saucepan and warm over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until sugar is melted. Remove from heat. Stir in softened gelatin until dissolved. Slowly add remaining 3 cups water, stirring constantly. Pass through jelly bag or fine sieve until mixture is clear.
3. Divide the gelatin into separate bowls and color as desired, adding ¼ teaspoon of coloring at a time. (See page 190 for natural colors.) Pour into chilled jelly mold. Let each layer set completely before adding the next.
For additional jelly recipes, including Lemon Jelly Made with Calf’s-Foot Gelatin, Spatlese Jelly with Black Corinth Grapes, and Rhubarb Jelly with Strawberry Bavarian Filling, go to, www.fannieslastsupper.com.
Technology Transforms the Victorian Pantry
T
he late-nineteenth-century American cook was at the epicenter of changes so profound in terms of ingredients that it was much like the music aficionado in the late 1990s, who used a turntable for his LP collection while relying on a large group of CDs, and then a smattering of digital downloads from iTunes for his MP3 player. The old sat next to the new; the from-scratch traditions were taken for granted, while the newer convenience foods were adopted with the enthusiasm only the long-suffering can muster for life-changing technology. In terms of baking, the first area that was revolutionized by science was leaveners, a shift away from yeast to natural forms of baking soda and chemical leaveners such as baking powder.
Yeast has been the leavener (this term comes from the Latin word
levare,
which means “to raise”) of record for over four thousand years, and many home cooks, at least until the mid-1800s, still followed the old method of creating their own starter for bread baking: making a thin batter with flour and water and then letting it stand in a warm place until it fermented. This worked reasonably well in kitchens that were already full of yeast spores, but it was by no means a sure thing. No wild yeast spores might be attracted, or the starter might go “off” and sour. Other methods included making starters with potatoes or grapes. Flour, salt, boiling hop water, potatoes, sugar, and a little ginger was one recipe. Old potatoes were best, since they have more sugar; the hops and ginger prevented the yeast from souring.
The starter mixture would have to be kept warm, stirred several times while rising, and then put away in glass—not metal—containers the next day. (Metal would cause the yeast to turn dark.) And, of course, starters had to be fed and maintained properly, something that was not a problem in a household with a full-time cook who was constantly making bread. However, when bread could be purchased at a store and when the woman of the household now had to do her own cooking, this old-fashioned starter method was hardly convenient.
Other than making one’s own starter at home, the cook had three choices by Fannie’s time. Brewer’s yeast was nothing more than the skimmings from fermenting beer vats. Dry yeast cakes were brewer’s yeast combined with cornmeal, cut into small biscuits, and dried. These were relatively low in potency, since they had a smaller percentage of yeast. (Cornmeal was used here; starch or flour would have been used in England.) Finally, there was compressed yeast, small moist cakes enclosed in tinfoil. It contained a very high percentage of yeast, making it more potent; thus it became the preferred yeast among both home and professional bakers. It did not last long, however—just a few days—and had to be kept cold in the ice chest. Brewer’s yeast was all that was available in the United States until the mid-1800s. However, it spoiled easily and it had to be kept cold and used within a short time after preparation.
Baking powder, a mixture of baking soda and cream of tartar, was invented by a chemist named Hoagland who founded the Royal Baking Powder Company in 1866. The problem with these early mixtures was that the chemical reaction took place rather quickly, and much of the leavening power was dispersed during the mixing of the batter. Chemists needed to find alternatives to cream of tartar, which they did as early as 1864—the substance was referred to as MCP (monocalcium phosphate) and also as ACP (acid calcium phosphate). Additional refinements led to SAS (sodium aluminum sulfate) in the early 1890s, then SAPP (sodium acid pyrophosphate) in the early 1900s, and, finally, SALP (sodium aluminum phosphate) in 1960.
The other ingredient that came a long way in the twentieth century and therefore affected home baking was sugar. Cane existed a long time before the refining process that turned it into the white crystalline sugar that we know today. The stalk was simply chewed, and the sweet juices were released and enjoyed. The next step was to use vertical wooden rollers to crush the cane stalks, extracting about 25 percent of the available juice. This primitive method was eventually supplanted by a series of cast-iron rollers that boosted production to 40 percent. Eventually, steam-powered rollers came into vogue, and processors were capturing 65 percent of the total cane juice. To produce sugar, the cane syrup was simply boiled in a series of large kettles; lime juice was added to bring about the coagulation of undesirable albuminous ingredients, which rose as a scum to the top of the boiling sap that was removed. The boiled and clarified syrup eventually ran into granulation tanks, where it cooled, and a crust of crystals formed on top. The mixture was stirred, scattering the crystals throughout the syrup. The final operation was called
potting,
in which the mixture was placed into hogsheads (these were casks containing roughly sixty gallons) that had holes in the bottom, allowing molasses to drain out from the sugar mixture into a cistern below. This last phase of the initial process might take up to six weeks to ensure proper drainage.
At this point, the sugar had to be refined. One old method used lime water, bull’s blood, and heat. Animal charcoal (made from bones) was introduced in the 1830s from France and was the principal purifying agent in the United States. Sugar then had to be dried, either on floors or in heated drums, and it was also stirred so that the crystals broke up—this was referred to as the granulation stage. However, granulated sugar as we know it today was not invented until 1860, at the Boston Sugar refinery. Before this, loaf sugar was commonly sold in cones. It had to be grated at home before use—a difficult and time-consuming process.
There were yellow sugars as well as white sugars, the former being cruder and having a lower percentage of sucrose, sometimes as low as 80 percent and up to 92 percent. (The best white sugars were 99.8 percent pure.) The whiter the sugar, the more expensive it was. The goal in producing white sugars was to remove all traces of molasses or other impurities to provide a hard, clean, granular sugar. Yellow sugars started with less pure syrup and were boiled in a manner that caused the sugar and molasses to bind together, producing a softer and yellower product. (One can still buy a cone of yellow sugar in some Hispanic grocery stores.) Cube sugar was a later invention that was usually made through the use of molds, centrifugal force, and baking to finish, although sometimes it was simply sawed into cubes. Powdered and bar sugars were passed through fine silk cloths, and starch was added to prevent caking. Red frosting sugar was a Boston specialty used for decorating; it was nothing more than granulated sugar dyed red.
Fully refined, pure, granulated sugar was at the heart of the Victorian love of confections. Brightly colored penny candies, ice-cream parlors, confectionary stores selling sugar sculptures for table decorations, and even birthday cakes, a craze that originated in the 1890s, all got a boost or a start from the availability of refined white sugar. How popular was sugar? Total consumption rose 150 percent from 1879 to 1900, from 2,097 million pounds to 4,488 million pounds. No doubt that Americans had a sweet tooth.
Although Fannie Farmer recognizes the following types of sugar in her first chapter—brown sugar, loaf, cut, granulated, powdered, and confectioner’s—her recipes rely almost solely on fine granulated sugar, with special applications requiring powdered or confectioner’s sugar. Brown, loaf, and cut sugar really had no place in home cooking by 1896.
Perhaps the biggest result of the sugar and chemical leavener industries was the explosion in variety and number of cakes. The list was virtually endless: tea cake, snow cake, caramel prize cake, Empire State cake, sea foam cake, Dolly Varden cake (Dolly Varden is a character in Dickens’s
Barnaby Rudge,
and the term was often used to refer to a dress of sheer muslin worn over a brightly colored petticoat; this notion of something sheer over something colorful was applied to fish as well as to cakes, as in the Dolly Varden trout), poor man’s cake, one egg cake, white perfection cake, cheap cream cake, walnut cake, orange cake, sour milk cake, lemon cake, and gold cake. One could also find pound cakes, an earlier form of cake including a wedding cake, which used a pound each of butter, sugar, and flour, plus ten eggs and lots of dried fruit, including raisins, currants, citron, almonds, brandy, wine, and spices. Angel cake, similar to the modern angel food cake, was also popular. Yes, they did have fruit cake, made two or three weeks ahead of time from a cup of pork fat, hot coffee, brown sugar, molasses, spices, flour, baking soda, cream of tartar, raisins, currants, and chopped dried figs; it “will keep all winter if you lock it up.” The one major exception, a cake that was almost never made, was a chocolate cake. It was, however, becoming a more popular ingredient (chocolate was rare earlier in the century), and one could make chocolate (hot cocoa), Vienna chocolate (this version has beaten egg whites added at the last minute), chocolate Bavarian cream, chocolate blanc mange (milk, gelatine, grated chocolate, sugar, and vanilla), chocolate tartlets, chocolate caramels, and chocolate creams.
The sponge cake was the ultimate all-purpose recipe of the era. It was the basis for Boston cream pie, invented at the Parker House in Boston (two layers of sponge cake filled with pastry cream and drizzled with chocolate ganache). It was often made into an endless series of two-layer cakes with a simple filling, jam for example, with nothing more than confectioner’s sugar as a topping.
VICTORIAN SPONGE CAKE
Although I have developed my own recipe for a modern sponge cake, this recipe is an authentic sponge from the Boston Cooking School and gives you a good idea of what one of its workhorse recipes was really like. I have updated the recipe to reflect modern appliances and mixing methods.
4 eggs, separated
½ teaspoon cream of tartar
8 ounces sugar
4 ounces cake flour
2 teaspoons lemon rind
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/8 teaspoon salt
Beat egg whites with cream of tartar and 2 tablespoons of the sugar (reserve the rest) until it holds 2-inch peaks. Whites should still be moist and slightly soft. Remove to a separate bowl. Using the same mixing bowl as for the whites, beat the yolks with the remaining sugar until light and ribbony, 4 to 5 minutes in an electric mixer. Add flour and mix on low speed for 10 seconds. Remove bowl from mixer, add whites, lemon rind, juice, and salt and fold together by hand with a large rubber spatula. Bake in a 375-degree oven for about 30 minutes.
ANOTHER COMMON RECIPE, ONE FOUND ON MANY FANNIE
menus, was the French cream cake, similar to Boston cream pie. The earliest recipe we came across was from 1870 in
The Godey’s Lady’s Book Receipts and Household Hints
. The cake was a standard cold-water sponge cake, baked in a pie pan, split when warm, and filled with the cream. The cookbook suggests, as is the case with a genoise, that the cakes stand for a day or two before serving. We made the Royal Baking Powder Company version of this recipe and discovered something interesting. Since the cream used over one hundred years ago was so much thicker and better, our custard filling came out thin and runny, making slicing difficult. This turned out to be a common problem in all of our testing—matching modern ingredients to Victorian recipes. Other recipes for French cream cake—and this was Fannie’s approach—were based on classic
choux
paste, the type of pastry used to make éclairs,
gougères
, and Paris-Brest. This may be the origin of the term “French” cream cake, since
choux
paste is very French indeed, made by boiling water and butter, stirring in flour, and then beating in eggs one at a time, usually after the mixture has cooled a bit.
The following recipe uses my own slightly adapted recipe for sponge cake filled with pastry cream. The cake needs to sit for twenty-four hours before serving.
FRENCH CREAM CAKE
Although Fannie’s recipe uses a
choux
paste for the cake, we decided to develop this recipe using the lighter and more appealing sponge cake. It is crucial to beat the egg-and-sugar mixture a very long time until it is very pale and light. This may take five minutes, which will seem almost forever. You will be tempted to stop beating at three minutes or so. If using an 8-inch round cake pan, be sure that it is at least two inches high, otherwise the batter will rise above the sides of the pan. This is one cake you do
not
want to underbake because it will collapse on you. Make sure that the middle of the cake springs back when lightly touched with your finger or a fork.
For the cake:
½ cup cake flour
6 tablespoons all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons milk
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
5 eggs, room temperature
¾ cup sugar
For the cream:
2 cups milk
3 tablespoons cornstarch
¾ cup sugar
Pinch salt
4 egg yolks
4 tablespoons cold butter, cut into 4 pieces
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1.
For the cake:
Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 8- or 9-inch round cake pans and cover pan bottom with a round of parchment paper. (If using an 8-inch pan, it must be at least 2 inches high.) Whisk flours, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl (or sift onto waxed paper). Heat milk and butter in a small saucepan over low heat until butter melts. Off heat, add vanilla; cover and keep warm.
2. Separate 3 eggs, placing whites in the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the whisk attachment (or large mixing bowl if using hand mixer or whisk). Reserve the 3 yolks plus the 2 whole eggs in another mixing bowl. Beat the whites on high speed (or whisk) until whites are foamy. Gradually add 6 tablespoons of the sugar and continue to beat whites to soft, moist peaks. (Do not overbeat as stiff, dry egg whites will be difficult to incorporate into the batter.) If using a standing mixer, transfer egg whites to a large bowl and add yolk–whole egg mixture to mixing bowl.