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Ambrosia
Peel and slice fresh oranges, round, one pineapple sliced thin; put in a deep stand alternate layers of orange, pineapple and grated cocoanut. Begin with the oranges, using cocoanut last. Spread between each layer finely-powdered sugar. Add sugar to the cocoanut milk and pour over the dish.
A dish of assembly rather than cooking, so nearly everything depends on the fruit and on one ingredient that has changed meaning entirely.
- "Cocoanut milk" is coconut water"Cocoanut milk" is most likely coconut water -- in American recipes of this period the phrase usually meant the thin liquid drained from inside a whole coconut before cracking it, rather than the thick canned milk pressed from the flesh (though some period sources used it for grated flesh steeped in liquid). Canned coconut milk would turn the dish heavy and opaque; the thin liquid keeps it light.
- The coconutFresh grated coconut is the point of the dish. Bagged sweetened flake is much sweeter and drier, so cut the added sugar sharply if you use it, and let it sit in the juices to soften.
- "Finely-powdered sugar""Finely-powdered sugar" here means a fine-ground granulated sugar rather than modern confectioners' sugar, which contains cornstarch and will cloud the juices. Superfine or caster sugar is the closest match.
- A "deep stand"A "deep stand" is most likely a footed compote or similar deep serving dish; a trifle bowl will do. A clear bowl shows off the layering the recipe takes trouble to specify.
- Pineapple prepSlice crosswise, then cut out the woody core from each round before halving or quartering the rings. Canned pineapple works but is packed in syrup, so drain it and reduce the sugar.
- Segment the oranges if you likeSliced rounds keep the membrane. Peeling the oranges to the flesh and cutting out segments gives a cleaner result; catch the juice and add it to the coconut liquid. Note that the recipe itself calls for round slices.
- Rest, don't rushCover and chill one to two hours so the sugar dissolves and the juices pool. Beyond about half a day the pineapple softens the oranges and the coconut loses its bite.
- Quantity and yieldThe recipe gives no orange count. Six to eight medium oranges to one pineapple and one coconut fills a large compote and serves eight.
Ambrosia takes its name from the food of the Greek gods, and the dish reads as an extravagance built from fruit that had to travel. It became fixed in American cookery, and especially Southern cookery, as a Christmas and holiday dessert in the later nineteenth century, when oranges, coconuts and pineapples were reaching northern and inland tables. Grating a whole coconut by hand was the labor in it. Later versions accumulated marshmallows, sour cream and maraschino cherries; this one, sugar and fruit and nothing else, is the older shape.