Mix cold boiled rice with the juice and rind of a lemon, 1 cup of sugar and ½ glass of fine rum; then press into a mold. Let get very cold and serve with cold cooked fruit.
May 27 — No. 27
Russian
A one-sentence rice mold with no quantities for the rice and no cooking beyond what you have already done. Everything depends on how the rice was boiled in the first place.
- The hinge: the rice must be stickyNothing here binds the mold except starch, so the rice has to be short-grain and cooked soft in milk or water until it is gluey. Rinsed long-grain rice will collapse the moment you turn it out.
- How much riceThe original gives no amount. A cup of sugar and a lemon will season roughly 4 cups of cooked rice, which is about 1 1/4 cups raw short-grain.
- "Half a glass" of rumThe book never defines its glass. Period usage varies widely: a wineglass is commonly reckoned at about 2 fl oz, while a plain "glass" or tumbler can be several times that, so half of one is anywhere from a tablespoon or two up to half a cup. Start small, taste, and stop before the alcohol overwhelms the lemon.
- Juice and rindUse the zest only, grated fine, and no white pith. One lemon gives 2-3 tablespoons juice; add it gradually, since too much liquid keeps the mold from setting.
- MoldingRinse the mold with cold water rather than greasing it, pack the rice in firmly with the back of a spoon to drive out air pockets, and chill at least 4 hours. Dip the mold briefly in hot water to unmold.
- "Cold cooked fruit"This means a compote: stone fruit, cherries or plums simmered in light syrup and chilled, with the syrup spooned over. Cranberry or red-currant sauce fits the Russian framing.
- YieldServes about six. Note that the quantities above come to more than a quart once the sugar and rum are worked in, so allow a mold of at least a quart and a half.
Cold molded rice with lemon, sugar and spirits belongs to the nineteenth-century family of rice desserts that runs from French riz à l'impératrice to the sweet rice served across Central and Eastern Europe, and books of this period attached national labels loosely — the "Russian" tag here probably owes more to the rum and the accompanying fruit compote than to any particular Russian original. The format of the book explains the brevity: a dish for every day of the year, each squeezed into a few lines, with the reader expected to know already how to boil rice and turn out a mold. Rice puddings of this kind may well have made use of cooked rice left from an earlier meal, and they could be made a day ahead and left in the cold larder, which mattered in kitchens without refrigeration where a set custard was a riskier proposition.