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Bonbons: Chop
Chop up a half cupful each of almonds, pecans and walnuts and mix with enough fondant to make it of the right consistency to mold into bonbon shape with the hands. Dip in melted maple fondant, or chocolate fondant. Chop up some almonds fine and mix with some fondant, using about a half cupful of nut meats to each cupful of fondant, flavor with almond, and pour into a square or oblong box lined with paraffine paper. Melt some white fondant and mix with it a half cupful of chopped candied cherries, pour over the nut fondant, and when this has cooled pour over another layer of nut fondant. Cut into cubes and press an almond in some of the cubes and candied cherries in others.
FRUIT BONBONS Remove the stones from nice large dates, fill the cavities with fondant of different flavors and colors. If preferred these may be dipped in fondant, or left as they are. Prunes may be stuffed with fondant or a fondant and nut mixture, and then dipped in fondant of different colors. Chop up some figs until fine, work into this an equal quantity of nut meats. Roll up into balls; if not moist enough add a little cream. Dip into melted fondant. Raisins are also good prepared in this manner. Dip into maple fondant. Melt some fondant in a double boiler, and stir into it candied orange peel cut into tiny strips. Pour in a lined box or greased square or oblong pan. When partly cool mark off into squares and decorate the top of each square with a tiny star cut out of the candied orange. Candied lemon peel. The fondant should be flavored with orange. Candied lemon peel can be used in the same way, and in this case the fondant should be flavored with lemon. When cool cut into squares. Candied cherries can be cut up into bits and stirred into pale pink fondant flavored with rose. Press little hearts cut out of candied cherries in the center of each square.
To make a delicious fruit loaf melt one-half cupful of fondant, add a half teaspoonful extract of almond or vanilla, and stir in two tablespoonful of candied cherries cut in quarters, and a tablespoonful of chopped angelica. When mixed pour into a lined candy box in an even layer. Melt one-half cupful of chocolate fondant and stir into it one-fourth cupful of chopped dates and flavor with vanilla. Pour over the other layer in the box. Melt one-half cupful of maple fondant and stir into it one-fourth cupful of chopped nut meats, and pour over the other layers. Cover with paraffine paper and set where it will cool quickly. When firm, break down the sides of the box and cut into slices or cubes. Any kind of fruit may be used in the different layers. Sections of oranges or tangerines may be dipped in fondant, but one must be careful that they are not broken in any way to let the juice escape as this will probably soften the fondant and make it messy.
This is really a run of variations on one technique: soften stored fondant, load it with nuts or fruit, and either mold it by hand or layer it in a lined box. The whole thing hinges on how you melt the fondant.
- Melting fondantFondant is melted only to soften, not to cook: hold it over hot (not boiling) water and warm it just enough to flow, stirring gently. Overheated fondant sets coarse and grainy and the dipping coating loses its gloss. If it stiffens, thin it with a teaspoon of hot water or sugar syrup rather than more heat.
- Paraffine paperThis means paraffin-coated wrapping paper, the everyday waxed paper of the period. Modern parchment or plain waxed paper does the same job; parchment releases layered candy more cleanly.
- "Enough fondant to make it the right consistency"For hand-molded nut centers, work in fondant until the mass just holds a shape without cracking or sticking to the palm. The recipe gives no proportion here; where it does state one later, it is half a cupful of nut meats to each cupful of fondant. Nuts vary in oil and the original is deliberately vague.
- AngelicaCandied angelica stalk, once a standard green decoration, is now a specialty import. Candied citron, chopped candied pineapple or plain green candied cherries stand in for the color and chew.
- Candied peelPeriod candied orange and lemon peel was firm and thick-cut, closer to today's whole candied peel from a baking supplier than to the soft diced mixed peel sold for fruitcake. You need pieces stiff enough to cut small stars and hearts from.
- Dipping fruitThe warning about oranges and tangerines is the real one: any pierced membrane leaks juice, which softens the coating, as the original says. Dip fresh citrus sections close to serving and pat them thoroughly dry first. The dried-fruit centers (dates, prunes, figs, raisins) keep considerably better.
- Layered loavesEach layer must set firm before the next goes on, or the colors bleed together; the original says to pour the next layer only 'when this has cooled.' It also directs you to set the finished box 'where it will cool quickly,' though a damp cold place risks condensation, which makes fondant sticky and dull.
- YieldThe three-layer fruit loaf uses a cupful and a half of fondant in all, half a cupful per layer, plus its fruit and nuts. The original does not specify the size of the candy box or the number of cubes.
Fondant is often described as the workhorse of the American home candy kitchen around the turn of the twentieth century: cooks boiled a large batch of sugar syrup, creamed it, and ripened it in a covered jar for days, and it was apparently kept on hand for centers, dipping coatings and layered slabs like these. That is why the page reads as a list of variations rather than a single recipe -- it assumes a crock of fondant already in the pantry and is simply cataloguing what to do with it. The reliance on candied cherries, angelica, citrus peel and dates reflects a period when candied and dried fruit were the only fruit flavorings that kept reliably, and when boxed, layered, hand-cut bonbons were made at home. Confectioners' shops of the era sold much the same goods.