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Apricots with Bavarian Blanc-Mange
Put an ounce of either superior gelatine dissolved or clarified isinglass (see ISINGLASS, TO CLARIFY) with a pint of cream or new milk. Squeeze the juice of a lemon over a tea-cupful of apricot jam, and mix with it very gradually four table-spoonfuls of milk. Stir all together for a few minutes; strain through coarse muslin, and when nearly cold, put it into a mould which has been previously soaked in water. Let it stand twelve hours in a cool place. Time to boil the mixture, five minutes.
A moulded milk jelly of the pre-refrigeration kind, set with a quantity of gelatine that reflects both a weaker product and a warm larder. The proportions need adjusting before anything else.
- The gelatine is the hingeAn ounce of gelatine to a pint of cream will set to something closer to rubber with a modern product. Powdered gelatine today needs something in the region of a quarter to a third of an ounce (7-10 g) per pint for a mould firm enough to turn out, less for a spoonable cream.
- IsinglassDried sturgeon swim bladder, sold in sheets and clarified before use; it is now a niche brewing and conservation product rather than a kitchen one. Leaf or powdered gelatine replaces it directly.
- MeasuresAn Imperial pint is 20 fl oz (568 ml), just under 2½ US cups. A teacupful in Victorian cookery books is usually reckoned at roughly a quarter of a pint, about 5 fl oz.
- New milkSimply fresh whole milk, as opposed to the skimmed or soured milk that a dairy household also had on hand. Whole milk or single cream is the equivalent.
- Acid and setLemon juice and jam together carry enough acid to weaken gelatine. Dissolve the gelatine in the warmed milk or cream first, then stir the sweetened fruit in off the heat rather than boiling the whole mixture together for five minutes.
- StrainingCoarse muslin catches the fibrous scraps of apricot but lets the fruit through. A fine sieve gives a smoother cream; skip the straining if you want visible fruit.
- The mouldSoaking the mould in cold water was the standard way to help release; a film of water between metal and jelly prevents sticking. A very light film of neutral oil does the same and is more reliable with modern non-stick moulds.
- Setting timeTwelve hours in a cool place assumes a larder. Four to six hours in the refrigerator sets it, though overnight gives a cleaner turn-out.
- Yield and servingA pint mould serves four to six. The title implies apricots were served with the blanc-mange, though the recipe itself gives no directions for presentation.
Blanc-mange began as the medieval blanc manger, a genuinely white dish of pounded almonds, rice or capon; by the time Cassell's was compiled in the 1870s the name meant little more than a sweetened milk jelly turned out of a mould. The "Bavarian" tag marks the richer version made with cream — the bavarois of French pastry work, usually said to have been named for the Bavarian court, though the connection is traditional rather than documented. The cross-reference to clarifying isinglass shows a kitchen still working from raw fish glue, with the packeted "superior gelatine" offered as the newer convenience. Moulds of this kind had the practical advantage that they could be made the day before and left to firm in a cool room.