Home › The Principles of Cookery › Calf's Foot Jelly
Calf's Foot Jelly
In order to obtain calf's foot jelly quite clear, care should be taken, first, to mix the ingredients when they are cold; and secondly, not to stir the jelly after it has once boiled and risen in the saucepan. Take a pint and a half of calf's foot stock (see CALF'S FOOT STOCK), and be very particular that it is free from every particle of fat and sediment. Put it into a saucepan with the strained juice and thinly-peeled rind of two large lemons, three table-spoonfuls of pounded loaf sugar, a glass of white wine, the whites and shells of four eggs (the whites must be beaten, but not to a froth), and half an ounce of clarified isinglass. Let these stand for a few minutes; then put them on a slow fire, and stir them a little until the liquid boils and rises in the pan; when this point is reached the jelly should not be touched again, except that the scum may be gently removed as it rises. Let it boil for twenty minutes. Draw the jelly to the side of the fire, and let it stand to settle twenty minutes longer. Wring out the jelly-bag in hot water, and pour the jelly through it. If it is not perfectly clear (which, however, it can scarcely fail to be, if attention has been paid to the directions given), strain it two or three times until it is. Do not keep it in a metal mould--that will be likely to discolour it. It should be kept in a cool place, and in summer will most likely require a little ice round it. If the stock be very strong, the isinglass may be dispensed with, but it is always safer to put a little with the jelly. When all the liquid has run through the bag, an agreeable and refreshing beverage may be obtained by pouring a little boiling water through it. Sufficient for rather more than a quart. Probable cost, without the sherry, 1s. per pint.
A Victorian clarified jelly that depends entirely on technique rather than ingredients. Two rules carry the whole recipe, and the book states both in its first sentence.
- The hinge: do not stir after it risesThe beaten egg whites and shells coagulate into a raft that traps sediment as the liquid comes to the boil. Stir after that point and you break the raft, pushing fine particles back through the liquid; no amount of straining will fully recover the clarity.
- Start coldCombine stock, egg white, wine, sugar and acid while everything is cool, then heat slowly. Adding egg white to warm stock sets it in threads before it can gather up the sediment.
- Calf's foot stockA separate entry in the book, cross-referenced here; such stocks are made by long-simmering calf's feet until the liquid sets firm when cold, then chilling and removing every trace of fat and sediment, as this recipe insists. Pig's trotters give a similar gelatinous result. If starting from unflavoured powdered gelatine instead, you are making a different dish and clarification is largely unnecessary.
- IsinglassDried fish swim bladder, chiefly sturgeon, sold in leaf or shred form and used as a setting agent. Half an ounce is roughly 14 g. Modern leaf or powdered gelatine can stand in, though isinglass was reckoned the stronger setter, so judge the quantity by the strength of your stock; bloom it in cold water and add it with the other cold ingredients, not to hot liquid.
- Loaf sugar and a glass of wineLoaf sugar was cut from a cone and pounded; ordinary granulated sugar is the equivalent. "A glass" of wine is a wineglassful, commonly reckoned at about 2 fl oz. Note that the recipe calls for white wine but the cost line refers to sherry.
- StrainingA jelly bag is a conical flannel or close-woven cotton bag hung on a stand; a double layer of dampened muslin in a sieve does the same work. Wring it out in hot water first so the jelly does not chill and gel in the cloth, and let it drip without squeezing.
- Setting and storageThe warning against metal moulds refers to reactive tin, copper and pewter, which the lemon juice discolours. Glass, china or modern stainless steel are all fine. "A cool place with ice" means the refrigerator: a lightly sweetened meat stock is a good growth medium, so chill it promptly and treat it as you would any fresh stock, using it within two or three days.
- YieldRather more than a quart, or about 1.2 litres, which fills a large mould or eight to ten small glasses.
Calf's foot jelly was less a dessert than a medicine in the nineteenth century, the standard offering to invalids and new mothers because it was thought both nourishing and easy on the stomach; it appears constantly in Victorian sickroom cookery alongside beef tea and gruel. The gelatine came from long-boiled feet, a use for an otherwise unpromising cut, and clarifying that cloudy brown stock into something transparent and quivering was a genuine test of a cook. Isinglass, the fish-bladder gelatine hedged in here as "always safer to put a little," was the commercial insurance against a weak set, and the same substance was long used to fine beer and wine. The closing suggestion of pouring boiling water through the spent bag is thrift of a familiar kind: the jelly-bag still held enough flavour and sugar to make a hot lemon drink for the sickroom.