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Cherry-Water Ice
Boil a pound of sugar with a pint and a half of water, remove the scum as it rises; when it is clear, pour it into a large jug containing one pound of Kentish cherries bruised, a few of the kernels, blanched and pounded in a mortar, the juice of two lemons, and a glass of noyeau. Let these soak; strain, add a few drops of cochineal, and freeze. Imbed in the ice till wanted. Probable cost, 9d. for this quantity, exclusive of the noyeau. Sufficient for one quart of ice.
This is a period ice recipe whose flavouring depends on crushed cherry kernels, and that is the part that rules it out. The notes below explain the terms and the hazard rather than offering a working method.
- The kernels are the problemCherry stones contain amygdalin, which can release hydrogen cyanide when the kernel is crushed, wetted and left to stand, which is what "pounded in a mortar" then "let these soak" sets up. The recipe gives no count beyond "a few," so there is no way to know the dose; the kernels are blanched and the syrup goes in hot, which may reduce the enzyme activity but cannot be relied on to remove the hazard. A current cherry sorbet or granita recipe should be used instead.
- NoyeauNoyau (Crème de Noyaux) is a liqueur historically flavoured with the kernels of cherries, peaches or apricots, which is why it turns up alongside the pounded stones here — the whole point of the recipe is that bitter-almond note. Modern commercial versions are made with controlled almond flavouring, but they do not change the status of the crushed kernels in the jug.
- Imperial measuresCassell's pint is the British imperial 20 fl oz, so "a pint and a half" is 30 fl oz, about 850 ml or roughly 3 1/2 US cups. A "glass" of liqueur in books of this date is loose — usually reckoned at a wine glass, roughly 2 fl oz.
- Kentish cherriesKent was the country's cherry county, and the term is often used loosely for the English orchard crop, though "Kentish Red" is also the name of a specific sour cherry. Recipes of the period assume a sharp fruit closer to a morello than to a modern sweet Bing.
- CochinealThe red colouring is carmine, made from the dried bodies of the scale insect Dactylopius coccus. It is still permitted as a food colour, though it is not vegan and is a recognised allergen for a small number of people; period kitchens kept it as a liquid tincture.
- "Imbed in the ice"Before mechanical refrigeration an ice was frozen in a pewter mould or sorbetière set in a pail of crushed ice and salt, then buried in the same mixture to hold until service. "Probable cost, 9d." is nine old pence, a reminder that Cassell's was written for households counting the ingredients as carefully as the method.
Water ices reached English cookery books from Italian and French confectioners in the eighteenth century and were still a mark of an ambitious table when Cassell's Dictionary of Cookery appeared in the 1870s, since making one meant buying ice. The bitter-kernel flavouring here belongs to a long confectionery habit: cooks treated the stones of cherries, peaches and apricots as a cheap source of the almond note, and ratafia, noyau and macaroons all trade on the same chemistry. Nineteenth-century writers were not wholly unaware of the danger — prussic acid from kernels was well documented in the medical literature of the period, and some authors warned against distilling laurel or kernel waters — but the domestic books went on calling for "a few of the kernels" as a matter of taste. That gap between what was known and what was printed for the kitchen is one of the more useful things a book like this records.