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Cranberry Jelly
Make half a pint of very strong isinglass jelly, using nearly an ounce of isinglass to the half pint of jelly. When it is clear, add a pint of cranberry-juice which has been drawn out over the fire and pressed from the fruit. Sweeten the liquid with half a pound of best loaf sugar. Add a tea-spoonful of lemon-juice and the whites and shells of three eggs. Simmer the preparation gently without stirring it for a few minutes, let it stand to settle, strain it until clear, and pour it into a mould. Probable cost, 3s. 6d. Sufficient for a quart mould.
A clarified moulded jelly of the sort Victorian kitchens turned out for cold tables and game dinners. Two things need translating: the setting agent and the imperial measures.
- Isinglass to gelatineIsinglass is dried sturgeon swim bladder, sold in shreds and once the standard clear setting agent. Its strength varied enormously by grade, so the original ounce cannot be converted exactly; for the roughly 30 fl oz of finished liquid here, plan on about 25-30 g of powdered gelatine for a jelly firm enough to unmould, or the equivalent in leaf (check the sachet weight, which varies).
- Imperial pintsCassell's pint is 20 fl oz, not 16. Half a pint of jelly base is 285 ml and the pint of cranberry juice is 570 ml, giving about 850 ml total for the quart (40 fl oz) mould.
- Drawing the juice"Drawn out over the fire and pressed from the fruit" means cooking the berries with a little water until they burst, then straining. Reckon on 2 to 2 1/2 lb of fresh or frozen cranberries for a pint of juice. Press gently through a sieve rather than forcing pulp through, or the jelly will never clear.
- Loaf sugarLoaf sugar was cut from a refined cone and is simply granulated white sugar today. Half a pound is 225 g, which is restrained for cranberries; taste the sweetened juice before setting.
- The clarificationThe egg whites and crushed shells coagulate and trap sediment. The hinge is the instruction not to stir: let the raft form undisturbed, hold it at the barest simmer for a few minutes only, then rest and strain through a scalded jelly bag or double muslin without squeezing. Prolonged boiling weakens gelatine and clouds the result.
- Setting and turning outChill at least 6 hours, preferably overnight. Rinse the mould with cold water before filling; to release, dip the outside briefly in hot water and invert onto a wetted plate.
- Yield and servingA quart mould serves 8 to 10. Serve cold; a jelly of this kind could go to table either as an accompaniment to roast turkey, game or cold meats or as a sweet jelly, and the recipe does not specify.
- The cost line3s. 6d. is three shillings and sixpence, and the book gives it as a 'probable cost' rather than a fixed price. Both the imported cranberries and the nearly an ounce of isinglass were expensive, which accounts for the figure.
A clarified moulded jelly of a kind common in nineteenth-century British confectionery, where transparency and a turned-out shape were the aim. Isinglass, obtained from the swim bladders of sturgeon and much of it imported from Russia, was prized over calves'-foot stock because it gave a colourless, near-flavourless set, and it survives today mainly as a fining agent for beer and wine. Cranberries were an imported item, reaching Britain both from northern Europe and, increasingly through the nineteenth century, as the large-fruited American cranberry shipped in barrels of water; British cookery books of the period generally treat them as a comparative luxury.