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Custard Mould
Make a rich custard (see CUSTARD A LA REINE). When it has been thickened, and is nearly cold, mix with it half an ounce of isinglass dissolved in a little hot milk. Whip it well for ten minutes, then pour into an oiled mould, or into five or six smaller moulds, and send it to table, with dissolved red currant jelly poured over it. Time, twelve hours to stiffen. Probable cost, 2s. 6d. Sufficient for six or eight persons.
A Victorian moulded cream: a rich boiled custard set with fish gelatine and lightened by whisking as it cools. The whole thing hinges on getting the gelatine in at the right moment.
- The hinge: timing the isinglassThe custard must be cool enough not to cook further but still fluid enough to take the setting agent evenly. If it is genuinely "nearly cold" it will already be thickening, so dissolve the gelatine first, temper it with a spoonful of custard, then stir it back in quickly and completely.
- IsinglassIsinglass is a collagen preparation made from the swim bladders of sturgeon and other fish; it was the premium setting agent before commercial gelatine took over. Powdered gelatine is the modern equivalent, but the strengths are not the same, so treat the half ounce as a starting point rather than a conversion and test a spoonful on a cold saucer before committing the whole batch.
- "A rich custard"The cross-reference is to the book's own Custard a la Reine, which should be made up and thickened as directed there before anything else happens. Whatever the exact method, once yolks are in the pan do not let it boil, or it will curdle and no amount of whisking will bring it back.
- Whipping for ten minutesThis is hand-whisk timing, and the point is to aerate the custard while it is on the edge of setting so the finished mould is light rather than dense. A machine will get there faster; work by eye and stop when it holds soft ridges.
- Oiling the mouldUse a flavourless oil, applied thinly with kitchen paper. A thick film pools and leaves greasy patches on the turned-out surface. To unmould, dip the mould briefly in warm water and invert onto a chilled plate.
- Twelve hours to stiffenThat figure assumes a cool larder. In a domestic refrigerator four to six hours is usually enough for small moulds, though an overnight set does no harm and makes turning out easier.
- The sauce"Dissolved" red currant jelly means the jelly warmed gently until it pours. The recipe has it poured over the mould as it is sent to table, so do it at the last moment: left standing, it will slide off and pool.
- Yield and costSix to eight portions, as stated. At 2s. 6d. this was not an everyday pudding.
Moulded custards and creams were a fixture of the nineteenth-century dinner table, where a dish that arrived standing up on its own carried real prestige. The setting agent was the expensive part: isinglass, extracted from fish bladders and much of it imported from Russia, was prized because it set clear and clean-tasting, unlike the calf's-foot jelly that cooks otherwise boiled down themselves over many hours. By the time Cassell's dictionary appeared, commercially prepared gelatines were increasingly available alongside it. The red currant jelly poured over supplies both acidity and the contrast of colour that Victorian table arrangement prized.