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Darioles
Butter the dariole moulds and line them with a thin paste made as follows. Beat half a pound of butter to a cream; stir into it very gradually one pound of flour, with which three ounces of fine sugar has been mixed, and the yolks of three and the whites of two eggs, beaten separately. When the moulds are lined, have ready a custard to fill them, composed of the following ingredients:--Eight well-beaten eggs, without the whites, six crushed macaroons, two ounces of sugar, half a pint of cream, and half the grated rind of a small lemon. These should be stirred over the fire until the custard thickens; when it is cool the darioles may be filled and baked. They will take fifteen minutes in a quick oven; they should rise like a souffle, and be served at once with sugar strewn over, or they will fall. Probable cost, 1s. 8d. Sufficient to fill twelve moulds.
A rich sweet pastry lining filled with a cooked custard, baked hot and fast so it puffs. Two things decide whether it works: the custard must thicken without boiling, and the darioles must reach the table straight from the oven.
- The custard must not boilEight yolks in half a pint of cream will scramble the moment the mixture approaches a simmer. Stir over gentle heat, or over a pan of barely trembling water, until it coats the back of a spoon, then take it off. Cool it fully before it goes into the raw pastry, or the lining goes soggy and slumps.
- Dariole mouldsSmall tapered, straight-sided tins, commonly around 2 to 3 inches tall and holding roughly 3 to 4 fl oz, though sizes varied. Castle-pudding moulds are much the same thing and timbale moulds are similar. The recipe itself says the quantities are sufficient to fill twelve.
- "A quick oven"No figure is given; the term is usually glossed as somewhere around 400-450F. The high heat is what makes them rise like a souffle in fifteen minutes; a cooler oven will simply set the custard flat.
- Half a pint of creamAn imperial pint is 20 fl oz, so this is 10 fl oz, about 1 1/4 US cups. Single or pouring cream is closer to the period intent than heavy whipping cream.
- MacaroonsHard almond macaroons of the amaretti type, dried and crisp, not the soft coconut sort or French macaron shells. Six of them, crushed to crumbs, both flavour and thickener.
- "Yolks of eight eggs, without the whites""Eight well-beaten eggs, without the whites" -- eight yolks only. The paste separately takes three yolks and two whites, so one white is left from those three eggs, and the custard's eight whites are over as well. The recipe says nothing about what becomes of them.
- Handling the pasteHalf a pound of butter creamed into a pound of flour gives a very rich, soft dough. Chill it before rolling and keep it thin, or the lining will be heavy under a light filling.
- Serving and yieldTwelve darioles, one or two a person. The recipe warns they will fall unless served at once, so dust with sugar and carry them straight through. "Probable cost, 1s. 8d." is a Victorian price and no guide to anything now.
The name is Old French and the dish is very old: daryols or darioles appear in fifteenth-century English recipe collections as small pastry cases filled with a sweetened, spiced custard, and much the same thing survived in French pastry as a filled dariole. The word travelled from the pastry to the vessel, so that by the nineteenth century a dariole mould meant the little tapered tin regardless of what went into it, which is how the term is still used. The origin of the word itself is uncertain and the explanations offered for it are traditional rather than documented.