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Frangipane Fritters
Make a Frangipane cream by mixing four eggs with one cold floury potato, four ounces of butter, six ounces of sugar, and a quarter of a pound of powdered ratafias. Flavour with a little rum, and bake or steam this until set. Then let it get cold, cut into slices about half an inch thick and one and a half inches long, sprinkle each with a little powdered cinnamon, and make it quite dry with some powdered sugar. Dip each piece in batter, and fry in boiling oil to a nice brown. Sprinkle some finely-powdered sugar over them, pile up on a dish, and serve. Probable cost, 1s.
This is a set almond custard, chilled firm, then cut, breaded and deep-fried — closer to a fried cream (crema fritta) than to the almond-butter frangipane of a modern tart. The whole thing hinges on the cream setting firm and going properly cold.
- Chill it hard, not just coolThe instruction to "let it get cold" is the one that decides whether the dish works. A cream at room temperature will slump off the slice and burst in the fat; spread it no more than half an inch deep in a lined tray and refrigerate several hours, ideally overnight, before cutting.
- Weights in metricFour ounces of butter is about 115 g, six ounces of sugar about 170 g, and a quarter of a pound of ratafias about 115 g. Period eggs are often said to have run smaller than today's large, so four medium is a reasonable reading.
- RatafiasRatafia biscuits were small, hard, almond-flavoured macaroons, sold by the pound and crushed for puddings. Crisp Italian amaretti, crushed to a coarse powder, are the closest thing on a modern shelf; a mix of ground almonds and crushed meringue also works, though it is sweeter.
- The potatoOne cold floury potato — a medium baked or boiled Russet or Maris Piper, roughly 5–6 oz — acts as the starch that binds the custard, in place of flour or cornflour. Rice it or push it through a sieve while barely warm; mashed with a fork it will leave lumps that show up in the finished slice.
- Baking or steamingNo temperature is given. Bake in a water bath in a moderate oven — around 325F works — until the centre is just set and no longer wobbles loosely, roughly 35-45 minutes at a half-inch depth, or steam covered over gentle heat. Too hot an oven risks curdling and weeping.
- BatterNo batter is specified. A plain frying batter of flour, a little salt, egg and enough milk or beer to make it coat the back of a spoon will serve; drain each slice of loose sugar before dipping or the batter will slide.
- "Boiling oil"Frying oil does not boil. The period phrase means hot enough to brown a cube of bread in under a minute — 350–360°F. Fry in small batches so the temperature holds, and drain on paper before the final dusting of sugar.
- Yield and costThe quantities are generous; the number of fingers depends on how wide they are cut, since the recipe fixes only thickness and length. The "probable cost, 1s." is a shilling in Victorian money.
Frangipane takes its name from the Frangipani family of Rome — the association is traditional rather than documented, and is usually attached to a sixteenth- or seventeenth-century Frangipani whose almond-scented perfume was said to be fashionable in Paris. In French kitchen usage the word came to cover two different things: the almond cream baked into galette des rois, and a thick egg-and-almond pastry cream of the sort used here, set firm and fried in slices. The technique of setting a starch-bound custard, chilling it and deep-frying it is the same one behind Italian crema fritta and Spanish leche frita, and crushed ratafia biscuits were one way a nineteenth-century household got almond flavour without buying almonds and pounding them.