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Fruit Fritters, Batter For
Fruit fritters are made by frying fruit which has been dipped in batter, in hot fat, and draining well before serving. The following recipe will serve for many kinds of fruits, and also for vegetables. Warm half a pint of milk, in which stir two ounces of butter; make it into a batter, with about ten ounces of flour. Sweeten to taste, and flavour with nutmeg, cinnamon, etc., and a glass of any liqueur or brandy. Stir in the whites of two eggs well whisked, and fry at once, in hot dripping or lard. Fruits such as pineapple, apple, orange, peach, etc., should be cut in slices, dipped in the batter, fried nicely, and when dried before the fire, strewed with sifted sugar. Such fruits as strawberries, cherries, apricots, and raspberries, should be thrown into the batter, and a spoonful poured into the boiling fat; all stones must be previously removed. For frying vegetables, mix into the batter, in the place of sugar, etc., savoury herbs and salt. Time, two or three minutes to fry. Sufficient for four or five persons. (See also BATTER FOR FRYING MEAT, FISH, FRUIT, ETC.)
A single all-purpose frying batter, sweetened for fruit or salted and herbed for vegetables. The proportions are given by weight in imperial measure, so a scale is the shortest route to getting it right.
- The measuresHalf an imperial pint of milk is 10 imperial fl oz, a scant 1¼ US cups; ten ounces of flour is about 2¼ cups scooped and levelled, though weighing is safer. A "glass" of liqueur or brandy in books of this period is usually taken as roughly 2 fl oz.
- Batter consistencyTen ounces of flour to ten fluid ounces of milk gives a thick, clinging batter, suited to slices of fruit; the recipe itself says "about ten ounces", so there is latitude. If it will not pour from the spoon for the berry version, slacken it with a spoonful or two more milk rather than reworking the flour.
- Whites onlyThe recipe uses two whisked whites and no yolks, which is what keeps the coating light and pale. Whisk them to soft peaks and fold in at the last moment; the batter will deflate if it stands, hence "fry at once."
- Melting the butterWarm the milk only enough to melt the two ounces of butter. Milk much hotter than that risks lumping the flour, and it is safer to let it cool to about blood heat before the whites go in.
- Fat and temperatureDripping or lard both work; so does any neutral oil with a high smoke point. Hold the fat at 350-375°F — below that the batter drinks fat, above it the outside colours before the fruit heats through. The recipe names no temperature, but the stated two to three minutes is consistent with that range.
- Draining"Dried before the fire" means drained and kept warm in dry heat. A wire rack in a 200°F oven does the same job; draining flat on paper steams the underside soft.
- Soft fruitStrawberries, cherries and raspberries go into the batter and are dropped by the spoonful, since they will not hold a coating on their own. Stone the cherries and apricots first, as the text insists, and pat wet fruit dry or the batter will slide.
- Savoury versionFor vegetables, leave out sugar, nutmeg and spirit and season with salt and chopped herbs. Firm vegetables — cauliflower, salsify, celeriac — should be parboiled first, as two or three minutes in fat will not cook them.
Fritters of this kind are among the oldest sweet dishes in English cookery — batter-dipped apple slices appear in medieval manuscripts under names like "fruture" — and by the late nineteenth century the form had settled into exactly what Cassell's describes: a household batter kept in the cook's head, adjusted with sugar and spice for fruit or salt and herbs for vegetables. Cassell's, like most large Victorian dictionaries of cookery, was organised to teach method first, on the assumption that a cook who understood one batter could produce a dozen dishes from it, and the cross-reference at the end points the reader to the companion batter for meat and fish. The splash of brandy or liqueur is not only for flavour: alcohol thins the batter, weakens gluten development and evaporates fast in the fat, all of which help the coating fry crisp rather than tough.