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Quince Blancmange
Pare two or three pounds of quinces without coring them, and throw them into cold water as soon as they are peeled. Drain them, and put them into a saucepan, with as much cold water as will cover them, let them simmer gently until tender, and turn them into a bowl. The next day strain the juice through a jelly-bag, and put it, when clear, into a saucepan, and with each pint put one and a half ounces of isinglass or gelatine, and half a pound of loaf sugar, or a little more, if that is not enough to suit the taste. Simmer all gently together until the isinglass is dissolved, and carefully remove the scum as it rises. Pour the blancmange out, and stir into it, very gradually, about a pint of thick sweet cream: continue to stir until it is almost cold. Pour it into a mould that has been soaked in cold water, and put it in a cool place, or upon ice, until set. Time, half an hour to boil the quince juice with the isinglass. Probable cost, 3s. 6d. Sufficient for eight or nine persons.
A clear quince jelly loosened with cream, set in a mould. The recipe is sound, but the setting agent is the one thing that will not translate directly.
- The gelatine is the hingeAn ounce and a half of isinglass per pint of juice is far more setting agent than a modern kitchen needs, partly because isinglass was a variable trade product of uneven purity. Note too that a pint of cream follows, so the dose works out at something under an ounce per pint of finished mixture. Modern powdered or leaf gelatine is a consistent product; roughly 1/4 oz (7 g, one standard envelope) per pint of total liquid gives a mould that turns out and still quivers. Use the Victorian quantity and you get a bouncing rubber.
- IsinglassDried fish swim bladder, chiefly sturgeon though other fish were also used, sold in leaves or shreds and dissolved by long simmering. It is still made for brewing and conservation work, but plain gelatine is what the recipe itself offers as the alternative.
- Loaf sugarCone sugar broken from a hard loaf: highly refined white sugar, valued as the cleanest sugar then available, though the recipe still expects scum to be skimmed. Ordinary granulated sugar is the direct equivalent, half a pound to the pint of juice.
- Paring without coringQuince cores and seeds are rich in pectin and mucilage, so leaving them in gives the juice body; the seeds are sometimes said to lend a faint almond note. Everything is strained out through the jelly bag, so nothing solid reaches the finished dish.
- The jelly bag and the overnight waitLet the cooked fruit drip without squeezing or pressing, or the juice clouds and the blancmange sets murky rather than translucent. A double layer of scalded muslin over a sieve does the job; expect several hours to overnight for two or three pounds of fruit.
- "Pour the blancmange out"It means tip the hot sweetened juice out of the pan into a bowl before adding cream, not into the mould. Add the cream in a thin stream while stirring: quince juice is acidic and a fast pour of cold cream into hot syrup can curdle it.
- Stir until almost coldNot fussiness. Cream and jelly separate into layers if the mixture is moulded warm, leaving a pale cap on the turned-out shape. Stirring to the point of thickening keeps it homogeneous.
- Setting timeHalf an hour is the boiling time, not the chilling time. Allow at least four hours in the refrigerator, better overnight; with a pint of juice and a pint of cream the mixture needs a mould of two pints or more. Wetting the mould, as directed, still helps it release; dip briefly in warm water to turn out.
- YieldAs stated, eight or nine small servings. The "probable cost, 3s. 6d." is a period price marker rather than any guide to today's shopping.
Blancmange began in medieval Europe as a genuinely white dish of pounded almonds, rice and shredded capon, and the name simply describes it: blanc manger, white food. By the nineteenth century it had lost the meat and become a moulded sweet, set first with isinglass or calf's-foot jelly and later with commercial gelatine or cornflour, and cooks felt free to colour and flavour it as they pleased, so that a pink quince version sits comfortably under the same heading. Quinces earned their place in a book like Cassell's because they are almost unusable raw and generous in pectin, which makes them ideal for jellies, cheeses and pastes; the fruit's long cooking turns it from hard and astringent to fragrant and rose-tinted. The two-day method here, simmering one day and straining the next, is characteristic of a kitchen with cool larder space and no expectation that dessert should be finished in an hour.