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Rhubarb Fritters
Pare five or six rhubarb stalks, and cut them small. Beat a pint of flour to a smooth paste with half a pint of water, add a pinch of salt, a pint of milk, and two well-beaten eggs, then stir the rhubarb into the batter. Put a large table-spoonful of lard or sweet dripping into a thick-bottomed frying-pan. Melt the fat, and when it is boiling hot, put in the batter by spoonfuls, and keep each spoonful separate. Flatten the tops of the fritters a little, and when one side is brightly browned, turn them over upon the other. When they are done enough drain them, and serve on a hot dish with a little piece of butter, a grate of nutmeg, and a tea-spoonful of sugar over each. Time to fry, three or four minutes. Probable cost, 1s. Sufficient for five or six persons.
A drop-batter fritter rather than a dipped one: the rhubarb goes into the batter and the whole thing is spooned into shallow fat. The batter is thinner than a modern fritter batter, so expect something closer to a fat, lacy pancake.
- Imperial pintsCassell's pint is 20 fl oz, not the US 16. A pint of flour measured by volume is roughly 2 1/2 US cups (about 9-10 oz by weight); half a pint of water is 10 fl oz and the pint of milk another 20 fl oz.
- Mix in the order givenBeating the flour to a smooth paste with the water first, then slackening with milk, is the reliable way to a lump-free batter without a whisk or blender. Reversing it and adding all the liquid at once will give you lumps to strain out.
- The batter will be looseThat much liquid to that much flour gives a thin, pourable batter. Let it stand 20-30 minutes so the flour hydrates and it thickens slightly, or the fritters will spread rather than hold as separate spoonfuls.
- Rhubarb prep"Cut them small" is not specified further; a small dice, say 1/2 inch or less, will cook through in the three or four minutes given. Older, thick field rhubarb wants the stringy outer skin pared off as instructed; slim forced stalks do not.
- Fat and heatLard or dripping still fries these best, and the flavour suits the sugar and nutmeg. "Boiling hot" means the fat is shimmering and will set the outside of a spoonful at once -- a good frying heat, but not so fierce that the batter browns before the rhubarb softens.
- SweeteningThe sugar goes on at the table, not in the batter, so the fritters themselves are unsweetened against very sour fruit. Modern palates usually want a tablespoon or two of sugar in the batter as well, or a heavier dusting at the end.
- LeavesRhubarb leaves contain oxalic acid in quantity and are not eaten. Trim them off and discard; only the stalks are used.
- YieldFive or six servings, as stated. Hold the finished ones on a rack in a low oven rather than stacking them on paper, which steams the crust.
Rhubarb reached English kitchens as a medicinal root long before it was eaten as a fruit; the culinary use of the stalks only became widespread in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, once cheap sugar made the sourness manageable. Forced rhubarb was being raised for the early market well before this book was compiled, though the large-scale Yorkshire trade that later gave the "rhubarb triangle" its name grew up over the closing decades of the century; either way the stalks were among the first fresh things a household could buy before the summer fruit came in. A batter fritter like this is a thrift dish of the same family as apple and elder-flower fritters: flour, milk, eggs and a spoonful of dripping stretch a few stalks into a hot pudding for six, at a probable cost of a shilling.