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TRIFLE, GOOSEBERRY (another way)
Prepare the gooseberry-pulp as in the last recipe. Cut four or five rather stale penny spongecakes into slices, lay them in a deep glass dish, pour over them a wine-glassful of brandy and a wine-glassful of sherry, and let them soak till they have absorbed the liquor. Spread the gooseberry-pulp upon them, and cover the fruit with the following preparation. Sweeten a pint of new milk, and flavour with lemon-rind or any other agreeable flavouring. Mix two table-spoonfuls of cornflour very smoothly with a quarter of a pint of cold milk; add three well beaten eggs, and then mix all thoroughly. Make the flavoured milk hot without letting it boil, and stir it into the rest. Turn the mixture into a saucepan, and beat it over a gentle fire until it begins to thicken. Pour it out to cool, and stir frequently. When cold, spread it over the fruit. This dish should be made two or three hours before it is wanted. Time, half an hour to boil the gooseberries; about half an hour to make the Oswego. Probable cost, exclusive of the brandy and wine, 1s. 8d. Sufficient for five or six persons.
A layered trifle of soaked sponge, gooseberry pulp and a cornflour-thickened custard. The custard is the only part that can go wrong, and it goes wrong quickly.
- The hinge: keep the custard below a simmerThree eggs plus cornflour will thicken at around 175-180F; take it much past that and the eggs scramble into grains that no amount of beating will smooth out. Stir constantly over low heat and pull it off the moment it coats the back of the spoon.
- The half-hour timing is wrongThe half-hour timing covers more than the thickening -- "about half an hour to make the Oswego" appears to include warming the flavoured milk and the stirring as it cools. The thickening stage itself takes only minutes on a modern burner, so watch the pan rather than the clock.
- Wine-glassfulIn Victorian usage roughly 2 fl oz, so about 1/4 cup each of brandy and sherry. That is a generous 1/2 cup of spirits over four or five small cakes, which is deliberate; reduce it if the trifle is for a mixed table.
- Penny spongecakesSmall individual sponges, closest today to savoiardi or trifle sponge fingers; six to eight of those stand in for four or five penny cakes. Stale is specified for a reason, since fresh sponge collapses into paste as soon as the liquor hits it.
- Cornflour and "Oswego"Cornflour is cornstarch. Oswego was a proprietary cornstarch name associated with the starch works at Oswego, New York, and the name was used loosely enough that a cookbook could call a cornflour custard or pudding simply "the Oswego," as here.
- New milkFresh whole milk, unskimmed and unsoured. A pint plus a quarter pint means the British imperial pint of 20 fl oz, so about 2 1/2 cups plus 2/3 cup.
- SweeteningNo quantity is given for the sugar in the milk; for the custard, 2 to 3 tablespoons suits most palates. The pulp follows the preceding recipe, which carries its own sweetening, and green gooseberries are sharply acid.
- Assembly and chillingCool the custard fully before it goes on the fruit, or it will thin the pulp and slide. Two or three hours ahead is the minimum; refrigerate, and serve the same day since the sponge softens further overnight.
- YieldFive or six, as stated, in a deep glass dish.
Gooseberries were the great early-summer fruit of the British kitchen garden, picked hard and green in May and June for pies, fools and trifles long before dessert fruit ripened, and Cassell's gives them a run of recipes accordingly. Trifle itself began in the sixteenth century as little more than sweetened, flavoured cream; the sponge-and-wine construction familiar today emerged over the eighteenth century, and by the time this dictionary appeared the form was fixed as cake soaked in spirits, a fruit layer, and a custard on top. What marks this version as late-Victorian is the cornflour: it is tempting to read the arrival of cheap boxed maize starch, sold under names like Oswego, as what allowed households to stretch three eggs into a pint and a quarter of custard that would set reliably without a bain-marie, though that is inference rather than something the book states. The costing of 1s 8d, with the brandy and sherry pointedly excluded, is a reminder that the book was written for a mistress keeping accounts as well as a cook keeping time.