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California Fig Salad
This is so very rich that a little will go a long way, but those who have a fancy for rich sweets find it delicious.
Mix in a salad bowl two dozen fine fresh California figs with 1 cupful of pure honey. Pour over them 1 quart of rich whipped cream, flavored with 1 teaspoonful of brandy and 1 tablespoonful of powdered sugar. Serve very cold. 1 tablespoonful of sherry may be used instead of the brandy.
A dessert in salad's clothing, and the proportions are extravagant even by the standards of its own headnote. The main decisions are how much cream to whip and how to cut the figs.
- Scale it downAs written this serves a dozen or more: two dozen figs, a cup of honey and a quart of cream. A quarter batch — six figs, 1/4 cup honey, 1 cup heavy cream — fills four small dishes and is plenty.
- The cream"1 quart of rich whipped cream" is ambiguous: it may mean a quart of liquid cream before whipping, or a quart of cream already whipped. Read as liquid, it roughly doubles in volume once beaten. Either way, use heavy or whipping cream with at least 36 percent fat; anything labelled light or half-and-half will not hold.
- Fresh figs, not driedThe recipe calls for fresh figs and names no variety; any good fresh fig will do, such as Black Mission or Kadota. Stem them and quarter or halve them; whole figs sit awkwardly under cream. Dried figs would need soaking and would make the dish sweeter still.
- Cut the honeyA cup of honey to two dozen figs is a great deal of sugar on top of already sweet fruit. Half that amount, warmed slightly so it coats rather than pools, is closer to modern taste, and the tablespoon of powdered sugar in the cream can be dropped.
- Flavouring the creamAdd the brandy or sherry and the sugar to the cream near the end of whipping, once soft peaks have formed. Alcohol added at the start slows the whipping.
- Serve very cold, and soonChill the bowl and beaters, and assemble within an hour of serving. Figs release juice into whipped cream and the mixture slackens and weeps if it stands.
- As a courseDespite its placement among the salads, treat it as dessert. A small glass or coupe rather than a salad plate suits both the richness and the volume of cream.