Fruit Cups

A chilled tapioca-and-fruit dessert of the sort that filled the "fruits and cereals" chapters of turn-of-the-century recipe collections. The instructions assume you know how tapioca behaves, so a few notes on that carry most of the weight.

• Which tapiocaIn a book of this period, unqualified "tapioca" may well mean the small pearl kind, which generally wants a soak of an hour or more in the grape juice before it will cook tender. Quick-cooking (minute) tapioca needs no soaking and thickens in a few minutes of simmering, then sets further as it cools.
• Cook it gentlyBring the grape juice barely to a simmer and stir often; tapioca sinks and scorches on a dry-heat burner. It should look translucent with no white centres before you take it off.
• Add the fruit off the heatThe crushed fruit and lemon juice go in after cooking, not during. Acid slows starch thickening, and heat turns raw crushed berries or peaches to jam.
• Salt"Add salt" means a pinch, no more than 1/8 teaspoon for the quart. It sharpens the grape juice rather than seasoning the dish.
• Grape juiceUnsweetened bottled Concord juice is closest to what the writer had. Modern grape juice is often sweetened already, so sweeten the crushed fruit lightly and taste before adding more.
• Timbale cupsSmall straight-sided moulds of about 4 to 6 ounces. Ramekins, custard cups or stemmed glasses all work; rinse them in cold water first if you mean to unmould.
• Set on iceChill for several hours; pearl tapioca will want longer. The mixture firms as it chills, though at 2 tablespoonfuls of tapioca to a pint of juice the set will be soft rather than sliceable.
• Wine jellyThe garnish means a separately made sweet gelatine dessert set with wine, cut in cubes, not a preserve. A cube or two of any clear jelly gives the same effect if you are not making one.
• YieldRoughly a quart of finished mixture, filling six small cups.