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Almond Chicken Mousse
To a cup of boiling water add two chicken bouillon cubes; when dissolved add the slightly beaten yolks of three eggs. Cook in a double boiler until the mixture thickens. Mix a tablespoonful of granulated gelatin in two tablespoonfuls of cold water, stir it into the egg mixture and when the gelatin is dissolved remove from the fire and strain into a bowl. Flavor with a quarter teaspoonful of paprika and the same amount of celery salt. Then add half a cup of finely minced, white meat of chicken and an equal amount of coarsely chopped blanched almonds. Set the bowl in another bowl of ice water; when the mixture thickens stir in a cup of heavy cream that has been beaten stiff. Turn into a mold that has been rinsed in cold water and set in ice box until needed. When unmolded on the platter for serving, surround the mousse with crisped cress. Minced veal may be used in place of chicken.
Also a cup of chicken soup stock instead of the bouillon cubes and water.
A gelatin-set savory mousse from the era when a molded chicken salad was the standard hot-weather lunch. The custard base is the only real technique in it, and it is where the dish is won or lost.
- The hinge: cook the yolk base gentlyThree yolks in a cup of stock is a thin custard, and it will curdle if the water in the lower pan boils hard. Keep it at a bare simmer and stir until it coats a spoon, around 175-180F; the straining step afterward is insurance, not a substitute.
- Gelatin measureA tablespoon of granulated gelatin is roughly one standard envelope (1/4 oz, about 7 g). Softened in two tablespoons of cold water it will look like stiff paste; add it to the hot custard off direct heat and stir until no grains remain.
- Bouillon cubes then and nowCubes vary a good deal in salt and intensity from brand to brand. Taste before adding the celery salt and paprika, and if you use the homemade stock alternative the recipe offers, expect to need more salt, not less.
- The chicken must already be cookedThe recipe assumes leftover roast or poached breast, minced fine. Nothing in the method cooks the meat, so it needs to go in fully cooked and cold.
- Blanched almondsBlanched means skinned, not toasted. Pour boiling water over whole almonds, slip the skins off, dry them well, then chop coarsely. Sliced or slivered almonds from a packet work, though they give a softer texture than a rough chop.
- Timing the foldThe ice-water bath should bring the base to the consistency of unbeaten egg white before the whipped cream goes in. Too warm and the cream deflates; too cold and it sets in lumps you cannot fold out.
- The moldRinsing with cold water is the period trick for release, and it still works. Allow a mold of about 5 cups, since the whipped cream roughly doubles in bulk; to unmold, dip the outside in warm water for five to ten seconds and invert onto a chilled platter.
- Chilling and yield"Set in ice box until needed" means at least four hours, better overnight. It serves four to six as a lunch or supper dish, and should be eaten within two days.
- CressWatercress, crisped in ice water and spun dry. Peppery upland cress or mache stands in well; ordinary lettuce does not, since the point is the bite against a rich, bland mousse.
Molded savory mousses like this one belong to the long American vogue for gelatin cookery that ran from the 1890s through the 1950s, when packaged granulated gelatin removed the day-long business of boiling calves' feet and put aspic within reach of any household. Books with titles in the vein of Cook and Be Cool were aimed squarely at the summer problem in kitchens without air conditioning: the cook wanted a dish that could be assembled in the cool of the morning, set in the ice box, and brought out at midday needing no further heat. Chicken bouillon cubes, which the recipe leans on, were one of the conveniences a home cook could by then reach for without ceremony. The suggestion that minced veal may replace chicken is a reminder that veal was then a common, unremarkable meat in American home cooking, not the specialty item it has since become.