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Date Foam
Make an orange or lemon gelatine jelly. (With a plain gelatine it is best to follow directions given by the manufacturers of the particular brand one uses, as they know best the strength of their gelatine, using, however, in a warm climate one cup less of water than that recommended). With this as a foundation, when the gelatine begins to harden slightly on being removed from the stove and whipped in process of cooling, add the well-beaten whites of two eggs and one cup of stoned, chopped dates. Place in a mould and set on ice to chill.
The problem here is structural, not a matter of technique: raw egg white is folded into a gelatine that has already been taken off the heat and cooled to the point of setting, then chilled and served. Nothing in the dish ever reaches a temperature that would make the egg safe.
- The raw egg white never gets hotBy the time the whipped whites go in, the jelly is cool enough to be thickening — well below any temperature that would kill Salmonella. It then goes onto ice and is eaten cold. A foam like this is a raw-egg dessert in every practical sense. Use a current recipe if you want a whipped fruit jelly.
- Why 1900 was untroubled by itWhy the period was untroubled by it -- Raw or barely-set egg white was ordinary in snows, whips, floats and charlottes across the period, and household books do not generally seem to have flagged it. The change since has more to do with the scale and distribution of egg production than with any new fragility of cooks.
- "Follow the manufacturer's directions"Sound advice then and now: powdered and leaf gelatines of the era varied widely in bloom strength, which is why the author declines to give a quantity. Modern granulated gelatine is standardised, so any figure quoted here would not transfer.
- The warm-climate noteCutting a cup of water was one way to keep a jelly standing in a hot room before domestic refrigeration. "Set on ice" here most likely means an icebox or a bowl packed in ice rather than a refrigerator shelf.
- Stoned dates"Stoned" simply means pitted. Modern soft dates such as Medjool are likely to be moister than what the book assumes.
Whipped gelatine desserts — called snows, sponges, foams or whips depending on the book — were common in American and British household cookery in the decades either side of 1900, and they were made much easier by commercial powdered gelatine. Before that, jelly generally meant hours of simmering calves' feet or isinglass, and a whipped jelly was a laborious dish. Once packet gelatine of reliable strength was on grocery shelves, the technique became a familiar middle-class dessert: set the jelly part way, beat air into it, fold in egg white for volume, and add fruit for interest. Imported dates also became cheaper and more widely available over the same decades, which is why fruit-recipe collections of the period give them so much space. The instruction to trust the gelatine manufacturer over the cookbook is a small marker of the moment — the author defers to an industrial product as more consistent than her own directions could be.