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Boiled Custard
1 qt. scalded milk 4 eggs 4 tablespoons sugar 1/4 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon corn starch 1 teaspoon vanilla Mix corn starch with a little cold milk and cook in scalded milk ten minutes; beat eggs and sugar together, pour the boiled milk over it and cook until thick enough to mask the spoon. Remove at once and set in cold water, stir often until almost cold; add the flavoring and salt and strain into the dish from which it is to be served. This custard may be used with sliced cake, macaroons, or fruit.
COCOANUT CUSTARD: One cup grated cocoanut may be added after straining for cocoanut custard.
CHOCOLATE CUSTARD: Melt 1 ounce of chocolate over hot water and add to the hot custard before straining.
ORANGE CUSTARD: Add the juice of 2 and the lightly grated rind of 1 orange just before serving.
Charlotte Russe, No. 1 2 cups cream 1/2 cup powdered sugar 1 speck salt 1/2 dozen lady fingers 1 teaspoon vanilla Mix the cream, vanilla and sugar. Set into ice water and when chilled whip to a thick froth. Drain and fling into a dish that has been lined with the cake. Keep on ice till wanted. Serve in the same dish.
A stirred custard sauce, not a baked one, with three variations and a stray Charlotte Russe recipe that has drifted in from the following page. The whole thing hinges on holding the eggs below the point where they scramble.
- The temperature that matters"Thick enough to mask the spoon" means the custard coats the back of a spoon and holds a line drawn through it, which happens at about 175-180F. Past 185F the eggs curdle. A double boiler or very low direct heat with constant stirring both work; an instant-read thermometer removes the guesswork.
- Scalded milkHeat the milk to just below a simmer, when bubbles ring the edge of the pan, about 180F. The step is usually attributed to the days of unpasteurised milk, and it also shortens the cooking.
- Whole eggs, not yolksFour whole eggs give a firmer, slightly more custard-pudding set than the yolk-only creme anglaise most modern recipes use, and the whites are what curdle first. Temper by pouring the hot milk into the beaten eggs in a thin stream while whisking, as the recipe directs, rather than the reverse.
- Corn starch as insuranceOne teaspoon in a quart is a very small amount, there to buffer the eggs against curdling rather than to thicken. Slake it in a few tablespoons of cold milk before it goes into the hot.
- Cooling and strainingSetting the pan in cold water and stirring stops the residual heat from carrying the custard past the point of no return. Straining catches the inevitable threads of set egg and the vanilla goes in off the heat so the flavour is not driven off.
- The chocolateChocolate sold by the ounce in recipes of this period generally meant unsweetened baking chocolate, not a chocolate bar. One ounce in a quart is subtle; you may want two, with a spoonful more sugar.
- The orange versionCitrus juice added to a finished custard can thin or curdle it, which is why the instruction says just before serving. Add it cold, stir gently, and serve within the hour.
- CocoanutFreshly grated coconut was standard when this was written. Unsweetened desiccated coconut is the nearest substitute; sweetened flaked coconut will make the custard cloying unless you cut the sugar.
- Yield and the stray recipeA quart of milk with four eggs serves six to eight, poured over cake, macaroons or fruit. Charlotte Russe No. 1 is a separate dessert: sweetened cream whipped over ice, spooned into a dish lined with lady fingers, and kept cold until served. Use heavy cream and chill the bowl and beaters.
"Boiled custard" is a misnomer that survived in American cookbooks for well over a century: the one thing the cook must not do is boil it. It is the same preparation the French call creme anglaise, and in the American South a thinner version of it became a Christmas drink served in cups, close kin to eggnog. Its place in the pudding chapter of a flour company's cookbook is straightforward marketing logic: such promotional books aimed to be complete household manuals rather than pamphlets of flour recipes, so they carried sauces, custards and creams alongside the breads and cakes. The teaspoon of corn starch is a period tell. Commercial corn starch had been widely available in American kitchens since the mid-nineteenth century, and here it works as a hedge, protecting an anxious cook from curdling.