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Tapioca Wine Soup
1/3 cup pearl tapioca 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 cup cold water 3-inch piece stick cinnamon 3 cups boiling water 1 pint claret wine 1/2 cup powdered sugar Soak tapioca in cold water two hours. Drain, add to boiling water with salt and cinnamon; let boil three minutes, then cook in double boiler until tapioca is transparent. Cool, add wine and sugar. Serve very cold.
A cold sweet wine soup thickened with tapioca, served as a first course or a light dessert. Nearly all the work is in getting the tapioca fully clear before the wine goes in.
- The hinge: cook the tapioca until truly transparentPearl tapioca that still shows a white centre will stay chalky, and starch is slower to soften once sugar and acid are in the pot. Soaked pearls can want the better part of an hour in the double boiler after the initial three-minute boil; stir occasionally and judge by eye, not the clock.
- Pearl tapioca, not instantThis needs the small pearl tapioca sold in bags or in Asian groceries, which is why it is soaked two hours first. Instant or minute tapioca is pre-cooked and dissolves into paste here.
- Powdered sugarIn books of this period "powdered sugar" means finely granulated sugar, not the cornstarch-cut confectioners' sugar on shelves now. Use superfine or ordinary granulated; note that it goes into the cooled base, so stir until it has fully dissolved.
- ClaretClaret meant a dry red Bordeaux or a wine in that style. Any dry, medium-bodied red works — Cabernet, Merlot, a Loire Cabernet Franc. A pint is 2 cups, and it is added off the heat, so the alcohol remains.
- CinnamonA 3-inch piece of cassia or true cinnamon stick, boiled with the tapioca. The recipe does not say to remove it, but it should be lifted out before chilling. Ground cinnamon will cloud the soup and settle.
- Chilling and consistencyTapioca thickens considerably as it cools, and this should pour like a thin cream, not set. Chill thoroughly -- the recipe wants it served very cold -- and thin with a little cold water or extra wine if it stiffens too far.
- Yield and servingAbout 6 cups, serving six in small cups or bowls. A spoonful of whipped cream or a few berries on top would not be out of place.