Hard Sauce
Use two parts of pulverized sugar to one part of butter. Cream the butter and add the sugar gradually until very light. Flavor with Larkin Nutmeg or with lemon-juice.
A two-ingredient pudding sauce that lives or dies on the creaming. The proportions are given as parts, so it scales to whatever you need.
- Pulverized sugarThis is confectioners' (powdered) sugar, ground much finer than granulated. Modern powdered sugar contains cornstarch, which is harmless here; granulated will not dissolve in cold butter and leaves the sauce gritty.
- Parts, in practiceA workable batch is 1/2 cup (1 stick, 4 oz) butter to 1 cup sugar. The original does not say whether the parts are weight or volume; either reading gives a stiff, sweet sauce, so judge by texture and add sugar until it stops absorbing.
- Butter temperature is the hingeThe butter must be soft enough to cream but still cool, around 65F. Melted or oily butter will not hold air and the sauce goes greasy; chilling and re-beating may or may not recover it.
- Add the sugar graduallyBeating it in a spoonful at a time is what makes the sauce "very light." Dumping it all in at once gives a dense, heavy sauce. Five to eight minutes with a mixer is not too long.
- Larkin NutmegLarkin was the mail-order company that issued this book, and "Larkin Nutmeg" is simply its house-brand nutmeg; the recipe does not say whether it was sold whole or ground. Use about 1/4 teaspoon freshly grated per half cup of butter.
- Lemon juice, sparinglyLiquid thins the sauce and can make it curdle. A teaspoon at most, worked in at the end; lemon zest carries more flavor with no risk.
- SaltButter was often salted for keeping in this period, which may be why none is called for. With unsalted butter, add a pinch, or the sugar tastes flat.
- Serving and yieldHalf a cup of butter's worth serves six to eight. Chill it firm, then serve it cold in a mound or in pats on hot steamed pudding, apple dumplings or mince pie, so it melts as it is eaten.
Hard sauce is generally said to take its name from its state rather than its flavor: unlike the poured custards and "soft" sauces of the same era, it is served cold and firm and depends on the heat of the pudding beneath it to turn to cream. English cooks made a close relative in brandy butter, the same creamed butter and sugar flavored with spirits, while American versions are commonly flavored instead with nutmeg, lemon, vanilla or rose water. Larkin was a Buffalo soap and household-goods firm that gave premium cookbooks to its customers, which is the likeliest reason a plain sauce names a brand of nutmeg. Steamed puddings of the kind this sauce accompanies were a common winter dessert.