Cheese Salad
1/2 lb. American cream cheese. 1 pt. whipped cream. 1 tablespoon granulated gelatine. 4 tablespoons water. 1 teaspoon grated onion. Salt and pepper to taste.
Put in half-dozen small cups or moulds and chill. Serve with cooked dressing.
This is a moulded cheese mousse rather than a tossed salad, and the original leaves out every step between the ingredient list and the moulds. The order of operations is the whole recipe.
- Method, filled inSprinkle the gelatine over the 4 tablespoons cold water, let it stand until spongy, then dissolve it over hot water and cool it to barely warm. Beat the cheese smooth with the onion, salt and pepper, stir in the liquid gelatine quickly, then fold in the whipped cream. If the gelatine goes in hot it will thin the cheese; if it goes in cold it will set in threads.
- "American cream cheese"Most likely domestic soft unripened cheese, as distinct from the imported French soft cheeses a fancier kitchen might buy. Modern block cream cheese is its closest descendant; use 8 oz, at room temperature so it beats without lumps. Whipped spreadable cream cheese has added water and air and will set poorly.
- 1 pt. whipped creamAmbiguous in the original. Read as 1 pint (2 cups) heavy cream, whipped, which yields roughly a quart of foam and gives a light mousse; a pint of already-whipped cream would make a much denser, cheesier mould. Whip to soft peaks only, since the folding stiffens it further.
- Gelatine quantityOne tablespoon of granulated gelatine is slightly more than one modern envelope (an envelope is 1/4 oz, about 2 1/4 teaspoons). It should give a set firm enough to unmould but not rubbery.
- Grated onionGrate it on a fine rasp and use the juice with the pulp. This is the only seasoning besides salt and pepper, so a mild sweet onion gives the intended flavour; a hot storage onion will dominate the cream.
- Chilling and unmouldingRinse the cups with cold water before filling. Allow at least 4 hours, and preferably overnight. Dip the moulds briefly in warm water and turn out onto lettuce.
- "Cooked dressing"Not mayonnaise. A boiled dressing of egg, flour or cornstarch, vinegar, mustard and milk, thickened over heat and cooled. Its sharpness is what keeps the dish from being merely rich.
- YieldSix small moulds, one per person as a salad course. Rich enough that larger portions overwhelm a meal.
Mrs. Wilson's book belongs to the high season of the moulded salad, when granulated gelatine sold in measured envelopes made setting a dish in jelly far simpler than the older calf's-foot method, and moulded salads became widespread in American cooking. The salad course in this period was often not leaves at all but something turned out of a mould onto a lettuce leaf, judged on how cleanly it held its shape. Commercial cream cheese was still a fairly young product, usually traced to New York State dairies in the 1870s, and was sold in foil-wrapped blocks by the time this book appeared; Mrs. Wilson's "American" appears to distinguish it from the imported French soft cheeses a fancier kitchen might have used. The pairing with a cooked dressing rather than mayonnaise is also of its time: boiled dressings were cheaper and kept better without refrigeration.