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Chafing-dish Dainties (Dice cut into inch-length)
dice; cut into inch-length pieces cooked spaghetti enough to make one cup. Put one cup and a half of thin cream into the blazer over hot water, and, when hot, add the meat and spaghetti. Beat the yolks of two eggs, add two tablespoonfuls of cream, and stir into the hot mixture; add, also, half a teaspoonful (scant) of salt and a dash of paprica.
Stir constantly until the mixture thickens slightly, then serve at once with toast or crackers.
A chafing-dish creamed dish, thickened with egg yolk rather than flour. The text as printed begins mid-sentence, so the first ingredient — the diced meat — is lost with the previous page; cooked chicken, ham, sweetbreads or lobster are the usual candidates in this section, and about a cup of it suits the quantities given.
- The blazerThe blazer is the upper pan of a chafing dish, set over the hot-water pan. A double boiler or a stainless bowl over barely simmering water does the same job, and the water bath is not optional here — it is what keeps the yolks from scrambling.
- Thin creamPeriod "thin cream" was the lighter grade of cream, closest to today's light cream; half-and-half is a thinner substitute. Heavy cream will work but gives a heavier sauce than intended.
- The hinge: never let it boilOnce the yolks go in, the mixture must only thicken to the point of coating a spoon. A boil, or direct heat under the pan, will curdle it into grainy custard with no way back.
- Temper the yolksThe two tablespoons of cream beaten into the yolks are there to loosen them. Ladle in a little of the hot cream as well before returning everything to the pan; it makes curdling far less likely at the join.
- PapricaAn older spelling of paprika. The paprika of the period was typically mild, used for colour and a gentle warmth rather than heat.
- SpaghettiCut into inch lengths, which suits eating from a chafing dish with a spoon. Cook the pasta fully; it does no further softening in the sauce.
- YieldAbout two servings as a light supper or four as an appetiser on toast. Serve the moment it thickens, since it stiffens and can break on standing.
Chafing-dish cookery had a considerable vogue in American homes around 1900, when the appliance sat somewhere between a cooking tool and a piece of social equipment: it let a hostess make a hot dish at the table, after the servants had gone or where there were none, and it suited the late-evening supper and the bachelor apartment equally. Books of the period return often to the same formula seen here — diced cooked meat or shellfish warmed in cream and bound with egg yolk, seasoned lightly with salt and paprika, and served on toast. The technique is essentially a loose stirred custard, which is why the water bath and the constant stirring are written into the instructions; the chafing dish gave gentle, indirect heat.