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Peach Salad
(English style.) Cut ripe, fine-flavored peaches into quarters, after removing the skins. Cover with champagne, thoroughly chilled, and sprinkle with tea-rose petals. Serve at once.
Peach,-Strawberry-and-Cherry Salad. (London style.) Let a large handful of fresh rose petals stand an hour or two in a cool place in a cup of Hungarian wine. Strain out the leaves and pour the wine over a quart of mixed fruit, - peaches pared and cut in quarters, strawberries hulled and cut in halves, and cherries stoned, - all thoroughly chilled. Let a handful of rose petals stand an hour or two in a cup of thick cream; then strain the cream, sweeten slightly with powdered sugar, whip to a stiff froth, and use as a garnish for the fruit.
Two macerated fruit salads that depend entirely on the quality of the fruit and the perfume of the roses; there is no cooking to get wrong, only sourcing and timing.
- Rose petals must be food-safeUse petals from roses you know have not been sprayed — your own garden, a farmers' market, or petals sold for culinary use. Florist roses are routinely treated with systemic pesticides and are not edible. Snip off the bitter white heel at the base of each petal.
- "Hungarian wine" means a sweet Tokaji"Hungarian wine" most likely means Tokay -- In American cookbooks of the period, Hungarian wine usually pointed to Tokay, a sweet golden wine, though the recipe does not specify. A Tokaji Aszu or late-harvest Furmint gives the likely intended effect; a dry white will read as sour against the fruit.
- A cup is 8 fl ozThe measures here are American cups — 8 fl oz of wine for a quart (about 1 lb 8 oz, or roughly 4 cups) of prepared fruit, and 8 fl oz of cream for the garnish.
- "Thick cream" is heavy or double creamModern heavy whipping cream (36% fat) works; British double cream (48%) is closer to what was meant. Ultra-pasteurized cream whips more stubbornly — chill the bowl and beaters.
- Infuse the cream coldThe petals stand an hour or two in the cream and are then strained out; the recipe specifies a cool place only for the wine infusion. Do not warm the cream to speed it up; the aroma is volatile and heat also makes the cream harder to whip stiff.
- Serve at once means itThe first recipe says to serve at once; cut peaches brown and strawberries weep soon after meeting sugar and wine. Prepare the infusions ahead, cut and dress the fruit immediately before it goes to the table.
- Chilling is the whole techniqueThe first version calls for thoroughly chilled champagne, the second for thoroughly chilled fruit. Hold the cut fruit and the strained wine separately in the refrigerator and combine at the last moment.
- YieldThe recipe gives no yield; a quart of prepared fruit would serve roughly four to six as a dessert course.
Fruit "salads" of this kind sat awkwardly between the salad course and dessert, and the labels English style and London style were doing the work of a fashion note in British dining rooms. Steeping rose petals in wine or cream to borrow their scent is much older than the book, descending from the rose-waters and flower-flavored creams of medieval and early modern European cookery. What dates the recipe most precisely is the champagne: chilled champagne poured over fresh peaches was a set piece of luxury dining, and it points to the same taste that produced the peach-and-wine desserts of the period. Hungarian Tokay, meanwhile, was among the most prestigious sweet wines available to an American hostess of the day, which is why the author names the country and not the grape.