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Condensing Milk for Blanc-Mangers and Creams
Skimmed milk which is superabundant in many hotels can be immensely improved for the pastry cook's purposes by condensation. No process is required but to set 4 quarts of milk on the range in a shallow pan with the sugar in it that is required for 2 quarts-probably 12 ounces-and let the milk simmer till reduced to 2 quarts. The cheesy coating that forms on boiling milk will not appear on that which has sugar in it.
A hotel-kitchen thrift measure: surplus skimmed milk reduced by half with sugar, giving a sweetened concentrate for blancmanges and creams. The whole thing turns on gentle heat and a wide pan.
- The hinge: a wide pan, a low flameReduction speed depends on surface area, not on how hard the milk boils. Use the widest pan you have and keep it at a bare simmer; milk sugars scorch on the bottom and the burnt taste cannot be strained out.
- Quantities4 quarts (16 cups) skimmed milk with 12 oz sugar, roughly 1 3/4 cups, reduced to 2 quarts. That is about 6 oz sugar per finished quart, noticeably less sweet than modern canned sweetened condensed milk.
- TimingThe original gives none. On a domestic burner in a wide pan expect an hour or more for 4 quarts, and possibly considerably longer at a bare simmer; judge by volume, not the clock. Mark the level in the pan at the start, or measure once into a jug.
- Why the sugar mattersThe "cheesy coating" is the protein skin that forms on plain heated milk. The author's observation is that sugar in the pan keeps it from forming; sugar does raise the boiling point slightly and thickens the liquid, though the exact reason the skin fails to set is not settled.
- Skimmed milk is not a compromise hereModern skim milk works exactly as intended: with little fat to separate out, the reduction stays smooth and the result is a clean-tasting base for a starch- or gelatin-set cream. Whole milk reduces just as well but will want stirring to keep the fat incorporated.
- Stirring and strainingStir every few minutes, scraping the base and the ring that forms at the waterline. Strain the finished concentrate while warm to catch any coagulated specks.
- StorageThis is not the shelf-stable canned product, which keeps by virtue of a far higher sugar concentration than this. Cool it quickly, refrigerate, and treat it as fresh dairy "index": 6 "index": 6, "verdict": "hedge" -- a few days at most.
- Using it2 quarts of concentrate stands in for 4 quarts of milk plus 12 oz sugar. When substituting into a modern blancmange or custard, reduce the recipe's sugar accordingly or the set will be cloying and the starch will soften.
The American Pastry Cook belongs to the run of late nineteenth-century American hotel-kitchen manuals — books written for men cooking at volume, where the standing problem was what to do with the by-products of a large operation. A hotel skimmed its milk for cream and butter and was left with quantities of skim it could not sell; boiling it down with sugar turned a surplus into a keeping-quality sweet base. Commercially the same idea had already been industrialised: sweetened condensed milk in tins is generally credited to Gail Borden in the 1850s, and by the 1880s it was a familiar grocery item. What this entry records is the kitchen-scale version of that trade, done in a shallow pan on the range rather than in a vacuum evaporator, and the small practical observation — that sugar keeps the skin from forming — is the sort of thing that only turns up in books written by working cooks.