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Rocky Mountain Cream
Make Bavarian cream, about half the quantity of the first Bavarian receipt, also prepare about a pint of sweet green muscatel grapes, and enough of bright clear jellies cut in dice to make another pint. When the cream is finished beating and about to set firm mix in the grapes and jellies lightly without breaking them, and pour into a bright milk pan where it will be about 1 1/2 inches deep. Shake and smooth it down and set on ice. When to be served cut across in strips 2 inches wide. Cut these again in triangle shapes. Place the piece in the saucer with the point upwards, pyramid form, and a spoonful of whipped cream around.
There should be 3 colors of jelly, clear lemon, amber and red wine.
A moulded Bavarian cream studded with grapes and diced jelly, cut into wedges and stood point-up. Everything depends on getting the jellies firm and the cream at exactly the right stage of setting before the two are combined.
- The hinge: fold at the right momentThe cream must be thick enough to suspend the fruit and dice but still pourable — the point where a spoon leaves a slowly closing trail. Fold too early and the grapes and jelly sink to the bottom; too late and the cream tears and traps air pockets.
- "Half the quantity of the first Bavarian receipt"This is a cross-reference to the book's base recipe, so the volume is not stated here. Whatever the base makes, remember that a pint of grapes and a pint of diced jelly go in on top of it, so scale to the shallow pan rather than to a fixed figure.
- The diced jelliesThese are separate wine and fruit jellies, set stiff in flat pans and cut into dice; the recipe does not give a size, so cut them small enough to fold in without breaking. Set them firmer than a jelly meant to be eaten alone, or they will soften and bleed colour into the cream.
- Three coloursThe recipe specifies clear lemon, amber and red wine. Amber would come from a fortified wine such as sherry or Madeira, the red from a red table wine or port. Clarity matters more than flavour here, so strain through a jelly bag or coffee filter.
- Muscatel grapesSweet green muscat grapes with seeds were the period fruit. Any seedless green grape works; halve larger ones and dry them well on a towel, since surface juice thins the cream where it touches.
- "A bright milk pan"A wide, shallow tinned pan. A quarter-sheet pan or any straight-sided dish that gives a depth of 1 1/2 inches does the same job — the depth is what makes the triangles stand up at the table.
- "Set on ice"Refrigerate. Four hours will do; overnight is better, and a fully chilled set is what allows clean cuts. Dip the knife in hot water and wipe it between cuts.
- Yield and servingCut across in 2-inch strips, then cut the strips into triangles; the yield depends entirely on the size of pan you use. Slide each onto a chilled saucer with the point upward and spoon lightly sweetened whipped cream around the base.
The American Pastry Cook belongs to the era of hotel and restaurant pastry work in which a Bavarian cream was less a dessert than a canvas. Once a kitchen could set gelatin reliably — and commercial sheet gelatin, followed later in the century by powdered gelatin, gradually made that routine rather than a day's labour over calves' feet — the fashion turned to suspending bright things inside a pale cream and cutting it to show the cross-section, much as in the savoury aspics and macédoines of the same kitchens. The name is usually explained as a nod to the snow-capped peak the triangular slice is meant to suggest, standing point upward in its ring of whipped cream, though the recipe itself does not say so; American desserts of the period were often christened after scenery and railroads.