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Codlin Tart
794. Scald the codlins as is directed under that head; when ready, take off the thin skin, aud lay them whole in a dish; put a little of the water the apples were boiled in at bottom, strew them over with lump sugar or fine Lisbon; when cold, put any of the previouslydescribed pastes round the edges and over the tart, or bake a crust in an empty tin or dish, and lift the lid; cut it in quarters, without touching the paste on the edge of the dish, and make the points stand up, or remove the lid altogether to introduce the fruit. Pour a good custard over it when cold, and sift sugar over. Or, line the bottom of a shallow dish with paste, lay the apples in it, sweeten, and lay little twists of paste over in bars.
An assembly rather than a baked pie: the apples are cooked first, cooled, and only then brought together with pastry and custard. Nothing here needs long baking, and the whole point is that the fruit keeps its shape.
- What a codlin isA codlin (or codling) is a hard, sharp green cooking apple, generally an early-season variety, and one often coddled — scalded gently — though it was baked too. Any firm tart apple that holds its shape will do; Bramley tends to collapse, so something along the lines of a Granny Smith or a russet is a safer choice.
- Scalding the applesThe scalding method referred to is not reproduced here; the usual practice was to cover whole apples with water and hold them below boiling until the skins loosen and slip off. Water at a bare tremble rather than a rolling boil keeps the flesh whole; hard boiling bursts them and the dish falls apart.
- Fine Lisbon sugarLisbon was a soft, pale brown cane sugar, moist and slightly molasses-flavoured. Light muscovado is the nearest modern equivalent; lump sugar is simply loaf sugar broken up, so granulated serves.
- The pastesThe pastes described earlier in the book are presumably short and puff crusts. The recipe gives no oven heat; if you bake a lid separately "in an empty tin", roll it about a quarter-inch thick, dock it, and bake in a hot oven (around 400F) for 15-20 minutes until dry and coloured through — it has to be firm enough to lift and to stand in quarters.
- The lid trickCutting the baked lid into quarters and standing the points up shows off the fruit and keeps the pastry out of the juice. Do it once the crust is cold and crisp; a warm lid bends instead of snapping cleanly.
- The custard"A good custard" here means a stirred egg custard — roughly 4 yolks and a tablespoon of sugar to a pint of scalded milk or cream, cooked over low heat to about 175F until it coats a spoon, then cooled. Pour it over cold apples only, or it will thin and slide.
- The barred versionThe recipe gives no baking directions for this variant. The lined dish needs baking; if you bake the base blind first, the twists laid over need only long enough in a hot oven to colour, since the fruit is already cooked and gains nothing from more heat.
- YieldThe recipe gives no quantities; a shallow dish will take roughly six to eight scalded apples. Assemble the same day — the custard and cooked fruit will not keep well beyond that.