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To Scald Codlins
1101. Wrap each in a vine-leaf, and pack them close in a stew-pan; and when full pour as much water as will cover them. Set it over a gentle fire, and let them simmer slowly till done enough to take the thin skin off when cold. Place them in a dish, with or without milk, cream, or custard; if the latter, there should be no ratafia. Dust fine sugar over the apples.
A gentle-heat method for whole green cooking apples, in which vine leaves both cushion the fruit and lend it colour. The whole point is a bare simmer: any real boil and the apples burst before the skins will lift.
- What a codlin isA codling: a hard, sharply acid green apple of the sort grown for cooking rather than eating raw, often used before full ripeness. Small underripe Bramleys, Granny Smiths, or windfalls of any cooking variety will do; choose them all of a size so they cook evenly.
- Vine leavesFresh grape leaves were the standard wrapping; they keep the fruit from knocking together and were believed to hold the green colour. Brined leaves from a jar work but must be rinsed well, or the apples take up salt. If you have none, line the pan with a folded cloth or parchment instead.
- Stew-pan and heatA stew-pan here is a wide, straight-sided pan; the recipe has the fruit packed close and covered with water. "A gentle fire" means a bare simmer, the water barely trembling and never rolling. On an induction or gas hob that is the lowest usable setting, and a heat diffuser helps.
- TimingNo time is given in the original; go by the test in the recipe, which is not softness but skin: they are ready when a cooled apple's thin skin slips away under the thumb. Expect a fairly long slow simmer, and note that overcooked they collapse into sauce.
- Cool before peelingThe instruction to skin them cold is not fussiness. Hot, the flesh tears with the skin; cold, it lifts off cleanly.
- RatafiaAn almond flavouring, made with bitter almonds or peach and apricot kernels, and also the name of the little almond biscuits crumbled over puddings; the word is older than this book. The recipe simply directs that if custard is used there should be no ratafia; no reason is given. If you want a scented custard, vanilla or a strip of lemon peel will serve.
- ServingServe at room temperature or lightly chilled, in a shallow dish, with cold pouring cream or a thin pouring custard, and caster sugar dusted over at the last moment so it does not dissolve. Reduce some of the cooking liquor to a syrup if you want a sauce.
- YieldThe original gives no quantity. As a rough guide, reckon two small codlings per person and fill whatever pan you have.