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Marsh Mallows
Dissolve a half pound white gum arabic in one pint of water, strain and add half pound fine sugar; place over the fire, stirring constantly until the sugar is dissolved, and all is the consistency of honey; add gradually the whites of four eggs well-beaten, stir the mixture till it becomes somewhat thick and does not adhere to the finger; pour into a tin slightly powdered with starch and when cool divide off into squares.
This is a gum-arabic marshmallow, the older kind, made before gelatin took over the confection entirely. It behaves less like a modern marshmallow and more like a soft pastille, and the gum is the whole job.
- Get the gum dissolved first, and slowlyHalf a pound of gum arabic (acacia gum) in a pint of water is a very heavy solution and it will not dissolve quickly. Powdered gum stirred into warm water and left to stand several hours, or overnight, saves a great deal of grief; lump gum needs longer still. Rushing it over direct heat risks scorching before the gum is in solution.
- The straining is not optionalNatural gum arabic carries bark, grit and insoluble matter. Strain the dissolved gum through several layers of cheesecloth before the sugar goes in, or the finished squares will be speckled and gritty.
- Buy food-grade gumGum arabic is still sold, as acacia gum, in powder form for baking and beverage work. Avoid art-supply gum arabic, which is not sold to food standards.
- "Fine sugar"Superfine or caster sugar, not confectioners' sugar, which contains starch. Half a pound is about one cup plus two tablespoons.
- Consistency of honeyThis is the only doneness cue given and it is a reasonable one: the syrup should ribbon thickly off the spoon, not run. Use a heavy pan over low heat, or a double boiler, and stir the whole time — a gum syrup catches and burns readily.
- Adding the whitesAdd the beaten whites in a slow stream with constant stirring, off the heat or at the barest simmer, or they will set into threads of cooked egg. Even so, the mixture is not held at a high temperature for long; if you are cooking for anyone vulnerable, use pasteurised whites.
- The pan and the starch"Powdered with starch" most likely means cornstarch, though potato starch was also used for dusting. Dust an 8-inch square tin generously, or line it with parchment and dust that; the mixture is tenacious. Dust the tops as well before cutting, and dust the cut faces after.
- Setting and textureAllow several hours at room temperature, uncovered, to firm and dry. Expect a dense, chewy, slightly resinous sweet rather than the airy gelatin marshmallow — closer to a French pâte de guimauve. Store in a tin between layers of starch-dusted paper; refrigeration makes them weep.
The name is older than the confection: Althaea officinalis, the marsh mallow, is a real plant of salt marshes and ditches whose root yields a thick mucilage, used for centuries in Europe and the Near East as a throat and chest remedy. French confectioners sweetened and whipped that root paste into pâte de guimauve, and by the nineteenth century the plant had largely been dropped in favour of gum arabic, which gave the same body more cheaply and reliably — which is why a recipe titled "Marsh Mallows" contains no mallow at all. Gelatin gradually displaced gum in commercial work, and the extruded, cornstarch-moulded marshmallow of the American grocery shelf is a later, mid-twentieth-century development. The Butterick book, a general household manual issued by the pattern company, prints the older gum formula.