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Cranberry Compote
Pick off the stems from about one quart of cranberries. Put three-fourths of a pound of crushed loaf-sugar in a saucepan with one and one-half pints of water and the rind of a lemon thinly pared; place the saucepan over a moderate fire and let the contents boil till reduced to a thick syrup. Put the cranberries in and stir them constantly over the fire with a wooden spoon for ten minutes. At the end of that time, remove the cranberries from the fire, allow them to become cold, then turn them into a compote dish, or any variety of fancy dish, dust caster-sugar over them, and serve.
A short, clear recipe once the period vocabulary is translated. The main adjustment is the syrup: it is boiled down before the fruit goes in, which is what keeps the berries whole rather than reducing them to sauce.
- A quart of cranberriesCranberries were sold by dry measure. A quart is about 4 cups whole berries, roughly 1 lb — a supermarket bag is 12 oz, so buy a bag and a third.
- Loaf-sugar and caster-sugarLoaf sugar was refined sugar sold in a hard cone and broken up for use; crushed loaf sugar is simply granulated sugar. Three-quarters of a pound is about 1 2/3 cups. Caster sugar is superfine sugar, used here only as a dusting at the table.
- One and one-half pints of waterThree cups. That is a great deal of liquid for the sugar given, which is why the recipe insists on boiling it down first.
- "Reduced to a thick syrup"This will take a good while at a steady boil, until the volume has dropped by half or more and the bubbles thicken; time depends on the width of your pan. Rushing this stage is the usual failure: thin syrup plus fruit gives you watery sauce.
- Ten minutes is too longTen minutes may be too long -- Cranberries tend to burst within a few minutes of heat. If you want whole berries in syrup, stir them gently until most have just split, then pull the pan off; the full ten minutes of stirring is likely to break them down.
- The lemon rindThe recipe says thinly pared, so take it in wide strips with no white pith. It is worth fishing out before the compote goes into the dish rather than leaving a boiled strip in the serving bowl.
- It sets as it coolsCranberries are high in pectin, so the syrup will thicken noticeably at room temperature and more still in the refrigerator. Judge consistency cold, not hot.
- Yield and servingRoughly 3 cups, enough for six or so as a dessert compote or more if served alongside roast poultry or game. Covered and refrigerated it should keep for several days.
A compote, in the French sense Oscar Tschirky's kitchen used, is whole or halved fruit poached in sugar syrup and served in its own liquid — distinct from a jam, which is cooked to a set, and from the American cranberry sauce, which is cooked to a mash. The cranberry itself is a North American native, harvested commercially in Massachusetts and New Jersey bogs through the nineteenth century and well established by the time this book appeared in 1896, which is why it turns up in a hotel kitchen that otherwise leaned heavily on European technique. The instruction to crush loaf sugar reads as conservative vocabulary for the period: granulated sugar had largely displaced loaf sugar by the 1890s. Served cold with a dusting of fine sugar, this would have gone to the table either as a light dessert or as the accompaniment to roast game, a role cranberries had already held in American cooking for generations.