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Iced Cabinet Pudding
Cut in slices of moderate thickness some sponge-cakes, also some preserved pineapple, ginger, apricots and pears, all in equal quantities. Fill a plain pudding-mould with alternate layers of the above ingredients, strewing between each layer a few raisins and currants, pour over these ingredients a sufficient quantity of wine to moisten the cake, and leave them for an hour. Soak one ounce of gelatine in cold water, then strain it into a basin, and add the beaten yolks of four eggs, four ounces of sugar, three ounces of grated chocolate, and one and one-half pints of milk; stand the basin in a bain-marie, and stir the mixture until thickened. Pour the hot custard over the contents of the mould, and cover it securely. When the contents are cool, bury it in pounded ice-and salt for seven or eight hours. Afterward dip the mould into tepid water, quickly remove it, wipe it, turn the pudding out onto a fancy dish, garnish with croutons of red currant jelly, and serve.
An unbaked charlotte-style pudding in which a chocolate custard is set with gelatine rather than by heat, then chilled hard in an ice-and-salt bath. The whole thing turns on the custard: it must thicken without curdling, and it must be poured hot so the gelatine stays dissolved.
- The custard is the hingeSet the basin over simmering, not boiling, water and stir constantly until the mixture coats a spoon, roughly 170-175F. Beyond about 180F the yolks scramble and the pudding sets grainy; there is no flour here to protect them.
- One ounce of gelatineThat is about four 1/4-oz envelopes of modern powdered gelatine for 1 1/2 pints of milk, which gives a firm, sliceable set of the kind Victorian moulded work demanded. Three envelopes is closer to modern taste. Bloom it in cold water for 5 minutes, then dissolve it into the hot custard rather than straining cold gelatine into raw yolks.
- Chilling without a salt bathPounded ice and salt for seven or eight hours was the standard way to get a hard chill in a kitchen of this date. A refrigerator overnight will set the pudding, if less coldly; the pudding is meant to be very cold and firm, not frozen solid.
- Preserved fruitPreserved pineapple, ginger, apricots and pears means candied or syrup-preserved fruit, not fresh or canned in juice. Use glace fruit or drained fruit in heavy syrup, and blot it, since excess syrup will loosen the set. Fresh pineapple must not be used at all: its bromelain digests gelatine and the pudding will never firm.
- Sponge-cakeDay-old plain sponge or ladyfingers, which absorb the wine without collapsing. Fresh, soft cake turns to paste.
- The wineThe recipe does not specify a type; a fortified wine such as sherry, madeira or marsala suits the dish. 'A sufficient quantity to moisten' works out at roughly 1/2 cup for a 2-quart mould.
- Grated chocolateThree ounces of unsweetened or dark eating chocolate, grated fine so it melts into the custard. Cocoa powder is not a straight substitute at this ratio.
- Croutons of currant jellyCubes of stiff red currant jelly turned out and cut with a wet knife, used as a garnish around the base. A firm jelly is required or the cubes will slump on the plate.
- Mould and yieldA plain 1 1/2 to 2 quart charlotte or pudding mould. Serves 8 to 10. To unmould, dip in tepid water for 10 seconds only, wipe dry, and invert straight onto the serving dish.
Cabinet pudding is an English dining-room standard of the nineteenth century, a mould lined with sponge cake or bread, studded with dried fruit, filled with custard and usually steamed; it appears in period books under several names, including chancellor's pudding and diplomat pudding, and the grand titles are generally traced to its place on formal service menus rather than to any particular cabinet or diplomat. One version turns the dish inside out for a hotel kitchen: instead of steaming, the custard is set with gelatine and the mould buried in ice and salt, producing a cold pudding. The candied pineapple and preserved ginger point to an imported-luxury pantry, and the ice-and-salt chilling is a reminder that a large commercial kitchen had reliable ice long before it had mechanical refrigeration.