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Princess Pudding
Put two ounces of French gelatine into a large basin with one pint of cold water and let it soak for an hour or a little more; then pour over one pint of boiling water, stir it well, and while doing so add three breakfast cupfuls of moist sugar, the strained juice of four lemons and one pint of Madeira or Malaga wine. Pour the mixture into a saucepan over the fire, and when it commences to thicken add the whites of four eggs previously beaten to a stiff froth. Turn the whole into a Princess mould packed in ice, and when it is set and firm turn it out onto a dish and serve with one quart of rich custard poured round it. The dish may afterward be garnished with crystallized fruits, macaroon, ratafias or other sweet fancy biscuits.
A Victorian wine jelly lightened with beaten whites and turned out of a tall mould. Two things decide whether it works: the gelatine ratio and how cold you keep it while it sets.
- The hinge: fold the whites in barely warmIf the jelly is hot when the froth goes in, the whites collapse and you get a dense wine jelly with scum on top. Let the mixture cool over ice until it is thickly syrupy and just moving, then fold the froth through so it stays suspended. Working with pasteurized egg whites is sensible here, since the whites are never brought to a fully cooked temperature.
- Gelatine, and how much you actually need"French gelatine" was generally sold in leaf or sheet form, and nineteenth-century gelatines were typically weaker and less consistent in setting strength than modern products. Two ounces against three pints of liquid would set very firm with modern powdered gelatine; about 1 to 1 1/4 oz (four to five 1/4-oz envelopes) gives a jelly firm enough to unmould and still pleasant to eat.
- Do not discard the soaking waterThe pint of cold water used to bloom the gelatine is part of the recipe's liquid. Total liquid is three pints: one pint cold, one pint boiling, one pint wine.
- Moist sugarMoist or "soft" sugar was a damp, pale unrefined sugar, closest today to light brown sugar. Three breakfast cupfuls is roughly 1 1/2 lb, which is very sweet by current taste; a pound is enough, and the juice of four lemons (about 3/4 cup) keeps it from cloying.
- Breakfast cupfulA breakfast cup ran 8 to 10 fluid ounces, larger than a teacup. Treat it as a generous 8-oz cup and weigh the sugar instead if you want consistency.
- The wineMalaga was a cheap and widely available wine in American kitchens of the period; Madeira, though still used, was past its earlier peak. A medium-dry Madeira or an oloroso-style sherry stands in well; the alcohol is not cooked off, so the pudding tastes strongly of it.
- Mould and settingA Princess mould was one of many named mould shapes of the period; its exact form is not certain, and a tall shaped mould will serve. You need one of about 2 1/2 to 3 quarts to hold three pints plus the volume of the froth. Instead of packing in ice, chill 6 to 8 hours in the refrigerator, then dip the mould in warm water for a few seconds and invert.
- The custard and garnishThe quart of "rich custard" is a stirred cr"eme anglaise, poured cold around the base, not over it. Ratafias are small hard almond macaroons; amaretti serve the same purpose.
- YieldThree pints of jelly plus a quart of custard serves 10 to 12.
Oscar Tschirky's 1896 book records the Waldorf's kitchen at the moment when the elaborate moulded jelly was at its peak in American hotel dining: gelatine had become cheap and reliable enough to be an everyday dessert material rather than a labour of calves' feet. Adding whipped whites to a setting wine jelly was the standard way to turn a clear jelly into an opaque, aerated "sponge" that could be served with a sauce, and versions of it appear across late-Victorian British and American manuals under names like lemon sponge and wine sponge. The generous pint of Madeira or Malaga reflects how freely fortified wines were used in the kitchen as well as at the table. Dishes of this sort were named after royalty and nobility as a matter of course; the title is generally taken to describe the mould and the manner of service rather than any particular princess.