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Calf's-Foot Jelly
Cut across the first joint, and through the hoof, place in a large sauce pan, cover with cold water, and bring quickly to the boiling point; when water boils, remove them, and wash thoroughly in cold water.
When perfectly clean put into a porcelain-lined saucepan , add cold water in the proportion of three pints to two calf's feet, put sauce-pan over fire, and when water boils, set aside to a cooler place, where it will simmer very slowly for five hours; strain the liquor through a fine sieve, or a coarse towel, let it stand over night to set, remove the fat that has risen to the top, dip a towel in boiling water, and wash the surface, which will be quite firm. Now place in a porcelain-lined sauce-pan, and melt, add juice of two lemons, rinds of three cut into strips, one-fourth pound of cut loafsugar, ten cloves, and one inch of cinnamon stick. Put the whites of three eggs, together with the shells (which must first be blanched in boiling water), into a bowl, beat them slightly, and pour them into the sauce-pan, continuing to use the egg-beater until the whole boils, when the pan should be drawn aside where it will simmer gently for ten minutes, skimming off all scum as it rises. While simmering, prepare a piece of flannel by pouring through it a little warm water; and when the jelly has simmered ten minutes, pour it through this bag into a bowl, and repeat the process of straining until it is perfectly clear, when add a half gill of sherry (or brandy, and sherry mixed in equal proportions), stir well, pour into molds, and place upon ice or in a cool place until jelly sets and becomes firm enough to turn out and serve.
This is gelatin made from scratch, and the whole recipe turns on the clarification step. Everything before it builds body; everything after it builds clarity and flavour.
- The hinge: do not disturb the raftWhisk the egg whites and shells in only until the liquid reaches a boil, then stop entirely and let it simmer undisturbed for the ten minutes. Any stirring after the coagulated raft forms breaks it up and drives the cloud back into the jelly. The recipe allows for straining more than once, until the jelly runs perfectly clear.
- Never squeeze the bagWet the flannel or a doubled jelly bag with hot water, hang it, and let the jelly fall through by gravity alone. Pressing or wringing forces fine sediment through and undoes the clarification.
- Calf's feetNot a supermarket item; order from a halal or Latin butcher, or one who breaks whole carcasses, and ask for them split. Two feet with three pints of water is the stated proportion, and the feet must be scrubbed and the first boiling water discarded or the stock will taste of the yard.
- Loaf sugar and old measuresLoaf sugar was cut from a hard refined cone; ordinary granulated sugar is the equivalent. A quarter pound is 4 oz, a little over half a cup. A gill is 4 fl oz (half a US cup), so the half gill of sherry is 2 fl oz, or 4 tablespoons.
- Porcelain-lined saucepanThis means nonreactive. Enamelled cast iron or stainless steel is fine; bare aluminium or unlined copper will discolour the jelly and pick up a metallic note from the lemon juice.
- Heat level"Simmer very slowly for five hours" means barely trembling; the book gives no temperature, but that is conventionally taken as somewhere in the region of 180-190F, well below a boil. A rolling boil emulsifies fat into the stock and makes a permanently cloudy jelly.
- Test the set before you flavour itAfter the overnight chill the stock should be firm enough to unmould in one piece. If it is only loosely set, reduce it further before clarifying, since sugar, juice and wine all dilute it and no amount of chilling will fix a weak base.
- Yield and servingThree pints of water yields roughly a quart of finished jelly, enough for six to eight small moulds. Dip the mould briefly in warm water to turn it out, and keep it refrigerated; it will hold three or four days and softens quickly at room temperature.
Calf's-foot jelly was for most of the nineteenth century both a dessert and a sickroom staple, valued as a light, restorative food for invalids and recommended for that purpose in household manuals on both sides of the Atlantic. The gelatin comes from collagen in the feet, extracted by long slow simmering, and the elaborate clarification with egg white, lemon and wine exists because a brilliantly transparent moulded jelly was a mark of a skilled kitchen. Commercial sheet and leaf gelatin was already available when The Dixie Cook Book appeared in the 1880s, and recipes of this kind were on their way out; within a generation packaged gelatin desserts had largely displaced them, and the two-day process here reads as the older method being recorded near the end of its working life.