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Frosting with Gelatine
Dissolve large pinch gelatine in six table-spoons boiling water; strain and thicken with sugar and flavor with lemon. This is enough to frost two cakes. - Mrs. W. A. J.
A boiled-water gelatine icing of the sort used before meringue powder, meant to be spread warm and left to set glossy and firm. The whole recipe hinges on working fast: once the gelatine solution cools it stiffens in the bowl and cannot be spread smoothly.
- "Large pinch" of gelatineGenuinely ambiguous, but the intent is a very small amount, perhaps an eighth to a quarter teaspoon of modern powdered gelatine for six tablespoons of water. Much more and the icing risks setting rubbery.
- The gelatine itself has changedIn the 1880s gelatine was generally sold as sheets or shredded strands that had to be soaked and dissolved; granulated gelatine that dissolves readily came later. With modern powder, sprinkle it over a little cold water first, then add the boiling water, or it may clump.
- Six tablespoonsThree-eighths of a cup, or 90 ml.
- "Thicken with sugar"This most likely means pulverized (confectioners') sugar, which gives a smoother icing than granulated. Probably something in the region of three to four cups sifted, beaten in gradually until the mixture is thick enough to spread.
- Flavour with lemonThis may mean lemon extract, juice, or grated rind. If using juice, note that it adds liquid and acid; reduce the water by the same amount.
- SpeedBeat and spread while the mixture is still warm. If it sets in the bowl, warm it briefly over hot water rather than adding more liquid.
- YieldThe recipe claims enough for two cakes; on modern pans that suggests roughly two single layers, or the top and sides of one two-layer cake.
- Not egg-free by accidentEgg-free -- Unlike the usual frosting of raw egg white beaten with pulverized sugar, this one contains no egg, which makes it useful where uncooked whites are unwelcome. It is not, however, free of animal products.
Gelatine icing appears in American household books of the 1870s and 80s as an alternative to the usual frosting of raw egg white beaten with pulverized sugar. Packaged gelatine put a once laborious ingredient (traditionally extracted at home by long-boiling calves' feet) within reach of ordinary cooks. The Dixie Cook Book, compiled from contributed household receipts and published in the early 1880s, is typical of the genre in giving the contributor's initials rather than a name and in assuming the reader already knows how thick an icing ought to be; the instruction to "thicken with sugar" without a quantity would have been perfectly clear to anyone who had frosted a cake before.