No. 3480

Plombiere a la Montesquieu

Cook half a pound of rice in plenty of water with the juice of four lemons; drain and place it in a vessel to cover with a hot thirty-two degree syrup, draining this off an hour later. Put sixteen egg-yolks in a basin with half a pound of sugar, beat both together and mix in a pint of boiling milk; cook this, without allowing it to boil, until the preparation covers the spoon, then take it from the fire, let cool and pour in a pint of cream; pass the whole through a fine sieve and freeze; stir in the rice and a quart of well-drained whipped cream. Cut some preserved pineapple and melon in three-eighths inch squares and macerate in kirsch for two hours. Coat a plombiere mold with uncooked lemon ice cream; fill the center with the rice cream, put on the cover and freeze for one hour for each quart. Unmold on a napkin and garnish around with small lady's bouchees (No. 3376) iced with coffee icing; on top and in the middle place the macerated fruits and send to the table with a sauce-boatful of prunelle sauce, made with vanilla and whipped cream, to which some prunelle has been added.

← No. 3479 Excellent with Coffee and Parfait with Coffe Ices & Ice Creams No. 3481 Plombiere a la Richmond →

For the Modern Kitchen

A Delmonico's bombe: a mold lined with lemon ice, filled with a rich rice-studded custard ice cream, and served with liqueur sauce. Nothing in it is difficult, but the quantities are banquet-sized and several of the terms are trade shorthand.

Thirty-two degree syrupThis is a density reading on the Baume scale, not a temperature. A 32-degree syrup is roughly 58-60 percent sugar by weight, near 3 parts sugar to 2 parts water; boil to dissolve and check with a syrup hydrometer or refractometer if you have one.
The custard is the hingeSixteen yolks in a pint of milk thickens fast and will scramble if pushed. Cook it gently, stirring, to about 170-175F, until it coats the back of a spoon, then pull it off and strain immediately as directed. The sieve is not optional at this yolk ratio.
The riceHalf a pound is roughly 1 1/4 cups of dry short- or medium-grain rice. The lemon juice in the cooking water keeps the grains white and discrete; cook it fully soft, since firm grains freeze into hard specks. The hour in syrup sweetens and plumps it, and it must be drained well or the ice cream will be slack.
Uncooked lemon ice cream'Uncooked' here appears to mean no custard base: sugar syrup, lemon juice and zest, sometimes cream, churned straight. Freeze it firm, then line a well-chilled mold with a layer of about half an inch before filling.
The mold and the freezingA plombiere mold is a domed, lidded metal bombe mold. "One hour for each quart" assumes packing in a cask of crushed ice and coarse salt at about 3 parts ice to 1 part salt. In a home freezer set as cold as it goes, allow at least 6 hours and preferably overnight, and dip the mold briefly in warm water to unmold.
PrunelleSloe liqueur, usually prunelle de Bourgogne, not prune brandy. The sauce is a vanilla custard or sweetened whipped cream with the liqueur folded in at the end; add it off the heat so the alcohol is not driven off.
Lady's boucheesRecipe No. 3376 in the same book: small iced cakes of the petit-four sort; consult the numbered recipe for the exact form. Any small firm sponge bite glazed with coffee fondant will stand in.
YieldAs written this makes something over a gallon and will serve twenty-five or more. Halved or quartered it is still a substantial dessert; scale the mold accordingly, since freezing time follows volume.

A Little History

Plombieres is generally traced to the spa town of Plombieres-les-Bains in the Vosges, and by the nineteenth century the name had settled on a molded ice cream enriched with candied fruit steeped in kirsch a template that this recipe follows loosely, with cooked rice standing in for the more usual almond body. Charles Ranhofer, chef at Delmonico's in New York for over thirty years, published The Epicurean in 1894 as a working record of that kitchen, and its ice chapter runs to hundreds of numbered variations distinguished chiefly by garnish and dedication. The "a la Montesquieu" is a courtesy title of the sort restaurants of the period attached freely to composed dishes. The whole construction an ice-lined mold, a separate liqueur sauce, iced petits fours arranged around the base belongs to a service in which dessert arrived as a centerpiece.