No. 3483

Plombiere d'Alencon

Fill a plombiere mold with Chantilly cream (whipped cream made with a quart of cream and a quarter of a pound of powdered sugar, both firmly whipped together); place on the cover forcibly and pack it in ice, leaving it in a quarter of an hour for each quart; remove the cover and take out the contents, leaving only a thin three-eighths of an inch coating, then fill up the inside with alternate layers of No. 1 vanilla ice-cream (No. 3458), having half as much whipped cream added to it, intermingling it with macaroons soaked in maraschino or kirsch; fill it quite full, put back the cover neatly and pack in ice, freezing one hour and a half for two quarts; unmold and garnish the hollow on top of the plombiere with preserved peaches (No. 3682) and cherries, the former cut into pieces and softened in a light syrup with maraschino; place here and there a few lozenges of angelica; garnish around with various small cakes. Sauce of whipped cream flavored with noyau should be served apart.

← No. 3482 Plombiere a la Rochambeau Ices & Ice Creams No. 3484 Plombiere, Havanese Style →

For the Modern Kitchen

A moulded bombe from Delmonico's: a shell of frozen whipped cream lined into a mould, filled with vanilla ice cream, lightened cream and liquor-soaked macaroons. Everything depends on the shell setting hard before you scoop it out.

The hinge: freeze the shell solidThe whipped cream must be frozen through to the walls of the mould before you hollow it, or the three-eighths-inch lining will collapse when you spoon out the centre. Work fast with a warmed spoon, and return the shell to the freezer the moment it looks soft.
Packing in iceIn Ranhofer's kitchen this meant a mould buried in crushed ice with coarse salt, the usual proportion being several parts ice to one of salt, which brings the brine well below freezing. A modern freezer at 0F will do the job but more slowly, so the quarter-hour-per-quart for the shell and hour and a half for the filled mould given here will need extending.
The plombière mouldA tall, lidded, slightly domed metal mould with a hollow in the top when unmoulded. A metal bombe mould, charlotte tin or steep pudding basin substitutes; cover tightly with foil in place of the fitted lid so no brine or freezer air gets in.
Cream and sugarA quart is 4 cups of heavy cream; a quarter pound of powdered sugar is about 1 cup of confectioners' sugar or a generous 1/2 cup superfine. "Firmly whipped" here means stiff peaks, since soft cream will weep and set grainy.
Vanilla ice cream No. 1The cross-reference is to Ranhofer's own vanilla ice-cream recipe (No. 3458), which in this book will be a custard-style base rather than a plain uncooked cream. A good commercial French-style vanilla, softened and folded with half its volume in whipped cream, gives a similar light texture.
MacaroonsAlmond macaroons of the crisp Italian sort, not coconut and not French macarons. Soak them briefly in maraschino or kirsch so they stay chewy; drenched ones turn the filling icy.
NoyauThe sauce liqueur is flavoured with peach or apricot kernels. Buy a commercial crème de noyaux or substitute amaretto; do not infuse your own from bitter kernels, which carry cyanogenic compounds.
Angelica and garnishCandied angelica stems, cut into diamonds, are still sold by cake-decorating suppliers; candied citron peel is the usual stand-in. The preserved peaches want warming in a light syrup with maraschino and then cooling completely, or they will melt channels in the top.
Unmoulding and yieldDip the mould in warm water for a few seconds, invert onto a chilled platter, and return the whole thing to the freezer for twenty minutes before garnishing. A two-quart mould serves twelve to sixteen at the end of a long dinner.

A Little History

Plombières is a family of moulded frozen creams that took its name, by tradition rather than record, from the spa town of Plombières-les-Bains in the Vosges; by the mid-nineteenth century the term in professional French kitchens meant an iced almond or vanilla cream, often with candied fruit, set in a lidded mould. Charles Ranhofer, chef at Delmonico's in New York, gave a number of them in The Epicurean (1894), each with a place-name or a patron's name attached — Rochambeau, Havanese, and here Alençon, the Normandy town best known for its lace. The recipe belongs to the age of the ice-house and the salt-and-ice freezing tub, when a two-quart moulded bombe represented several hours of a pastry cook's attention and was carried to the table as the set piece of the meal.