No. 5

To Peel Almonds, Pistachios or Filberts

Pour Monder les Amandes, Pistaches ou Avelines

In order to remove the peels from almonds, filberts or pistachio nuts, they must first be plunged into boiling water and left on the fire until the skin detaches easily under the pressure of the finger, then drain and refresh in cold water; now drain and peel them by removing the skins wash in cold water, drain, wipe and dry in the heater or in a well aired place.

For Filberts or Nuts.—To be peeled dry, crack the shells with a nut-cracking machine, being careful not to break the kernel, then peel them dry by putting the nuts on a baking sheet and pushing it into a medium oven, removing them immediately the outer skin detaches when the nut is rubbed between the thumb and first finger; keep them either whole or in halves and use for ice cream and desserts. Those peeled in water are for chopping, or splitting in two for nougats, also for cooked sugar pastes.

← No. 4 Almond Milk Elementary Methods No. 6 To Pound, Crush, and Color Almonds →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer is describing two different operations that get confused today: wet blanching, which loosens almond and pistachio skins, and dry toasting, which is the only thing that works on hazelnuts you intend to keep whole. Choose by what the nut is for.

Blanching timeA minute or so in boiling water is usually enough for almonds; as the original says, the skin should slip under finger pressure. Long soaking softens and waterlogs the kernel, and the cold-water refresh in the original helps stop that, so do not skip it.
Pistachios and colourPistachios lose their green if held in hot water. Thirty seconds is enough, then straight into ice water; the skins slip and the colour stays. Green pistachios were the point in a Delmonico's kitchen, where they went into ices, nougat and decorative work.
"Avelines" and filbertsAveline is the French word for the filbert, a large cultivated hazelnut; the general French term for hazelnut is noisette. In English, filbert and hazelnut are used more or less interchangeably. Modern hazelnuts sold shelled are usually still skin-on and behave much as described here.
A medium ovenThe book gives no temperatures; a moderate oven, somewhere in the region of 325-350F, is the usual modern reading. Hazelnuts want roughly 10 to 12 minutes, until the skins craze and the nut smells toasted; tip them into a coarse towel and rub. Some skins always cling, and that is normal.
The heaterA nineteenth-century range had a warming closet above or beside the firebox — the "heater" here. An oven at its lowest setting with the door ajar, or an hour on a rack in a dry room, does the same job.
Why drying mattersBlanched nuts hold a surprising amount of water, and damp almonds will not grind to a dry powder, will not colour properly, and mould within days. Dry them until they feel and sound like raw nuts again before storing.
Wet versus dry, and whyWater-peeled nuts are slightly softened and pale, which suits pounding, chopping and boiled-sugar work such as nougat and praliné. Dry-peeled nuts keep their crisp texture and toasted flavour, so they stay whole or halved for ice cream and dessert garnish, as Ranhofer says.
Cracking without breakingThe "nut-cracking machine" was presumably a hand or lever cracker of the period. A modern lever cracker or pliers-style cracker, worked around the seam rather than crushing end to end, gives the best chance of intact halves.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894) set down the working practice of Delmonico's in New York, and its opening "Elementary Methods" are the shop-floor operations behind any dish: peeling nuts, pounding them, colouring them. The French heading, monder, means to hull or cleanse rather than simply to peel, and it survives in professional French kitchens today in amandes mondées, blanched almonds. That a great restaurant needed a written rule for this at all says something about scale: macaroons, almond milk, pralines and pistachio ices went through nuts by the pound, and every one arrived in its skin.