No. 58

Fondant

Put into a small untinned copper basin two pounds of loaf sugar, moisten it with sufficient water to melt it, about one pint, and put the basin on a good fire to bring the sugar to a boil; skim it carefully and so long as the impurities rise to the surface and continue boiling till the sugar is cooked to the degree of ball; then pour it on to a marble table or slab and keep it in position by four bars of iron, an inch square, and the length needed; when it is thoroughly cold work it with a spatula until it becomes a white and creamy paste; set it in an earthen vessel, and keep it in a cool place to use when needed. This fondant can be flavored and colored according to taste.

← No. 57 To Scale and Clean Fish; to Skin Eels Elementary Methods No. 59 Forcemeats; Remarks on →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer's fondant is the base of nearly every dipped and molded sweet in the confectionery chapters of The Epicurean. The method is sound and still standard; only the vocabulary and the equipment need translating.

The hinge: keep the pan spotless and the sides washed downFondant fails by premature crystallization. A single stray sugar crystal on the side of the pan, or a stirred syrup after boiling begins, will seed the whole batch coarse. Brush the sides with a wet pastry brush, cover the pan for the first minute so steam rinses them, and do not stir once it boils.
"The degree of ball"This is soft ball, roughly 237-240F (114-116C). The degree was traditionally judged by dropping a little syrup into cold water; a thermometer is easier and safer, since a few degrees either way is the difference between a workable paste and either syrup or a chalky lump.
Loaf sugarLoaf sugar was refined sugar broken from a cone, the purest grade available. Plain granulated cane sugar is its direct equivalent, and the skimming step is largely unnecessary now because modern sugar carries almost no scum.
Untinned copperSugar boilers were left untinned deliberately: tin softens and can melt at the higher temperatures sugar boiling reaches (caramel and crack), though a fondant syrup never gets that hot. A heavy stainless saucepan works. Untinned copper should not be used for anything acidic, so keep a sugar pan for sugar.
Water quantityA pint of water to two pounds of sugar is generous but harmless; the surplus simply boils off, at the cost of time. Half that amount will reach soft ball faster with the same result.
The marble and the iron barsThe bars are a frame to contain the poured syrup in a shallow, even sheet so it cools quickly and uniformly. Any heavy marble or granite slab with metal bars or a lightly oiled steel ring will do; a rimmed sheet pan is a workable substitute, though it cools less evenly.
"Thoroughly cold" is colder than you wantModern confectioners work fondant when the mass has fallen to about 110F (43C) and is still pliable. Taken to room temperature it stiffens badly and takes real effort with the spatula, though it will still turn white and creamy with persistence.
Insurance against graininessA tablespoon of glucose or corn syrup, or a small pinch of cream of tartar, added to the syrup interferes with crystal growth and gives a smoother, more forgiving paste. Ranhofer's plain sugar-and-water version rewards precision and punishes carelessness.
Yield and keepingAbout two pounds of fondant. Store it airtight with a damp cloth or a film of water on the surface to stop it skinning over; it keeps for weeks refrigerated and improves after a day or two of resting, becoming smoother to remelt and dip.

A Little History

The Epicurean (1894) was Charles Ranhofer's summation of some thirty years as chef at Delmonico's in New York, and its "Elementary Methods" chapter reads like a professional syllabus: butchery, stocks, forcemeats, and here the foundation of the pastry department. Fondant is simply the French present participle of fondre, to melt. The technique, boiling sugar to a fixed degree and then agitating the cooled syrup to force it into microscopic crystals, was the backbone of nineteenth-century French confectionery, and Ranhofer uses the familiar sugar-boiling vocabulary of thread, pearl, ball, crack, and caramel. That a hotel chef expected his readers to keep an untinned copper sugar basin, a marble slab, and a set of squared iron bars says a good deal about who the book was actually written for.