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Greater New York Ice Cream
Prepare a pint (only) of almond ice cream. Press four ounces candied vanilla marrons through a wire sieve into a copper basin add three ounces sugar and five egg yolks, set basin on the range and whisk up for ten minutes; place on the ice and stir with a spatula until thoroughly cold, then add a half teaspoon vanilla essence and two tablespoons curacao or benedictine. Mix well, add a half pint whipped cream without sugar and gently mix until well amalgamated. Line the bottom of a quart-brick mould with a sheet of white paper, then line bottom and sides with three-quarters of the almond ice cream. Place a half pint fresh, sound raspberries in a bowl, with a tablespoon each fine sugar and kirsch, thoroughly mix, then arrange three-quarters at the bottom and sides of mould. Pour in the marron preparation, place the remaining raspberries on top and fill the mould with balance ice cream. Cover with a sheet of paper, place cover on mould (lightly butter edges of cover all around to prevent any water getting into the mould), bury in the ice-cream tub to freeze for an hour and a half, remove unmould, lift up the paper and turn upon a cold dish. From a one-inch-square piece of angelica cut out even alphabetic strips, G. N. Y., and place them in centre of brick. Arrange all around the surface of the cream half-candied cherries and decorate base of brick with whipped cream, then chop an ounce of pistachio, sprinkle over the cream and serve.
A composed ice-cream brick in the Delmonico manner: three separate preparations layered into a mould and turned out as a monogrammed centerpiece. The work is in the assembly, not the cooking, and everything must be cold before it meets anything else.
- Start a day aheadThe pint of almond ice cream is assumed to be made, churned and firm before you begin; the recipe gives no method for it. Have it hard-frozen but spreadable, the way a bombe lining needs to be, or it will slump down the sides of the mould.
- Candied vanilla marronsMarrons glacés, chestnuts candied in vanilla syrup, sold in jars and tins around the holidays. Four ounces is roughly half a cup of purée once sieved. Sweetened chestnut spread (crème de marrons) is the nearest substitute, in which case cut the added sugar back sharply.
- The copper basin over the rangeThis is a sabayon: yolks, sugar and chestnut whisked over direct heat. Modern practice is a bowl over barely simmering water, whisking constantly until the mixture is thick, pale and registers 160F. Ten minutes over an open flame in a thin copper basin will scramble it if you stop moving.
- "Place on the ice"An ice bath, not the freezer. The sabayon must be completely cold before the whipped cream goes in, or the cream deflates and the finished layer freezes grainy.
- The mould and its liningA quart brick mould is a lidded rectangular tin holding about a quart; sizes varied, but figure something in the order of 6 to 7 inches long by 3 inches wide and deep. A loaf pan lined with plastic film works, though you lose the sharp turned-out edges. Buttering the rim was to seal against water or brine seeping in from the salt-and-ice tub, exactly as the recipe says.
- Freezing timeAn hour and a half applies to a mould buried in salted ice, which is far colder and faster than a domestic freezer. In a home freezer allow four to six hours, or overnight, then dip the mould briefly in warm water to unmould.
- AngelicaCandied angelica stem, bright green and now sold mainly by baking suppliers and at Christmas. It is what the letters G. N. Y. are cut from. Candied citron peel or green-tinted marzipan will stand in visually.
- Curacao, kirsch, alcoholBoth spirits lower the freezing point. Keep to the quantities given; increasing them gives a brick that never sets firm enough to unmould cleanly.
- YieldA quart brick cuts into eight to ten slices. Serve it sliced across the short side so each portion shows the almond, chestnut and raspberry layers.
The name is a piece of civic flattery: Greater New York was the term for the enlarged city created when Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island and the Bronx were consolidated with Manhattan in 1898, hence the angelica initials G. N. Y. set into the top. The form itself is the classic French bombe or moulded ice, a shell of one ice cream lining a mould filled with a lighter appareil a bombe - yolks and sugar whisked warm, cooled, and lightened with whipped cream - and the layering of chestnut, raspberry and kirsch belongs to the high-restaurant repertoire of the period. It appears here because this reads as a chef's book rather than a housekeeper's: the reader is assumed to own brick moulds, a copper basin and a salt-ice tub, and to have almond ice cream already churned. Marrons glaces were an imported luxury, and putting them at the centre of a dish named for the city was very much the point.