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Cucumber Jelly for Salad
Make a plain lemon jelly without sugar, tint it pale green with leaf green coloring, add a pinch of salt and a dash of cayenne, cut the cucumber in tiny dice and spread on a shallow pan (not tin), which has been dipped in cold water, pour over it the jelly and set aside to stiffen (it is best to scant the quantity of water in order to make the jelly very firm); turn out on a flat platter and with fancy cutters cut it out in spots, hearts and diamonds. Use this as a garnish for the salad.
A garnish rather than a dish: a firm, unsweetened lemon gelatin studded with diced cucumber, cut into shapes and laid around a salad. The whole thing succeeds or fails on the gelatin being stiff enough to cut cleanly.
- Make it firmer than a dessert jellyThe parenthetical instruction to "scant the quantity of water" is the hinge. For cut-out shapes that hold their edges, use one envelope of powdered gelatin (1/4 oz, about 2 1/4 teaspoons) to 1 1/4 cups of liquid rather than the usual 2 cups. A dessert-strength jelly will slump the moment it leaves the pan.
- "Plain lemon jelly without sugar"Meaning gelatin softened in cold water, dissolved in hot water, and sharpened with lemon juice — no sugar at all, since this is a savory garnish. Roughly 1/4 cup lemon juice to a cup of water, then the salt and cayenne to taste. Either boxed granulated gelatine or sheet gelatine would have been available to a cook of the period; either works.
- Not tinThe warning is chemical, not fussiness. Acidic lemon jelly sitting for hours in bare tin or unlined aluminum picks up a metallic taste and can discolor. Use glass, ceramic or stainless steel. Dipping the pan in cold water first is the old trick for release; a very light film of neutral oil does the same job.
- Depth of the layerPour to about 1/2 inch. Thinner than that and the cutters tear the jelly; much thicker and the shapes read as blocks rather than garnish. A 9-inch square pan takes close to 3 cups of liquid at that depth, so scale the gelatin quantities up accordingly, or use a smaller pan.
- Salt the cucumber firstCucumber is mostly water and will weep into the set jelly, softening it and clouding the green. Peel, seed, dice small, toss with salt, drain 20 minutes and pat dry before adding.
- "Leaf green coloring"A commercial green food color of the period. Two or three drops of modern green is plenty — the instruction says pale, and a strong green looks synthetic against real cucumber. Chilling in the refrigerator for 3 to 4 hours replaces the icebox or cold cellar.
- Unmolding and cuttingLoosen the edges, invert onto a chilled flat platter, then cut on the platter with small aspic or canapé cutters. Work cold and quickly; the jelly softens in a warm kitchen and the trimmings can be chopped and scattered as a base.
- YieldA 9-inch pan should give enough hearts and diamonds to garnish salads for something like eight to twelve, depending on the cutters used. Best made the day it is served.
Savory jellies were near-obligatory on the ambitious American table around 1900, when cheap granulated gelatine — generally traced to Charles Knox's business in Johnstown, New York, founded in 1890 — replaced the long labor of boiling calves' feet for stock jelly. That change moved aspic from the professional kitchen into the household one, and cookbooks of the period fill their salad chapters with molded rings, chopped "jelly croutons" and exactly this kind of decorative cut-out. The recipe also reflects a period taste for salads built to be looked at: greens dressed and mounded in the center, then framed with geometric garnish. Cucumber, cooling and faintly flavored, added color and crunch without competing with the dressing.