World Chocolate Day: Chocolate Souffle

Today is World Chocolate Day and to celebrate, the Downstairs Cook invites you to share in her recipe for Chocolate Souffle, via Mrs Beeton.  Nothing could be more indulgent than a light, richly flavoured and velvety soufflé, so without further ado, here it is:

Chocolate Souffle
Ingredients for a moderate souffle

4 eggs
1 teaspoonful flour
3 teaspoonfuls flour
90g of the best chocolate, grated

Break the eggs,separating the whites from the yolks and put them into separate basins.  Add the sugar, flour and chocolate to the yolks and stir for 5 minutes.  Then whisk the egg whites in the other basin until they are stiff and when firm,  mix lightly with the egg yolks until the whole forms a smooth aand light substance.  Butter a round souffle or cake tim, put in the mixture and bake in a moderate oven for 15 to 20 minutes.  Pin a white napkin around the tin, strew sifted sugar over the top of the souffle and immediatelly send it to the table.  If allowed to stand after it comes from the oven it will be entirely spoiled, as it falls almost immediately.

This recipe, along with over 100 others is included in the upcoming publication The Downstairs Cook: Favourite Recipes which will shortly be available as an ebook via Amazon

Orange Flower Water, Fairy Butter & The Bloke

I don't know what propelled me to buy a bottle of orange flower water at Harris Farm Market at Potts Point in Sydney last year.  Maybe because the name sounded so pretty and it hails from the exotic East.  Or because in the back of my mind there was a thought that I had come across a recipe of Mrs Beeton's in which it was an ingredient.  Which recipe I wasn't sure.  So the purchased bottle sat on a shelf in the pantry until recently when I found we had no cream to whip to place atop the dessert strawberries.  But we did have natural Greek yoghurt. Knowing The Bloke wouldn't tolerate a simple unadulterated dollop on top of his naked strawberries, I reached for the honey and there it was, the still unopened bottle of orange flower water, in all its exotic glory.  A small amount only went into the yoghurt before it was applied to the strawberries and that was all that was needed.  The Bloke gave it the thumbs up, and he's a very fussy eater (although his stated favourite dish is Sausages and Eggs).

As for that elusive recipe where Mrs Beeton employed orange flower water, I'm still yet to find it.  I think it was a dessert recipe.  I leafed through her hefty tome this morning with no success however, other than to find just one recipe that incorporates this delightful ingredient - one with the enchanting name of "Fairy Butter".  It is essentially a butter cream icing for use on cakes (fairy ones no doubt), although if making icing I would omit the egg, substitute icing sugar and put it all into the food processor instead of a "coarse cloth."  So here it is:

Fairy Butter

1/4 lb (125g) fresh butter
2 eggs
2 tablespoonfuls caster sugar
1 tablespoonful orange flower water

Boil the eggs hard and when cold, take out the yolks and pound them in a mortar with the sugar and the orange flower in a mortar to a smooth paste. Incorporate this mixture with the butter. Put the paste in a coarse cloth and force it through by wringing the cloth hard and squeezing the butter through it. The butter should then drop into the dish or plate in irregular pieces according to the holes in the cloth and should have a pretty effect. Plain butter may be done in the same manner.

Orange flower water was no doubt an exotic ingredient in Victorian and Edwardian times and luckily a little goes a long way.  In fact, the less you use the better, as it flavours subtly, but well.  In the days of few flavour enhancers it would have been a useful and piquant addition to whipped cream on desserts and imparted a luxurious touch to dishes in which it was used, which could be savoury or sweet.

And that elusive other recipe of Mrs Beeton's where orange flower water is an ingredient?  I'll keep looking in my travels through her comprehensive publication and advise accordingly, as soon as I've found it.

An Edwardian Christmas Dinner Menu (with Amber Pudding)

My 1900 edition of Mrs Beeton's Family Cookery & Household Management does not provide any specific menu designed especially for Christmas, but Mrs Beeton does mention traditional Christmas dinner fare in her December menus for twelve, ten or eight persons.

She would have you prepare and serve for ten persons "Gravy Soup" as an entrée, followed by Brill with a Shrimp Sauce.  After a suitable interval,  Scalloped Oysters would be served with Mutton Cutlets.  The centrepiece course consists of Roast Turkey and Ham, accompanied by potatoes and stewed celery.  A Russian Salad would then clear the palate before a dessert course of Plum Pudding and Maraschino Jelly.

Personally, I am more taken with one of her December Dinners for "Six to Twelve Persons" where the perennial first course of soup is Oyster Soup, followed by Turbot with Tartare Sauce.  A Vol-au-Vent of Chicken follows, then a Sirloin of Beef accompanied by potatoes and cabbage.  I would give the next course of "Partridges" a miss (you can go a bit overboard at Christmas) but would willingly tuck into the recommended dessert of Amber Pudding (I'll get to this one later) and Mince Pies.

In another menu for the same number of guests, Mrs Beeton proposes Stewed Pigeons as the second entrée after which a Saddle of Mutton is to be served with the ubiquitous potatoes and stewed celery.  A "Salad" is to follow, then an incredibly rich dessert course of Plum Pudding and Trifle.  I suggest serving only one of these, as clothes may not fit after scoffing both of these extremely rich and sweetened dishes at the one sitting.

Now to the recipe for Amber Pudding, which to me represents a fine and fitting recipe for a Christmas dessert with its glace cherries, apples and puff pastry:

Amber Pudding

Ingredients: (to fill a large pie dish)

6 apples                                      1 lemon
3 eggs, separated                       3 oz. sugar
a little caster sugar                     2 oz. butter
a few glace cherries                   short or puff pastry

Peel and core the apples and stew them with the rind and juice of the lemon and the sugar until reduced to a pulp.  Grease the bottom of the pie dish and line it half way down with pastry.  Pass the apple marmalade through a sieve, add to it the yolks of the eggs.  After mixing thoroughly, turn the mixture into the dish and bake for 15 minutes. 

Beat the whites of the eggs until they are stiff, adding as much caster sugar as they will take up.  Put this mixture on top of the baked pudding, decorate with the cherries and place into a moderate oven to bring to a bright golden colour.  This dish can of course be prepared ahead of time and served cold.

Edwardian cookery was the last hurrah of British cuisine as after WWI, when many soldiers had been buried on the battlefields, estates were sold off by the aristocracy and women went into service in reduced numbers. As a consequence, the wealthy went to live in smaller homes which warranted only one cook and lavish, multi-course, labour intensive meals were no longer served.

Aristocrats who formerly would never have set foot in a kitchen, except to deliver instructions to the cook or housekeeper, acquired at least a modicum of kitchen knowledge out of necessity.  Lady Agnes Jekyll published Kitchen Essays in 1922 where she describes meals for one in pieces such as the one entitled "Tray Food".  A supreme hostess, (whose first dinner party hosted Ruskin, Burne-Jones and Browning) Lady Agnes espouses in her delightfully written book that at Sunday suppers, 'it often matters less what is on the table than what is on the chairs...and a "loaf of bread, a jug of wine" might be found entirely adequate provision' at such occasions.  Such it was that simple food replaced heavy opulence and home entertaining changed forever.

Does the Millennium Woman Have Time to Hollow Out a Meringue?

After reading Mrs Beeton's recipe for meringues sandwiched together with liqueur or vanilla flavoured cream, I mentioned it to a friend and then said, "But it's so fiddly; you have to take them out of the oven halfway through the baking, scoop out the underside and then put them back into the oven and I really couldn't be bothered."  His response was  "But they sound so delicious!"

I couldn't deny this fact, so I resolved to try and do as Mrs Beeton says.  The results were as promising as the recipe sounds, so here it is:

Meringues: INGREDIENTS FOR 2 DOZEN - 1/2 lb of pounded sugar, the whites of 4 eggs.

Whisk the whites of the eggs to a stiff froth and, with a wooden spoon, stir in quickly the pounded sugar; and have some boards thick enough to put in the oven to prevent the bottom of the meringues from acquiring too much colour.  Cut some strips of paper about 2 inches wide;  place this paper on the board and drop a tablespoon at a time of the mixture on the paper, taking care to let all the meringues be the same size.  In dropping it from the spoon, give the mixture the form of an egg and keep the meringues about 2 inches apart from each other on the paper.

Strew over them some sifted sugar and bake in a moderate oven for 1/2 hour.  As soon as they begin to colour remove them from the oven; take each slip of paper by the two ends and turn it gently on the table and, with a small spoon, take out the soft part of each meringue.  Spread some clean paper on the board, turn the meringues upside down and put them into the oven to harden and brown on the other side.

When required for table fill them with whipped cream, flavoured with liqueur or vanilla and sweetened with sugar.  Join two of the meringues together and pile them high in a dish (i.e. cake stand).  To vary their appearance finely-chopped almonds may be strewn over them before the sugar is sprinkled over.

Great expedition is necessary in making this dish; as if the meringues are not put into the oven as soon as the eggs and sugar are mixed, the former melts and the mixture would run on the paper instead of keeping its egg shape.  The sweeter the meringues are made the crisper they will be; but if there is not sufficient sugar mixed with them they will most likely be tough.  They are sometimes coloured with cochineal and if kept well covered in a dry place will remain good for a month or six weeks.

A luxurious dessert or afternoon tea treat they turned out to be - I flavoured my cream with Triple Sec, but you could use Cointreau, Grand Marnier, Creme de Menthe, brandy or whatever is in your liquor cabinet.  The time spent was well worth the effort, as you now have a whole batch of meringues which will keep for some time, just waiting for their cream and liqueur filling at the right moment.

Your guests will be suitably impressed and you can congratulate yourself on producing a quite exquisite and elegant treat with only a relatively small amount of effort.

Ices & Iced Puddings

The heat here in this part of the world is intense at present and one should always have a water ice or iced pudding on hand to serve as a refreshing dessert. Otherwise known as sorbet, ices may be flavoured with just about any type of fruit.  Ms Beeton flavours hers with raspberry, strawberry or red currant fruit water and also provides recipes for banana ice cream, lemon water ice, pineapple ice, raspberry ice and strawberry ice cream. I will confine myself here to the recipes for ices first and the iced pudding second.

Ices:

[For every pint of fruit juice mixture (aka fruit water) allow 1 pint of syrup]

• Firstly, one must make a fruit water.  Select ripe fruit, pick off stalks and put into a pan with a little sugar strewed over. Stir mixture about with a wooden spoon until it is well broken, then rub it through a hair sieve.  
• Make a syrup by combining 1 cup of sugar with 1 cup of water in a small saucepan and allowing mixture to simmer over medium to high heat until sugar is dissolved (about 5 minutes).  Remove from heat, let it cool, add the fruit water, mix well together and put the mixture into a freezing pan.  When frozen, put it into small glasses or plates.  

Cook's Tips:

For an elegant serving method, a loaf shaped cake tin may be used if you do not have a decorative jelly or cake mould or glass serving bowls.  Serve slices cut with a very sharp knife on plates for an elegant presentation.

Additions such as aromatics: mint, lemon mint, chocolate mint, spearmint, other fresh herbs, cinnamon sticks, vanilla beans, cardamom, cacao nibs, fresh lemongrass, fresh ginger, lavender, jasmine, coconut, rosewater or any other aromatic ingredient may be swirled into the mixture before freezing.*

Liqueurs such as wine, Cointreau, champagne, prosecco or Spanish Cavacrème de menthe or triple sec may also be included in the mixture prior to freezing.

Iced Pudding:

INGREDIENTS: 1/2 lb of sweet almonds, 2 oz. of bitter ones, 3/4 lb of sugar, 8 eggs, 1 and 1/2 pints milk, a few slices of citron or preserved cherries.

Blanch and dry the almonds thoroughly in a cloth, then pound them in a mortar until reduced to a smooth paste; add to these the eggs, well beaten, the sugar and milk; stir these ingredients over the fire until they thicken, but do not allow them to boil; then strain and put the mixture into the freezing pot and freeze it.  When quite frozen, fill an iced-pudding mould, put on the lid and keep the pudding in ice until required for table; then turn it out on the dish.  This pudding may be flavoured with vanilla, curacao or maraschino.

*Further flavour suggestions:
- Pink Grapefruit, Tarragon with Vodka
- Key Lime
- Bittersweet Chocolate
- Lime Basil
- Strawberry with Black Pepper
- Lemonade
- Iced Tea (made with English Breakfast Tea which forms the 'fruit water')
- Cherry (made with Cherry Jam)
- Rhubarb
- Orange
- Limoncello-Mint
- Buttermilk
- French Martini (Pineapple juice (3 cups) Lemon juice (1/4 cup) Chambord (1/4 cup) Vodka (2 tblspns)
- Spicy Lemon (2 tblspns finely chopped crystallized ginger, 1/4 tblspn white pepper added to previously made Lemon Sorbet)
- Mango Tequila
- Early Grey with Chocolate
- Peach, Watermelon and Cranberry
- Port and Plum
- Hibiscus Tea with Rosewater
- Watermelon with Rosewater, Mint Leaves or Rose Petals & Coconut Cream (optional)

-

Steamed and Batter Puddings: Seasonable at Any Time

When you feel a need for comfort, look no further than a soft and flavoursome steamed pudding.  Mrs Beeton calls them "batter puddings" and provides a recipe for a baked version as well which includes instructions for decorating the finished pudding with "damsons, plums, red currants, gooseberries or apples."  Otherwise, her recipes are spare in detail.  Presumably, one learnt the necessary techniques from observing the more experienced cook.

I have inherited a 1970s pudding basin lid, pictured below in its red anodised glory.  This marvellous contraption clips onto an enamel basin which then needs to fit into a saucepan of boiling water in order to cook.

Mrs Beeton advised those cooking in the nineteenth century to "tie it down very tightly" which is what my mother used to do before a neighbour bequeathed the said 1970s pudding lid. What is tied down after the pudding basin is greased with butter, is a double round of greased foil or greaseproof paper large enough to tie with string over the top and rim of the pudding basin, with 2.5 cm (1") pleat in the middle.  Mrs Beeton doesn't say this, but unless you are making a pudding with jam or syrup as a topping, the bottom of the bowl should be lined with a round of greased greaseproof paper.

 

Marmalade puddings appear to have been popular around 1900.  Mrs Beeton provides a recipe for one large enough for 6 persons where "half a pot" of marmalade is put "all over the top" as soon as the pudding is turned out of the basin.  "It is advisable to warm the marmalade to make it liquid," she says, but the same effect can be achieved by placing some marmalade in the bottom of the pudding basin before steaming.

 

If using fresh fruit as a topping, peel and chop the fruit and place it in the bottom of the pudding basin before pouring in the batter.  According to the redoubtable Mrs B, the finished product "must be sent quickly to table and covered plentifully with sifted sugar."

 

Rather than the "deep, deep pleasure" afforded by contemporary cook Nigella Lawson's rather decadent desserts, the steamed pudding provides a warm and comforting feeling with its light, spongy texture and sweet topping, just like a mother's comforting hug.

 

Batter Pudding, Boiled. - INGREDIENTS for good-sized pudding. - 3 eggs, 1 oz. (28g) of butter, 1 pint (570 ml) of milk, 3 tablespoonfuls of flour, a little salt.

 

Put the flour into a basin, and add sufficient milk to moisten it; carefully rub down all the lumps with a spoon, then pour in the remainder of the milk, and stir in the butter, which should be previously melted; keep beating the mixture, add the eggs and pinch of salt, and, when the batter is quite smooth, put it into a well-buttered basin, tie it down very tightly, and put it into boiling water; move the basin about for a few minutes after it is put into the water, to prevent the flour settling in any part and boil for 1 and a 1/4 hour.  This pudding may also be boiled in a floured cloth that has been wetted in hot water; it will take a few minutes less than when boiled in a basin.  Send batter puddings very quickly to table, and serve with a sweet sauce, wine sauce, stewed fruit, or jam of any kind, when the latter is used, a little of it may be placed round the dish in small quantities, as a garnish.

 

Cook's Tips:

• Fill basin no more than two thirds with pudding mixture, to allow for expansion.
• It's also a good idea to tie a string handle across the top of the basin to make it easy to lift the hot pudding from the steamer.
• Cover saucepan tightly and check water level from time to time, adding more water if necessary.
• At the end of the cooking time, lift out the pudding basin, remove cover and stand on a cake rack for 10 minutes before running a knife around the edge and unmoulding pudding onto a serving platter.

  

Mrs B's baked and steamed batter pudding recipes can be found on page 38 of the 1900 edition of her Family Cookery & Housekeeping Book