I
came across the article below during my research into the history of vanilla
cultivation in Far North Queensland. I was about to dismiss it on account of
the author’s admonition against the reckless over-use of the vanilla bean (and
many other flavourings) , but the last word in the piece won her a reprieve. I
do love a good new food word. I have not come across “pie-crustian” anywhere
else, and the Oxford English Dictionary
does not know it, so presumably it is the invention of the author of the piece.
The
article appeared in The Queenslander
(Brisbane, Qld.) of 26 April 1890. The author’s subject is the making of pies
and puddings, and she speaks in the uniquely British Imperial tone of the era, and
with the stern Victorian manner that brooks no argument.
THE HOUSEKEEPER.
HINTS ON HOUSEWIFERY. PUDDINGS AND PIES.
It was well for
pretty Ruth Pinch that she bethought herself (on the memorable morning on which
she captivated her brother's faithful friend) to turn her 'prentice hand to the
making of a pudding rather than of a pie. For - whether Dickens knew it or not
– it is a much easier thing to make a good pudding than a good pie. As to
making light pastry with an aspirant to one's hand and heart looking on the while
– such a thing is scarcely possible. There could be no clear reckoning kept as
to the number of times one had rolled out the paste, for one thing, and the
result would be leaden. There are so many good and simple recipes to be had in
every cookery book from which even the least experienced housewife can, with ordinary
care, make a quite presentable pudding that I will only give her a few hints as
to the rocks on which, one is likely to come to grief. The first is over
sweetening. It is easy to add a little sugar, jam, or sweet sauce after a pudding
is oooked, and it it therefore only fair to those who are unable to eat
anything very sweet that where there are but one or two "sweets"
usually provided to choose from at table, these should be carefully made, so
that, if anything, they are less sweet than is directed in the recipe.
Over-flavouring is another too common weakness of many cooks. To those who have
at all a fine - that is, a discriminating
- palate, any flavouring used so that it prevails over the taste of the
viand to which it is added is most unpleasant. It deranges not only the appetite
of such a person but the digestion also. For my part I believe that if the history
of the culinary art ever comes to be analysed for philosophical purposes it
will be found that the delicacy of the human palate has everywhere been a sign
of the improvement of a race and of its advance in civilisation. We no longer
admit to our kitchens asafoetida and other horrible condiments of the ancient
world. Nor do we concoct therein such messes as were relished in the Middle
Ages. "High" game, even, is coming to be looked upon as an unpleasant
fashion of the old coaching days, when city people could not get their venison fresh.
By-and-by, it may be hoped, we shall find that essences, spices, and ready-made sauces are also
declared obsolete or that, at all events it will be made possible for one to
use them in accordance with one's own taste and not of that of the cook.
Meanwhile I will beg my readers to beware of the too-reckless use of the
vanilla bean, the peach leaf, the bay leaf, the essence bottle, and the nutmeg
grater. In making boiled puddings in which a rolled-out "paste" is
necessary it is always a good plan to make this as carefully as if it were
intended for a pie. Two purposes will thus be served. In the first place the
paste will be lighter and flakier, and consequently daintier and more digestible,
for every time one rolls it out. And in the second place one will thus learn
more quickly how to make good pastry for baked pies, tarts and so on. In making
pie-crust practice is indispensably necessary in order to arrive at perfection.
Some have naturally the "light hand," without which nobody can ever
make good pastry, just as some pianists have what is called "touch."
To these lucky folks the business soon becomes easy. Even they, however, cannot
learn in a day. A good plan is to select from the variety of recipes always
offered in one's cookery-book the one which best suits the ingredients most readily
procurable. In some households butter is plentiful. In others there is
abundance of dripping going to waste while butter must be purchased. Again,
where there is a large number to cook for, and the beef and mutton are home-killed,
it saves a great deal of time and toil to use suet for the pastry, as Chinese
cooks mostly do, without rendering it at all. Pastry made with suet can be as light and as palatable as
any one need, desire. When one has chosen one's recipe the next thing to do is
to keep to it. If one does not suoceed with that one would very likely fail
with another. An excellent method is to bake a saucer pie every day until one
has mastered the art of pie-crust making. This is far better than undertaking a
dish of ordinary site once a week and failing time after lima. A month's daily
practice, with due regard to the recipe, can scarcely fail to make even the slowest
and heaviest handed quite a clever pie-crustian.
The
recipe for the day is from another late nineteenth century Queensland
newspaper. It is for a creamy egg custard set with gelatin, made exotically
French by its name of ‘Nun’s Cheese.”
Fromage
des Nonnes.
This “nuns cheese” is
an acceptable dish to those who do not like the flavour of rich cheeses. Boil
half a pint of cream in an earthen pipkin. When it begins to boil, add a
tablespoonful of sugar and a teaspoonful of vanilla extract, or a piece of vanilla
bean. Remove it from the fire, cover the pipkin, and let the cream cool. Then
add six yolks of eggs, and strain the mixture through a hair sieve; return it
to the pipkin, and set it over the fire, stirring with a wooden spoon. When the
cream thickens let it cool, and add one ounce of dissolved gelatin. Pour into a
mould, and set on ice. It will harden in about the same time as jelly. When it
is to be served, wrap a napkin dipped in boiling water around the mould to
loosen it, and turn it out. Serve with vanilla cream biscuits.
The
Capricornian (Rockhampton, Qld) 16 April 1898
3 comments:
I'm pretty sure I'd find the pastry writers cooking unspeakably dull, but I recognize the "Fromage de Nonnes" as what was known in our family as "spanish Cream". I have ranted about the fact that nowadays the name has been changed to "pannacotta", to make it sound like a new thing, but apparently this is not the first time this has happened!
Speaking of coined words: While I consider myself a good cook, and a pretty fair baker, I am definitely "unpie-crustian".
"Pipkin" is not a word one hears very often either, sadly. However, there's a new phrase that I have to assume is an OCR error, and not invention: "time after lima."
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