Is There a Nutmeg in the House? (46 page)

To an eighteenth-century confectioner the making and freezing
of ice creams was hard manual labour. Emy’s directions include the alternate scraping down of the frozen cream as it formed on the inner walls of the freezing pot, and the vigorous turning and shaking of the heavy cylinder for the space of a quarter of an hour at a stretch until at a given moment he was required to do the scraping and mixing with the right hand and the turning of the pot, simultaneously, with the left. Practice, says Emy, will make you adept. He himself was certainly an experienced and skilled man at ice making. His ices would have been as good as any that could at that time be produced. His directions for freezing, embodying many acute observations on the effects of the weather on the whole process and on the proportions of salt to ice required for the freezing of different categories of confection, whether
neiges
or
fromages glacés
, whether rich or plain and so on, leave me in no doubt that Emy was a practitioner of unusual gifts as well as a highly literate writer.

Both unpublished,
c
.1984

Pomegranates Pink

Fifteen years ago in Murcia, Valencia and Alicante, the three Levantine provinces of Spain, there were some hundred establishments dealing in pomegranates and pomegranate syrup, the grenadine known to almost every barman in Europe. How many of these pomegranate dealers still flourish I don’t know, but what struck me at the time was the extraordinary contrast between the important commercial value of pomegranates and the total indifference of the village people – at any rate those of the village in Alicante province where I was then staying and have often stayed since – to this beautiful fruit hanging so heavily on the splendid trees. Nobody seemed to bother even to pick them.

How curious that the Persian Arabs who originally occupied Spain and Sicily and contributed so much to Spanish and Italian cooking appear to have bequeathed to Europe no lasting legacy concerning the kitchen uses of the pomegranate. In middle-eastern countries it is still much used, a salt as well as a sweet pomegranate juice often appearing as a seasoning or condiment, chiefly in conjunction with fat or rich foods such as duck, liver, and eggs
cooked in oil or butter. The sharp juice acts as a corrective, as do lemon juice, vinegar, and verjuice, the fermented juice of a particular variety of acid grape which figured so largely in medieval European cooking.

The cooks of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Spain were certainly familiar with the kitchen uses of the pomegranate, for both seeds and juice appear frequently in their recipes, just as they do in English, Italian and French cookery books of the same period, and even though pomegranates were comparative rarities in England and France, a good deal was known of them. A century later, much more.

In mid seventeenth-century France, for example, one Pierre de Lune, well known as cook and head steward in various households, among them those of Hercule de Rohan, duc de Montbazon, and the duchesse d’Orléans, wrote a cookery book called
Le Cuisinier
, published in 1656, chez Pierre David, Paris. From the many dishes and recipes
à l’espagnole
which appear in the book, it has been deduced that Pierre de Lune was of Spanish origin. It seems possible, although it does not necessarily follow. In grand French – and English – households the cooking of the period was still much influenced by the old Spanish and Italian methods, re-introduced and renewed by cooks brought in the trains of ambassadors and noblemen, through royal marriages, and via Jewish refugees from the Spanish Inquisition. There was also quite a cross-traffic in the translation of cookery books, Italian into French and English, French into English and Italian, and Spanish into Italian and vice versa. Cooking in the great houses of Europe in those days must have been as international as in a twentieth-century Hilton Hotel.

Pierre de Lune’s recipes certainly have a very cosmopolitan flavour, some showing a distinct Arab influence in the use of sweetmeats, spices, clove-studded lemons, and notably of pomegranate seeds as a decorative element in his dishes, much as in English cooking clusters of shining little red barberries were scattered on every other dish. Against the gleam of pewter or silver platters they must have looked uncommonly pretty. Pomegranate seeds likewise.

One of Pierre de Lune’s most charming recipes is called
oeufs à la germaine et à la romaine
. This dish, with its somewhat mysterious name, consists of eighteen egg yolks beaten together with cinnamon, salt and orange flower water, a quarter at a time being
made into a kind of flat galette or omelette, each one strewn with little pieces of candied lemon peel, apricots, and pistachio nuts, plus a crumbled macaroon, a little cream, and ‘scented water’. The fourth and final layer of this elegant confection is garnished with pomegranate seeds and cinnamon of Florence.

Another of Pierre de Lune’s egg recipes, ‘a yellow rock of eggs’ distinctly bears the stamp of the Spanish confectioner’s lavish hand with egg yolks (tons of them still go into Spanish sweets and
turrons
). For the yellow rock you make a syrup of sugar and white wine. To this you put a couple of dozen egg yolks and cook them until they come away from the pan. ‘When they are cooked put to them a little muskified orange flower water and the juice of a lemon, and pass them through a canvas cloth on to the dish you wish to serve them on. Garnish with pomegranate seeds and lemon rind dipped in
sucre cuit
,’ meaning, I think, a heavy sugar syrup. The name of the dish is descriptive enough, and anybody who has tried some of the incredibly rich Spanish – and Portuguese – sweetmeats and desserts will have a good idea of how it tasted.

De Lune’s recipes are wonderfully rich, strange and decorative. A leveret pie
à l’Anglaise
is made in an oval shape, or fashioned in the form of a hare. The leveret is larded, seasoned with salt, pepper, nutmeg, cinnamon and pounded bacon or salt pork. Separately you make a composition of lemon peel, Levantine dates and Brignolles prunes, all sliced and cooked in white wine with sugar, cinnamon, pepper, green citron peel. This seems to have been the equivalent of an English caudle, although eggless, for when the cooked pie, iced with sugar and orange flower water, was ready, you were to remove the cover and pour in the composition. In serving, the juice of a lemon and pomegranate seeds were to be added – presumably strewn over the carved-up and replaced cover.

Another pie,
à la Portuguaise
this time, has a filling of breast of guinea fowl and bone marrow. The usual spices, dried and candied fruit, sliced pistachio nuts and bacon are added, the pie crust being made of puff pastry in the shape of two dolphins, tail to tail. For the cooked and iced pie you were to make an
aigre doux
of lemon juice and sugar, to be poured in as in the leveret pie. Again,
en servant garnissez de grains de Grenade
.

Lovely stuff, all this. Not much in it though for the modern cook, although someone may like to try a modified version of the
germaine et romaine
dish. My own small contribution to
pomegranate cooking for times when consignments of Israeli or Spanish pomegranates turn up, are a sorbet and an ice cream, both much experimented in Spain, experiments observed with amazement by my host’s two young village maids.

POMEGRANATE WATER ICE OR SNOW

You need 600 ml (1 pint) of fresh pomegranate juice – in Spain I found the pomegranates so rich in juice that four yielded enough – plus 300 ml (½ pint) of red wine, the juice of one large orange, and a thick syrup made from 180 g (6 oz) of sugar boiled with a half tumbler – 90–120 ml (3–4 fl oz) – of water. Combine all the ingredients – you don’t cook anything except the sugar syrup – and freeze.

The name for this came from Gilliers’
Le Cannameliste Français
, 1751. Gilliers was confectioner and distiller to Stanislas, King of Poland, last Duke of Bar and Lorraine, father-in-law of Louis XV. His pomegranate water ice was called
Neige de Grenade
. The flavour is fine and fresh, the colours very rich deep garnet and carnation, varying and interestingly striated. Serve it in heavy but clear glass goblets.

POMEGRANATE ICE CREAM

Make a custard with 300 ml (10 fl oz) of cream thickened with three egg yolks and sweetened with 125 g (4 oz) of sugar. When cooled, add to the custard the fresh juice of two large pomegranates. When frozen this ice comes out a mysterious pale cedar-pink colour, and has a subtle flavour not easily identifiable.

Abigail Books
, Catalogue, Winter 1979

STRAWBERRY GRANITA

Now that we can buy strawberries nearly all the year round, a strawberry sorbet would seem to be the best basic one to know. Mine is the Italian version. It contains orange juice, which brings out the flavour of the strawberries in a remarkable way, giving the mixture an intensity and concentration of scent not otherwise to be achieved with any but the finest strawberries fresh from the garden.

Quantities are 1 kg (2 lb) of strawberries, the juice of half a lemon and of half an orange, 250 g (8 oz) white sugar, 150 ml (¼ pint) of water.

Hull the strawberries, purée them in the blender, press them through a stainless steel or nylon sieve (wire discolours the fruit). Add the strained orange and lemon juice.

Boil the sugar and water for about 7 minutes to make a thin syrup (to make a sorbet of greater density boil the syrup for 10 minutes or until it is beginning to thicken) and leave it to cool before adding it to the strawberry pulp.

Chill the mixture before turning it into the refrigerator trays to freeze, which will take 2–2½ hours at the normal ice-making temperature. Keep the trays tightly covered with foil during the freezing process, and transfer them from the ice compartment to the less cold part of the refrigerator for about 10 minutes before dividing up the ice and serving it.

As the name implies, this type of water ice should be slightly grainy, no more than just barely frozen. The quantities given should be enough for 6 to 8 helpings. Serve with French boudoir biscuits or sponge fingers.

STRAWBERRY AND CREAM SORBET

According to Escoffier, a fruit juice ice with added whipped cream is still a sorbet. It is the basic egg-thickened custard mixture which turns an ice into an ice cream. Whatever its name, this type of ice is very light and delicious. Make the mixture as for the
granita
, boiling the syrup rather longer to increase its density.

For 1 kg (2 lb) of strawberries allow 150 ml (5 fl oz) of double cream. Whip it very lightly, fold it swiftly into the chilled fruit and syrup mixture, freeze it in the covered ice trays, at the
maximum
freezing temperature, for 2–2½ hours. It should not be necessary, given the foil covering, to stir the ice.

RASPBERRY AND REDCURRANT GRANITA

In this mixture is concentrated the very essence of summer itself. Make it quickly while the season lasts and eat it freshly made. It does store in the deep-freeze, but with long keeping the strength of flavour goes out of it.

Proportions and method are the same as for the strawberry
granita
except that the orange is replaced by the freshly pressed juice of 125 g (¼ lb) of redcurrants per 500 g (1 lb) of raspberries.

LEMON AND ORANGE SORBET

4 oranges, 1 large lemon, 125 g (4 oz) of sugar, 150 ml (¼ pint) of water, whites of 3 eggs, 125–150 ml (4–5 fl oz) double cream.

Grate the zest of one orange and of the lemon into the sugar and water. Boil to a thin syrup. Strain when cool and mix it with the strained juice of the fruit. Chill and then freeze as for the strawberry
granita
.

Turn the frozen mixture into a bowl. With a fork break it into a snow. Quickly mix and fold in the egg whites whisked to a stiff froth. Now add the cream. Return the sorbet to the ice trays, cover them. Freeze, with the refrigerator turned to
maximum
freezing temperature, for about 1 hour.

LEMON AND RUM SORBET

While I would not monkey about adding liqueurs or frills to soft fruit ices, a lemon sorbet, however good, can stand a little dressing up. A spoonful or two of white rum, for example, poured over each sorbet as it is about to be served, makes it more interesting. Never add liqueurs or spirits to a water ice mixture before it is frozen or it may not freeze at all.

THE EDWARDIAN SORBET

‘The sorbet is served in small cut glasses for this purpose. They are sent into the room on a silver tray, and on the service table are placed each on a small plate with its corresponding teaspoon, before serving them to the guests.

‘As soon as the sorbet is served, the butler or a waiter hands round a large box of Russian cigarettes, and a second one passes a lighted spirit lamp or a small candle.’

The Modern Caterer’s Encyclopaedia
by J. Rey, published by Carmona and Baker,
c
.1907.

Nova
, 1965

MULBERRY WATER ICE

Sir Harry Luke, author of
The Tenth Muse
, one of the most civilised and original of modern cookery books, claims that the mulberry, his favourite berry fruit, makes the best of all water ices.

Made according to the same method as the strawberry
granita
on page 288, but omitting the orange juice, a mulberry ice is indeed both delicious and beautiful.

Unpublished, n.d.

MANGO SORBET

To make 1 litre (1¾ pints) of this delicious ice you need 4 or 5 fine ripe mangoes, a thin syrup made with 60 g (2 oz) of sugar to 150 ml (¼ pint) of water, 150 ml (5 fl oz) of cream, about 2 tablespoons of lemon juice.

Peel the mangoes and slice all the flesh into a bowl, scraping as much as possible from the stones. Purée it in the blender. There should be 650–700 g (22–24 oz) of fruit pulp. Add the cold sugar syrup and the lemon juice. Immediately before freezing blend in the cream.