Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well (84 page)

These amounts serve five to six people.

100 grams (about 3-1/2 ounces) of ladyfingers

70 grams (about 2-1/3 ounces) of Malaga raisins

50 grams (about 1-2/3 ounces) of sultanas

30 grams (about 1 ounce) of candied citron

Marsala wine, as needed

Remove the seeds from the Malaga raisins. Chop the candied citron into tiny pieces. Take a mold with a hole in the middle and grease it with cold butter. Dip the ladyfingers lightly and only on the surface in the Marsala wine. Now fill the mold first with a layer of the ladyfingers and then with a layer of the raisins and the candied citron. Prepare a custard with the following ingredients:

2 deciliters (about 4/5 of a cup) of milk

2 whole eggs

50 grams (about 1-2/3 ounces) of sugar

a dash of vanilla

Combine all the above items without first cooking them and pour the mixture into the mold over the ladyfingers. Cook the pudding in
bain-marie
. Remove hot from the mold and before serving, fill the hole in the middle with a zabaione until it overflows, covering the whole pudding.

Prepare the zabaione with the following ingredients:

2 whole eggs

1-1/2 deciliters (about 2/3 of a cup) of Marsala

50 grams (about 1 -2/3 ounces) of sugar

Beat the zabaione with a whisk in a metal bowl held over the fire. For the raisins you may substitute fruits in syrup, or a mixture of both, even a combination of candied citron and candied orange.

This recipe serves six people. This is a dessert sure to please.

1 liter (about 1 quart) of milk

200 grams (about 7 ounces) of sugar

8 egg yolks

a dash of vanilla

First beat the egg yolks with the sugar and then pour in the milk a little at a time. To hasten the cooking process, you can put the mixture over a high flame, but the moment it begins to smoke reduce the heat to prevent curdling. If it does curdle, pass the mixture though a strainer. Stir constantly; you can tell that the custard is cooked when it sticks to the wooden spoon. Add the vanilla shortly before removing from the fire.

With the above proportions, this custard, which contains no flour or other thickening agent, lends itself admirably to creamy ice creams—so much so that you would be hard pressed to find a comparable ice cream in any cafe. It can also be used for a runny English trifle: once it has cooled, add some slices of sponge cake or
ladyfingers lightly dipped in rosolio. If you want to make it taste even better, add some finely minced candied fruit.

This is a very delicate dessert that is offered, like all other desserts, toward the end of a meal. It is served in cups smaller than the ones used for coffee, one per person, which is why it is called “le tazzine” (“little cups”).

To serve ten people:

300 grams (about 10-1/2 ounces) of sugar

60 grams (about 2 ounces) of sweet almonds

10 egg yolks

1 deciliter (about 2/5 of a cup) of water

a dash of orange-flower water

ground cinnamon, to taste

Blanch the almonds, toast to a light brown, grind very fine and set aside.

Boil the sugar in the water for a minute or two, taking care that it does not turn brown. Allow it to cool and when it is lukewarm, begin to add the egg yolks, one or two at a time, stirring constantly in the same direction over very moderate heat. When the mixture becomes dense enough so that there is no more danger of it curdling, you can beat it with a whisk with a bottom-to-top motion which will make the cream more fluffy. Work the mixture in this way until the yolks have lost their reddish color and the mixture resembles a thick custard. Then add the orange-flower water and the almonds, mixing well. Pour the mixture into the cups and put a pinch of ground cinnamon in the middle of each one. When mixed in by each guest, this gives the dessert more aroma.

This is a dessert that can be prepared a few days in advance, without adverse consequences. If you want, you can use the leftover egg whites to make black pudding in the proportions described in recipe 665, or the meringue cake in recipe 633.

140 grams (about 5 ounces) of sweet almonds

140 grams (about 5 ounces) confectioners’ sugar

about 40 grams (about 1-1/3 ounces) of grated or powdered chocolate

4 tablespoons maraschino liqueur

Blanch the almonds, dry them in the sun or on the fire, and crush very fine with two tablespoons of the sugar. Pour them from the mortar into a bowl, add the rest of the sugar, and blend with the maraschino liqueur.

Dust a pastry board with the chocolate. Shape the mixture into little balls somewhat larger than hazelnuts—you should get more than thirty. Coat the balls thoroughly with the chocolate. They will keep for a long time.

It was the time of year when the gray mullet of the Comacchio Valley are excellent grilled, seasoned with pomegranate juice, and when, as the poet would say, the variously colored songbirds are driven by the first frosts to our fields in search of gentler climes, and the poor innocent little creatures get caught in one of the many snares and then threaded on a skewer.

… ed io sol uno
M’apparecchiava a sostenere la guerra
Sì del cammino e sì della pietate,
Che ritrarrà la mente che non erra.
¹³⁰
(… and I alone
was preparing myself to endure
both the journey and the compassion
that unerring memory shall relate.)

The journey I had to endure was a 200-kilometer trip to spend a holiday at a friend’s home on a very pleasant hill; and my compassion was for those charming little animals, for my heart ached every time I would see them, from the little house overlooking the field, get caught in the traitorous nets of the snares. But—since I don’t belong to the Pythagorean sect, and hold the firm conviction that when there is no remedy for a particular evil, one must make the best of it either by love or by force, and if possible profit from it—I tried to get on my host’s cook’s good side by teaching him how to prepare game more elegantly than he had been used to, and to season and cook it in such a way as to make it more pleasing to the taste; and in exchange for that and for some other culinary precepts, during my stay he made this and the next two desserts I am going to describe to you.

Game birds and game in general, in case you don’t know, are an aromatic, nutritious, mildly stimulating food. I know of a reputable doctor whose cook has orders to chose game, when he can find it, over any other meat. And as far as gray mullet goes, I will tell you that when I was at that wonderful age when one can digest even nails, our maidservant would serve this fish with an accompaniment of white onions, halved and roasted on the grill, seasoned, as the fish was, with olive oil, salt, pepper, and pomegranate juice.

The season for gray mullet in the Comacchio Valley runs from October to the end of February. And while I am on the subject of this fishing spot, I should add (as an amazing thing that is worth knowing) that up to the first of November of the year 1905, the catch in those valleys was the following:

So, after that prelude I will preach the sermon, and tell you how to make this so-called French-style custard.

1/2 liter (about 1/2 a quart) of milk

150 grams (about 5-1/4 ounces) of sugar

1 whole egg 4 egg yolks

2 sheets of isinglass
¹³¹

a dash of vanilla or lemon zest

Blend the sugar and the eggs well, add the milk a little at a time, and lastly the isinglass. Put the pan on the fire, stirring continuously in the same direction. When the custard starts to thicken and stick to the spoon, remove the pan from the fire. Take a smooth mold with a hole in the middle, of a size that the custard will fill; coat the bottom of the mold with a thin layer of butter or rosolio, and pour in the custard. In the summertime, place the mold on ice, and in the wintertime, in cold water. Unmold the custard on a kitchen towel folded over a tray.

If you don’t trust the quality of the milk, boil it for at least a quarter of an hour before you make the custard, or else increase the amount of isinglass by one sheet.

6 egg yolks

70 grams (about 2-1/3 ounces) of powdered sugar

15 grams (about 1/2 an ounce) of isinglass, equal to 6 or 7 sheets

3/4 of a glass of water

3 whole cherry laurel leaves or any other flavoring you like

Beat the egg yolks with the sugar in a saucepan; add the water and the laurel leaves, and put on the fire, stirring until done, which, as I have already told you, you can tell when the mixture thickens and coats the spoon. Then pour the mixture into a bowl, and while it is still hot, beat it vigorously with a whisk until it is fluffy and stiff. Remove the laurel leaves and add the isinglass a little at a time, continuing to beat with the whisk.

Take a decorated mold, grease it with oil, put ice all around it and pour in the whipped custard. If you like, you can add in the middle of the custard a layer of ladyfingers dipped in rosolio or spread with fruit preserves. Leave it in the ice for more than an hour; if it is difficult to remove the custard from the mold, wipe the outside of the mold with a cloth soaked in hot water.

Prepare the isinglass ahead of time as follows: first soak it, and then put it on the fire with two fingers of water. Cook down the mixture until it forms a rather thick liquid that sticks to your fingers. While it is still boiling hot, pour it into the custard, which you can flavor with alkermes,
¹³²
coffee, or chocolate.

This recipe serves five or six people.

150 grams (about 5-1/4 ounces) of sugar

85 grams (about 3 ounces) of sweet almonds

5 egg yolks

4 deciliters (about 1-2/3 cups) of milk

Blanch the almonds, and use a mezzaluna to chop them to about the size of grains of wheat. Put 110 grams (about 3-4/5 ounces) of the sugar on the fire, and when it has melted, pour in the almonds, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon until the mixture turns cinnamon-brown. Then transfer the mixture to a baking pan greased with butter, and when it has cooled, crush it in a mortar with the remaining 40 grams (about 1-1/3 ounces) of sugar until very fine.

Add the egg yolks and then the milk, mix well, and then pour into a mold with a hole in the middle; grease the mold first with butter. Cook in
bain-marie
and afterward, in summertime, keep the mold on ice.

If you are serving this dessert to more than six people, double the amounts, and if you are not sure about the quality of the milk, boil it first by itself for at least a quarter of an hour.