Cream in Moulds (Mrs. Etheridge's Recipe)

History

This recipe appears in Hilda's "Where Is It?" of Recipes, the Cape Colonial cookbook compiled by Hildagonda J. Duckitt and published in London by Chapman and Hall in 1891. Duckitt (born at Groote Post in the Cape Colony in 1839, died 1905) is often called South Africa's first celebrity cookery writer; her book gathered "many old Cape, Indian and Malay dishes and preserves". As printed, the recipe is headed "CREAM IN MOULDS. (Mrs. Etheridge's Recipe.)" — like many entries in the book, it is credited to a named contributor, here a Mrs. Etheridge.

The dish itself is a sweet moulded cream. Isinglass (a gelatine) is soaked and dissolved with a little hot milk; strawberry or apricot jam and cream are then stirred in, the mixture is sweetened and spiked with brandy, poured into a porcelain mould, and turned out "when cold and firm". It belongs to a whole family of set "creams" in the book — printed alongside Isinglass Cream, Fruit Cream in a Mould, Stone Cream and Swiss Cream — moulded gelatine-and-cream desserts typical of the period.

Beyond the recipe and its attribution to Mrs. Etheridge, the historical record documents nothing further about this specific dish: who Mrs. Etheridge was, where the recipe came from, or any social meaning it carried are not recorded.

Ingredients

• 1 oz Isinglass
• 5 tablespoonfuls Brandy
• 1 pint Cream
• Sugar
• 4 tablespoonfuls Strawberry or Apricot Jam

Instructions

1. Soak the ounce of isinglass in cold water.
2. Add a little boiling milk and stir until nearly cold.
3. Mix four tablespoonfuls of jam with the cream.
4. Add this mixture to the isinglass, stirring while until nice and smooth.
5. Stir in the brandy and sugar.
6. Pour into a porcelain mould and turn out when cold and firm.