Jellies (Vegetarian) and Jams : Part 1

Cassell's Vegetarian Cookery: A Manual of Cheap and Wholesome Diet
By A. G. Payne

(Page 11 of 16)

By vegetarian jelly we mean jellies made on vegetarian principles. To be consistent, if we cannot use anchovy sauce because it is made from fish, on the same principle we cannot use either gelatin or isinglass, which, of course, as everybody knows, is made from fishes. For all this, there is no reason why vegetarians should not enjoy jellies quite equal, so far as flavor is concerned, to ordinary jelly. The simplest substitute for gelatin, or what is virtually the same thing, isinglass, is corn-flour. Tapioca could be used, but corn-flour saves much trouble. Some people may urge that it is not fair to give the name of jelly to a corn-flour pudding. There is, however, a very great difference between a corn-flour pudding flavored with orange and what we may call an orange jelly, in which corn-flour is only introduced, like gelatin, for the purpose of transforming a liquid into a solid.

We also have this advantage in using corn-flour: it is much more simple and can be utilized for making a very large variety of jellies, many of which, probably, will be new even to vegetarians themselves. We are all agreed on one point, the wholesomeness of freshly picked ripe fruit. We will suppose the season to be autumn and the blackberries ripe on the hedgerows and that the children of the family are nothing loath to gather, say, a couple of quarts. We will now describe how to make a mold of -

Blackberry Jelly. - Put the blackberries in an enameled saucepan with a little water at the bottom and let them stew gently till they yield up their juice, or they can be placed in a jar in the oven. They can now be strained through a hair sieve, but, still better, they can be squeezed dry in a tamis cloth. This juice should now be sweetened and it can be made into jelly in two ways, both of which are perfectly lawful in vegetarian cookery. The juice, like red currant juice, can be boiled with a large quantity of white sugar till the jelly sets of its own accord; in this case we should require one pound of sugar to every pint of juice and the result would be a blackberry jelly like red currant jelly, more like a preserve than the jelly we are accustomed to eat at dinner alone.

For instance, no one would care to eat a quantity of red currant jelly like we should ordinary orange or lemon jelly - it would be too sickly; consequently we will take a pint or a quart of our blackberry juice only and sufficient sugar to make it agreeably sweet without being sickly. We will boil this in a saucepan and add a tablespoonful of corn-flour mixed with a little cold juice to every pint to make the juice thick. This can be now poured into a mold or plain round basin; we will suppose the latter. When the jelly has got quite cold we can turn it out on to a dish, say a silver dish, with a piece of white ornamental paper at the bottom. We now have to ornament this mold of blackberry jelly, and, as a rule, it will be found that no ornament can surpass natural ones.

Before boiling the blackberries for the purpose of extracting their juice, pick out two or three dozen of the largest and ripest, wash them and put them by with some of the young green leaves of the blackberry plant itself, which should be picked as nearly as possible of the same size, and, like the blackberries, must be washed. Now place a row of blackberry leaves round the base of the mold, with the stalk of the leaf under the mold and on each leaf place a ripe blackberry touching the mold itself. Take four very small leaves and stick them on the top of the mold, in the center and put the largest and best-looking blackberry of all upright in the center. This dish is now pretty-looking enough to be served on really great occasions. We consider this dish worthy of being called blackberry jelly and not corn-flour pudding.

Lemon Jelly. - Take six lemons and half a pound of sugar and rub the sugar on the outside of three of the lemons; the lemons must be hard and yellow, the peel should not be shriveled. Now squeeze the juice of all six lemons into a basin, add the sugar and a pint of water. Of course, the lemon-juice must be strained. (If wine is allowed, add half a pint of good golden sherry or Madeira.) Bring this to the boil and thicken it with some corn-flour in the ordinary way, allowing a tablespoonful of corn-flour for every pint of fluid. Pour it into a mold and when it is set turn it out. A lemon jelly like this should be turned on to a piece of ornamental paper placed at the bottom of a silver or some other kind of dish. The base of the mold should be ornamented with thin slices of lemon cut in half, the diameter touching the base of the mold and the semicircular piece of peel outside. If a round basin has been used for a mold, place a corner of a lemon on the top in the middle, surrounded with a few imitation green leaves cut out of angelica. This improves the dish in appearance and also shows what the dish is made of.

Orange Jelly. - Take six oranges, two lemons and half a pound of lump sugar; rub the sugar on the outside of three of the oranges, squeeze the juice of the six oranges into a basin with the juice of two lemons, strain, add the sugar and a pint of water. The liquid will be of an orange color, owing to the rind of the orange rubbed on to the sugar. (If wine be allowed, add half a pint of golden sherry or Madeira.) Bring the liquid to boiling point and then thicken it with corn-flour and pour it while hot into a mold or plain white basin; when cold, turn it out on to a piece of ornamental paper placed at the bottom of a dish; surround the bottom of the mold with thin slices of orange cut into quarters and the center part pushed under the mold; place the small end of an orange on the top of the mold with some little leaves or spikes of green angelica placed round the edge.

Black Currant Jelly. - The juice of black currants makes excellent jelly in the ordinary way if we boil a pint of black currant juice with a pound of sugar till it sets; but a mold of black currant jelly suitable to be used as a sweet at dinner can be made by adding less sugar and thickening the juice with corn-flour, allowing about a tablespoonful to every pint and pouring it into a mold or plain round basin. The mold can be ornamented as follows and we will suppose a pudding-basin to be used for the purpose. We will suppose the mold of jelly to have been turned out on to a clean sheet of white paper. Pick some of the brighter green black-currant leaves off the tree and place these round the base of the mold with the stalk of the leaf pushed underneath and the point of the leaf pointing outwards.

Now choose a few very small bunches of black currants, wash these and dip them into very weak gum and water and then dip them into white powdered sugar. They now look, when they are dry, as if they were crystallized or covered with hoar-frost. Place one of these little bunches, with the stalk stuck into the mold of jelly, about an inch from the bottom, so that each bunch rests on a green leaf. Cut a small stick of angelica and stick it into the top of the mold upright and let a bunch of frosted black currants hang over the top. If we wish to make the mold of jelly very pretty as a supper dish, where there is a good top light, we can dip the green leaves into weak gum and water and then sprinkle over them some powdered glass.

Red Currant Jelly. - Red currant jelly can be made in exactly a similar manner, substituting red currants for black.

Cassell & Company, Limited: London, Paris & Melbourne. 1891.