Retro Blueberry Ice
Posted by Lidian on April 23, 2008
A surprising find for the Retro Recipe Challenge, over at Dispensing Happiness. The idea was to find and make a recipe published before your mother was born; in my case, that meant poring over the handful of pre-1924 cookbooks in my collection and seeing what I could find.
Originally I was going to bake something, as that is something I am better at than traditional main courses (and I tremble to think what might happen if I attempted a gelatin mold). But the cakes I liked all seemed so - so heavy, so wintery. And it has been so warm here in Ontario, we are all quite excited about this. Wearing T shirts, getting reacquainted with ice-free sidewalks, opening windows. So I was looking for something light.
When I saw this recipe for blueberry ice I had to make it. Summery, strangely contemporary - and yet, and yet! Definitely pre-1924! It is from the Cook Book of Left Overs (1911), by Helen Carroll Clarke (former Instructor of Cookery, the Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, New York) and Phoebe Deyo Rulon (Former Instructor in Invalid Cookery and Dietician, Bellevue Hospital, New York City).
Helen and Phoebe recommend this ice for using up stewed blueberries, should you be troubled by a surfeit of them. But I think that you could substitute any stewed, fresh or frozen fruit.
I left out the egg white since raw egg white is not a good idea these days. And I used frozen blueberries, to which I gave a cursory stew, just to keep to the recipe (except for the egg white). I also left the whole berries in, but it would be just as good without them. Up to you, really. Here’s the original recipe:
The gelatin in the recipe really makes the texture better - unlike previous ices I’ve made, it scooped well even when frozen solid, and I didn’t have to keep taking it out of the freezer and beating it to break down the ice crystals. It’s a lovely color, and tastes deeply of blueberries. Here’s a picture of it. I put it in the sugar bowl of my grandmother’s tea set, circa 1895:
April 23, 2008 at 4:37 pm
When I lived in the tropics and had fruit literally falling at my feet, I made sorbets all the time. They are just so refreshing and the best dessert ever.
April 23, 2008 at 6:58 pm
I think so too - one of the all-time best desserts I ever had was in Quebec, 3 tiny scoops of different ices made from fresh berries. I still think about that dessert 21 years later!
April 27, 2008 at 5:06 pm
Oh, nice picture. I had a set of child-sized “Blue Willow” dishes when I was a kid. I don’t know where it is now, though.
April 27, 2008 at 7:20 pm
Tess - I love blue willowware, it is my favorite…the tea set is lovely, I have it in the kitchen high up behind glass doors, so I can see it every day. I need to look for more retro kitchenware - I really don’t have anything much but that.