by James Steen
The origin of syllabub’s name is unknown, but the dish is easy enough to make. Whisk 300 millilitres double cream with 75 grams caster sugar, but be careful not to over-whisk it. Add the juice of a lemon and 60 millilitres sweet wine or sweet sherry. Spoon into six tall-ish glasses. Place in the fridge to chill. Once chilled, serve.
We start to see the use of the word ‘trifle’ (from the Old French trufle, meaning small) during the reign of Elizabeth I. In The Good Huswife’s Jewell (1596), Thomas Dawson gives this recipe for trifle: ‘Take a pint of thicke cream and season it with suger and ginger, and rosewater; so stir it as you then would have it and make it lukewarm on a dish on a chaffinge dish and coales, and after put it into a silver piece or a bowle, and so serve it to the borde.’ Although he called it a trifle, it was more like a fool and so it had some way to go. (By the way, the ‘borde’ or board was a table, as in a piece of wooden board. When playing cards, if you kept your hands above the table, rather than underneath it, you were certainly not a cheat – instead, you were ‘above board’, decent and honest.)
Trifle, as we know it, came in the 1700s, and in the publication – pivotal in British gastronomy – of The Art of Cookery, Made Plain and Easy, by ‘A Lady’.
That lady was Hannah Glasse who was born in Holborn, London, in 1708, married an Irish soldier and together they worked as domestic staff in at least one aristocratic household. Hannah had financial problems and, in her late 30s, was sent to debtor’s prison. Clearly, she was a woman of great resolve, writing the recipes which she felt deserved a wide audience. A decade later, in 1747, she saw the publication of The Art of Cookery. It was a best-seller, with twenty editions published before the turn of the 19th century. All of this, while bringing eleven children into the world.
Her brilliant book partly illustrates the British love of cream at that time. She gives, among others, recipes for lemon-cream, orange-cream, barley-cream, almond-cream, and even steeple-cream, which begins with the instruction: ‘Take five ounces of hart thorn and two ounces of ivory, and put them in a stone bottle, fill it up with fair water to the neck …’ For ‘everlasting syllabubs’ – made with German wine and sack, as well as thick cream, the juice of Seville oranges and lemon rind – she asks the reader to, ‘beat it well together with a whisk half an hour’.
But she has a cooking tip: ‘The best way to whip syllabub is have a large, fine chocolate mill, which you must keep on purpose, and a large, deep bowl to mill [the syllabubs].’ The chocolate mill was what we might call a cocoa grinder which, as it revolved, thickened the syllabub.
Hannah Glasse’s recipe for trifle is short and almost as sweet as the dessert:
Cover the bottom of your dish or bowl with Naples biscuits broke in pieces, mackeroons broke in halves, and ratafia cakes. Just wet them all through with sack and then make a good boiled custard, not too thick, and when cold pour it over, and then put syllabub over that. You may garnish it with ratafia cakes, currant-jelly and flowers.
Glasse’s currant-jelly is, in fact, more like jam. The trifle, subsequently, was made with jelly. Did cooks think they were sticking to Glasse’s recipe by using ‘jelly’?
In 1861, Isabella Beeton uses jam in her recipe (in Household Management) but introduces the notion of jelly: she suggests jam in the trifle, but that the whipped cream topping should be adorned with bright currant jelly (or crystallised sweetmeats or flowers). There may also have been American-British jam-jelly confusion which led to the substitution: American cooks used jelly when they were supposed to use jam.
Whatever the reason for the switch from jam to jelly, it is jam which makes the superior trifle. Use a couple of jars of black currant jam, heated in a saucepan with a little sherry, before allowing it to cool and then use as a layer of the trifle. Chantilly cream is the finest topping: whip 500 grams double cream with 50 grams caster sugar and the seeds of one vanilla pod. Flaked almonds, toasted for a moment under a hot grill, are an ideal ornament.
BLACK FOREST GTEAU
Layers of kirsch-soaked dark chocolate sponge; sour, pitted cherries; a lavish covering of Chantilly cream and chocolate swirls. Baroque in style, but 20th-century German in origin.
There is the cake and then there is the gâteau. The cake is the manly one: think of a sweaty, sword-wielding Viking, reaching British shores, clambering over the side of his boat and yelling, ‘Kaka! Kaka!’ He was screaming for what we now call cake. Norsemen gave us that much-used word.
Cake is confusing. At times it is close in taste and cooking technique to bread and bun. Meanwhile, oatcakes are cakes but are also surely biscuits because they are flat and brittle. And the puffed up Eccles cakes (from the little town on the outskirts of Manchester) were not always sweet: once they were made with a filling of calf’s foot, as well as currants and spices.
Gâteau, by comparison, is elegant and beautiful. She has layers – light and never too thick – of sponge, and offers pure indulgence. That palatable pleasure may be in the form of sweet creams, iced fondants, fruit jellies or semi-sweet chocolate ganache. Or perhaps it is the appealing taste and scent of a liqueur.
While the cake fills a hole the gâteau brings a smile. The Victorians could not get enough of gâteaux. The larger the gâteaux and the taller they towered, the more impressive they were. Nothing has changed. Pâtissiers in Paris were lured across the English Channel in the 19th century to feed the fashion of London’s socialites. (Today many apprentice pâtissiers in Paris go to Tokyo to learn the art of pastry.)
The French-ness of Black Forest gâteau is to be found only in its name because this is a delight from Germany. There, you should ask for a slice of Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte (Black Forest Cherry Tart).
Some say this gâteau was born in Berlin, shortly before the Second World War. More convincing is the claim that it was created in 1915 by Josef Keller, a pastry chef in Café Ahrend in Bad Godesburg, on the west bank of the Rhine and not far from Bonn. After the First World War he opened his own café in his home town of Radolfzell, on the banks of Lake Constance. He trained August Schaefer during the 1920s and later gave his recipe book to his protégé. It contained the original recipe for the gâteau. Sour cherries and kirsch are products of the Black Forest and were readily available to Keller. He lived and worked close to the region of evergreen forests and ever-ticking cuckoo clocks.
Black Forest gâteau became a hit on the American dinner party circuit of the 1960s, and in the States is known as Black Forest cake. Its success in the United Kingdom has been phenomenal, achieving great notoriety as a dessert when, throughout the 1970s, it seemed to feature on every single British restaurant menu. It was up against the cheesecake, tinned fruit cocktail and gala melon ‘boat’ (which was served as both a starter and dessert).
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In my travels over the years I have asked accomplished, well-known chefs and cooks about their favourite cakes. Cornwall-based Nathan Outlaw opts for Battenberg (‘because I’m a lover of marzipan, which also accounts for the extra four or five stone I carry around’) while Pierre Gagnaire chooses tarte Tatin. Nobu, meanwhile, told me: ‘My father died when I was a kid and his brother brought some strawberry shortcake at Christmas time. I eat almost any cake but that’s my favourite.’
Torta de Santiago de Compostella, the almond tart from Galicia, wins the vote from Giorgio Locatelli and the esteemed food writer Claudia Roden.
Jason Atherton has a recently-acquired obsession with carrot cake: ‘I’ll sit down with a cup of tea and a slice of carrot cake and marvel at the way a cake can be made with carrots. It fascinates me.’
The masterful Anthony Demetre is equally smitten and fascinated. ‘Even before I first ate carrot cake, I loved it. Just the thought of carrots in a cake intrigued me.’ He is coeliac, but says: ‘I’ve now managed to make a spanking one that’s gluten free.’
Victoria sponge is another favourite, as is Black Forest gâteau because, as Claude Bosi says: ‘You have sweet, acidity and bitterness and the alcohol. Everything in one
cake.’
APPLE PIE
A British classic dating back to medieval times: lightly spiced, sweetened apples within a pastry case.
The apple arrived in Britain, it is believed, during the Neolithic period (4,000–2,500 BC) but was not a popular feature in the diet. It took the Roman invasion in the 1st century AD to muster up an interest in the fruit. The Romans introduced sweet cultivars. They were also knowledgeable about pollination and the wisdom of orchards.
When the Romans left Britain, the interest in apples faded and it was only after the Norman invasion that more orchards were created, particularly in the grounds of monasteries and wealthy landowners. The Normans gave us ‘sidre’, the Old French for cider. By the 14th century, it was used and cooked frequently in recipes. The Forme of Cury, compiled by Richard II’s chief chefs, contains recipes for fritters of parsnips and apples, as well as ‘tartis in applis’, apple tart. ‘Take good apples, and spices and figs,’ it advises, cover them in saffron and bake in ‘a cofyn’, which was the pastry case and not, in those days, supposed to be eaten.
Inevitably, the apple became a staple. Hardy and easy to grow, it was even easier to steal in large quantities and sell. The costard was a variety which was often sold by street vendors and, in time, costard mongers became costermongers, sellers of fruit and vegetables. Rummaging around beneath the apple trees in orchards, you might find the shrivelled apples, known as ‘scrump’ (stemming from Swedish), and if you thieved them then you were ‘scrumping’ (the word did not make it into the dictionaries until the 19th century).
The apple pie benefitted from a few factors in economic and social evolution: sugar became cheaper; spices became more available; and the pie crust became edible – the dish was more enjoyable to eat. Soon it would make its way to America where, eventually, it would become as American as the hot dog and burger. Across Europe, the apple with pastry is eaten: France has its tarte Tatin, Austria has its apple strudel, apple streusel cake is eaten in German homes, and Danish pastries are popular across the continent.
Few odes to food are as passionate as ‘Apple Pye’, penned by Dr William King (1663–1712). He was an English judge, author and poet, as well as a great gourmet. He hoped to publish a Biblioteca Culinaria, or The Cook’s Complete Library, but died before it could be achieved. However, during his lifetime he wrote prolifically of food. He noted that cooks ‘… are not of the most patient disposition’, though he was a man who loved to cook and who pondered culinary intricacies and strived to share the knowledge he acquired.
‘A good dinner,’ he also believed, ‘is brother to a good poem; only it is something more substantial, and between two and three o’clock, more agreeable.’
Of all the delicates which Britons try
To please the palate or delight the eye,
Of all the sev’ral kinds of sumptuous fare,
There is none that can with apple pie compare.
When first this infant dish in fashion came,
The ingredients were but coarse, and rude the frame.
And yet unpolished in the modern arts,
Our fathers ate brown bread, instead of tarts.
Pies were but indigested lumps of dough,
Till time and just expense improved them so.
King gives a tremendous salute to ‘godlike’ Edward of the Saxon line, whom he credits (heaven knows why) as refining the pie – quinces were added, the pies crusts were trimmed and cream was introduced as an accompaniment. Yet King provides insight into the 17th-century apple pie.
Draw out your dough elaborately thin,
And cease not to fatigue your rolling pin.
Of eggs and butter, see you mix enough,
For then the paste will swell into a puff …
Ranged in thick order let your quinces lie,
They give a charming relish to the pie.
If you are a wife, you’ll not brown sugar slight,
The browner (if I form my judgement right)
A deep vermillion tincture will dispense,
And make your Pippin redder than the quince.
When this is done there will be wanting still.
The just reserve of cloves and candy’ed peel.
Nor can I blame you if a drop you take,
Of orange water, for perfuming sake.
But here the art of nicety is such
There must be not too little, nor too much …
Half a century later, Hannah Glasse would have agreed with King’s words. Her recipe calls for a squeeze of lemon, a blade of mace, and suggests ‘you may put in a little quince or marmalade, if you please’.
It is best to avoid ‘cooking apples’ as they require lots of sugar to sweeten them. Cox’s Orange Pippin and Granny Smith are ideal varieties for apple pie.
DOBOS TORTA
A chocolate gâteau topped with caramel, and served in the cafés of Budapest.
This extravagant gâteau takes its name from its creator József C. Dobos (1847–1924), a skilled pastry chef and confectioner in 19th-century Budapest. Dobos was a colourful character, connoisseur and gourmet. Perhaps the Escoffier of Hungary.
Dobosh, as the cake is also known, consists of five thin, round layers of sponge, with fillings in between of coffee-laced chocolate buttercream. The shiny, dark, glistening top is a glaze made of caramel.
Dobos, it is said, acquired the buttercream recipe during a trip to France. His cake received its debut at the Hungarian National Exhibition, which took place in 1885, and achieved further notoriety when it became fashionable after receiving the royal seal of approval.
However, the creator refused to share his recipe. Inevitably, this led to copies which were not always so similar to the original. Clearly proud of his conception, Dobos travelled around Europe, baking the cake and showing it off at special parties. He also managed to write a few cookery books.
In later life, he donated his recipe to the Budapest Bakery Guild and Confectioner’s Chamber of Industry, enabling the original to be shared with fellow members of his profession.
In New Orleans, the multi-layered doberge cake was inspired by the dobosh, and created in the 1920s by the baker, Beulah Ledner. In New Orleans Memories: One Writer’s City, Carolyn Kolb writes: ‘The first change Mrs Ledner made was in the name – “dobos” doesn’t sound very French, and knowing that Orleanians loved their French pastries, she cleverly settled on “doberge” – which sounds about the same.’ The doberge cakes are usually chocolate or lemon flavoured, and covered in buttercream, followed by a coating of icing.
CRÈME BRÛLÉE
… In French. To the British, it can also be burnt cream or Trinity cream. Vanilla-infused custard is baked and crowned with a brittle caramel glaze.
This dessert is petite but has plenty of drama, and to be eaten, it needs to be broken into.
Just as an egg is cracked, this sweet, egg-rich pudding – usually cooked and served in a ramekin – has a topping of dark, crunchy caramel, which needs to be broken with the tap or three of a dessert spoon. Voilà! Theatre at the table. Beneath the fragments of sweet glaze there is a pot of silky indulgence: a smooth, vanilla-speckled mixture of double cream, egg yolks and sugar, which has thickened during baking.
It is so good that it has almost threatened the Entente Cordiale between France and Great Britain: each country claims to have invented it.
In the early 18th century, recipes for ‘burnt cream’ began to appear in British cookbooks. It also featured in The Experienced English Housekeeper (1769), Elizabeth Raffald’s hefty, compelling book of some 800 recipes – or ‘receipts’, as they were known – many of them appealing to the sweet-toothed reader. (Raffald was born and raised in Doncaster, and wrote that she had ‘spent fifteen years in great and worthy families in the capacity as a housekeeper, and had an opportunity of travelling with them, but finding the common servant so ignorant in dressing meat, and a good cook so hard to be met with, put me upon studying the art of cookery …’)
Her recipe
for burnt cream is certainly crème brûlée, even if it does have the addition of lemon peel, egg whites and orange flower water. It goes like this:
Boil a pint of cream with sugar, and a little lemon peel shred fine. Then beat the yolks of six and the whites of four eggs separately. When your cream is cooled, put in your eggs, with a spoonful of orange flower water and one of fine flour. Set it over the fire. Keep stirring it ‘till it is thick. Put it into a dish. When it is cold, sift a quarter of a pound of sugar all over, hold a hot salamander over it ‘till it is very brown and looks like a glass plate put over your cream.
We also know this dish as Trinity cream, after Trinity College, Cambridge, where it has been served for many centuries. There, a branding iron is used to imprint the college crest on the cream, which is served in a large bowl and not ramekins. Sometimes it is known as Cambridge burnt cream. At Cambridge, when the crest is not used, the brûlée top is cracked and whole raspberries are tossed onto the cream, a delicious and colourful twist which adds flavour, acidity and texture.
However, in France the term crème brûlée was used in print in 1691 by François Massiolot, chef to (among others) Philippe I, Duke of Orléans and brother of Louis XIV, and his son, Philippe II, who was a bit of a show-off at the stove and liked to cook for his mistress, a countess, and her staff.
François Massiolot later gave a recipe for crème anglaise (or crème a l’anglaise). This ‘English cream’, or custard, is similar to the one used for brûlée – suggesting perhaps that crème brûlée is indeed burnt (English) cream. (Crème anglaise also forms the yellow ‘sea’ in îles flottantes – the classic French dessert of poached meringues in custard, again served cold. This crème is a versatile base which can be flavoured with rum or liqueurs such as kirsch or maraschino, as well as chocolate, or infusions of coffee or tea.)