Lemon Sponge: or, Lemon fluff for hot weather

Halloween is approaching! Animatronic witches and zombies are appearing in various people's yards. A few people have already bedecked their houses with orange Christmas lights. However, no one is putting out ornamental porch pumpkins because it is still too hot out. Pumpkins may last half a year if you put them in the back of a closet, but they wouldn't survive a week in the Texas sun. Therefore, we are making more oven-free delights.

Lemon Sponge 1 (¼-oz) envelope unflavored gelatin ¼ cup cold water 1 cup boiling water ¾ cup sugar ¼ cup lemon juice (for me, it was 2 small lemons) 2 egg whites (save the yolks for the custard) ¼ cup whipping cream Custard (see below) Maraschino cherries for garnish Sprinkle the gelatin over the cold water. Let stand for about 10 minutes. Then add the boiling water, sugar, and lemon juice. Stir until the sugar is dissolved. Let cool in the refrigerator until almost completely set, stirring occasionally. (You can speed this up by putting the bowl of gelatin in a larger bowl of ice water and stirring for a few minutes.) With an electric mixer, beat the gelatin until frothy. Then, with fresh beaters (or just rinse the beaters real quick), beat the egg whites to soft peaks. Fold them into the gelatin. Lastly, whip and fold in the cream. Refrigerate overnight. Serve with custard on top, garnished with cherries. Custard: 2 egg yolks ½ cup milk 4 tsp sugar ½ tsp vanilla (or more if desired) Whisk together in the top of a double boiler, beating well. The sugar won't completely dissolve until it gets hot, so don't worry about the persistent grains at the bottom of the pot. Put over boiling water and cook, stirring constantly, until thickened. After the sugar has dissolved, taste and see if you want to add more of it. Remove from heat, transfer to a small container, and cover with plastic wrap. Press the wrap onto the surface of the custard, making contact (this prevents a skin from forming). Let cool for a few minutes, then add the vanilla. Refrigerate. Note: If raw egg whites are a concern for you, use pasteurized-in-the-shell eggs. - Hannah O'Brien Notebook of Hannah D. O'Neil (née Hanora Frances Dannehy) Notebook of Hannah D. O'Neil (née Hanora Frances Dannehy)- recipe credited to Hannah O'Brien

To make this recipe for a large number of people, use the following amounts: 4 (¼-oz) envelopes unflavored gelatin 6 egg whites (save the yolks for the custard) 1 cup whipping cream 1 cup boiling water 4 cups cold water 1 cup lemon juice 6 egg whites Maraschino cherries for garnish For the custard: 6 egg yolks 1½ cups milk ¼ cup sugar 1 tbsp vanilla

Apparently they really liked lemon sponge at my great-grandmother's house. She rewrote the ingredients in triple quantity under the heading "For large number to be served." And if they didn't like lemon sponge by the platterful, then it must have been one of her go-to recipes when she needed to come up with dessert for 20 with minimal effort. 

Based on various papers I've looked through, "H. O'Brien" was my great-grandmother's cousin. Come to think of it, I've never swapped a recipe with any of my cousins, so it's interesting to see my great-grandmother did at least once. 

We previously made a variation of today's recipe from the Dormeyer cookbook (which, like my great-grandmother, came from Chicago. Is this a local dish?). Today's version has a few extra steps, and I was curious if it'd be better or if you can't taste the extra fuss. Just like the first time, our lemon sponge begins with the foundation of so many things: gelatin!

I never really got involved with gelatin before I started going through this binder. My most ambitious  creation was canned peaches suspended in red Jello. Given my current progress, I may find myself attempting multiple layers if I don't have a sudden attack of sanity.

Just look at that crystalline loveliness in the mixing bowl!

After adding the lemon juice and boiling water, it looked like an innocent bowl of clear water and tasted like lemonade. A part of me I'm not quite comfortable with asked "why didn't I just use a box of lemon jello?" And indeed, given the path of American food history and the massive infusion of pre-canned and pre-packaged foods in the 1950s (all those canneries and factories didn't want to go out of business just because "our brave boys" had come home from fighting Hitler) this recipe may have later evolved to lemon Jello and Cool Whip.

We put the, um, fortified lemonade aside to chill while making the "soft boiled custard." Since we don't get any instructions, I cracked open my favorite cookbook of the moment, Mrs. Mary Martensen's Century of Progress Cook Book. It's accidentally period-correct and location-appropriate, but I actually picked this book because I've liked every recipe I've made but one. To my surprise, Mrs. Mary Martensen does not provide a plain custard recipe, though I did find a custard sauce. I think a custard sauce is meant to be runnier than a custard?

Mrs. Mary Martensen's Century of Progress Cook Book (recipes from The Chicago American), 1933

Anyway, Mrs. Martensen doesn't use a lot of sugar in this recipe. I first thought I should change that, but then I realized we're pouring this onto a sweet dessert. Besides, I could always stick a tasting spoon into the double boiler and see if our sauce needed a little help.

The custard takes us to the only part of the recipe that heated the kitchen (assuming you boiled your gelatin water in the microwave): standing over a steaming double boiler for a few minutes. I have to admit that I doubted Mrs. Mary Martensen as the custard came to a close. Sure, it passed the finger-swipe test on a spoon, but it still seemed very thin and runny.

Setting aside our custard, it was time to beat our gelatin until frothy. I've never tried to make gelatin pretend to be whipped cream, but I kept an open mind. It turned into a foam, though it melted in the process. (Remember the room-temperature air that ruined our prune whip?) I re-refrigerated our gelatin and then beat it again to hopefully firm it up and make sure the bubbles wouldn't slowly break.

Now, we fold white into white!

Lastly, we add a surprisingly small amount of whipped cream. I couldn't help thinking over and over that this recipe is a lot of white mixed into white. Or if you prefer to get a bit sociological, it's a big fluffy cloud of showing off that you own an eggbeater and an icebox.

As I was double-checking the recipe, I noticed a helpful hint on the other side of the page:

Since I always like to make recipes exactly as written, I refrigerated our first custard and made another. This involved cracking out another two egg yolks, but I figured I would find a use for the whites soon enough. Besides, extra custard has never made a day worse.

After everything had spent the night in the refrigerator later, it was time to serve our hopefully delicious lemon sponge. It turned out I didn't fold in the cream quite as well as I thought. But I think I could get away with calling it visible strata instead of ineptitude.

So, as far as topping our sponge, Mrs. Mary Martensen's custard slid right off. I didn't mind with this recipe because that meant we had a lovely moat of custard at the bottom of the bowl. But it's nice to know in advance that I shouldn't use this recipe for any attempt at aesthetic drizzle.

Yes, I bought cherries just to put on top of this.

The other sauce, made to my great-grandmother's cousin's specifications, did a little better.

I liked this recipe a lot more than I expected to. It's light and airy, which makes it great in the summertime. (And since summer keeps getting longer and longer...) The custard gave it just enough substance without turning it into something rich and heavy. And the whole creation had just the right amount of lemony flavor to make it refreshing.

Sour Cream Cookies: I wouldn't bother if I were you

After so many successes, Mrs. Mary Martensen has let me down.

Sour Cream Cookies ¼ cup butter 1 cup sugar 2 eggs, beaten ½ tsp lemon juice 1 cup sour cream ½ tsp baking soda 3½ cups flour 1 tsp baking powder Heat oven to 400°. Have greased or parchment-lined baking sheets ready. Cream the butter, then thoroughly beat in the sugar. Mix in the eggs, lemon juice, and sour cream. Sift in the remaining dry ingredients. Roll one-fourth inch thick, sprinkle with sugar, and bake ten minutes. Makes sixty cookies. Mrs. Mary Martensen's Century of Progress Cook Book (recipes from The Chicago American), 1933, via The Internet Archive

I always keep sour cream on hand because it's nice in so many things, and my current container was getting close to expiring. And while one can throw out things that are at the end of their prime, aren't cookies better?

Mrs. Mary Martensen's Century of Progress Cook Book (recipes from The Chicago American), 1933

Mrs. Mary Martensen tells us to add the sugar and a couple of other things to the bowl all at once, but I could already tell that would end badly. After all, our small allotment of butter was still clinging to the sides of the bowl in hard clumps. So I instead beat in the sugar until the two were thoroughly mixed before introducing the remaining ingredients.

Ahhhh, clump free!

We are directed to add "eggs, well beaten." I decided that the eggs would be plenty well-beaten after I was done mixing them in.

And so, it was time to add in the sour cream. Bearing in mind the New England raisin drops, I also added some vanilla-- and also some salt because I think they had unsalted butter in 1933.

After mixing in the flour, I began to doubt Mrs. Mary Martensen. (She had already disappointed us with the cabbage au gratin. At the time I charitably decided that no one's perfect.) No one could take a rolling pin to this sticky mess and make it a quarter-inch thick. 

I thought that maybe like Maxine Menster's cookies, you're supposed to refrigerate the dough first. Perhaps an experienced cook would have known that just from reading the recipe and mentally adding up all the ingredients in their head. 

But because I am not that good, I had already preheated the oven and refused to waste the electricity. So I forgot about doing things properly and thoroughly coated the mass of dough in flour to keep it from sticking. After that, I didn't need a rolling pin. I only had to pat it out with my fingers.

I was surprised at how nice and neat these cookies looked. My success felt like cheating fate.

I feared that these would melt into dough puddles, but instead they became adorable little poufs.

I tasted these and was immediately glad I halved the recipe. They're... not good. They have a perfect texture, but they taste like nothing. They're not merely bland. They taste empty. There is no absence of subtle flavor. Instead, there is no flavor. They weren't even sweet- the sugar somehow dissipated along with everything else. The dough had been promising, but all the life in the cookies got cooked out.

I guess it's nice that I cleaned out the fridge and avoided the temptation of excessive calories. Really, this recipe confounds me. The texture is perfect, but they're so depressing. These cookies are what Maxine Menster's are glad they ain't.

Second-Stab Saturday: Mushrooms will never be fish

We got shiitake mushrooms with the most beautiful emblem on top!

Isn't that 50% off sticker a work of art? I've never had shiitake mushrooms before. I always got the impression that shiitakes were, like, designer mushrooms. Or at least, they're like designer mushrooms if most of the cars in your supermarket parking lot were purchased used.

When I got the shiitakes out of the box, they felt limper and spongier than the ones I usually get. They also looked stringier. I don't know if shiitakes are supposed to be like that, or if this is why they were half price. Either way, I decided to cook them before they had a chance to expire and then let them wait until I figured out what to make of them.

Obviously, I couldn't help tasting them right out of the frying pan to see if they're as magically special as their non-discount price suggests. And... they're more intense and savory than the cheaper mushrooms I've always gotten heretofore. They almost tasted like I'd added soy sauce. They didn't taste dramatically different, but they somehow were mushroomier.

This brings us to the recipe I used them in: Mrs. Mary Martensen's fish pie. Remember how I said "Imagine this with mushrooms"?

Mrs. Mary Martensen's Century of Progress Cook Book (recipes from The Chicago American), 1933

First, we had to make our lovely potato nest. 

I don't use the pressure cooker as much as I thought I would, but it's great for steaming potatoes-- especially when your recipe won't forgive them getting a little bit dried out as the microwave tends to do. This time, our rack tipped off its little improvised stand (an empty tomato paste can with both ends removed). Nevertheless, our spuds remained safely above the danger of getting sogged.

I know I said this last time, but I have to once again note that Mrs. Mary Martensen uses a lot of parsley in the gravy. And yes, today we're using premade gravy. It came on the side of some recent drive-thru chicken.

The pie nearly spilled out of the pan, but we got it into the oven with no sloshing whatsoever.

I wanted to write that despite the original recipe's high baking temperature, you can bake this at 350° (gas mark 4, 180°C) if you want to slide it next to something else in the oven-- or if you're trying not to abuse the air conditioning in the summer. Unlike tater tots or a frozen pizza, nothing about this seems like it needs to bake in an extra-hot oven. But I was unable to test that because the oven got commandeered for one of those frozen dinner-tray things that bakes at 450°. That's gas mark 8 or 230°C--- substantially hotter than the recipe's original oven by any measuring system. The pie didn't seem to mind.

I didn't think a pan of cheese and gravy could be so precisely calibrated for a specific ingredient, but this really tasted like it should contain fish. And while the scant pint gravy was right for the original recipe, it was far too much for the mushrooms.

I don't mind that it was a sloppy mess on the plate (some of the best foods are), but it's more of a casserole than a pie. The potatoes, in addition to making this better simply by being potatoes, did make our pan a lot easier to clean. None of the gravy or mushrooms made contact long enough to get burnt and stuck on. 

The mushrooms weren't bad in this, but it wasn't the best way to appreciate them. If I make this again (and I have a feeling I will), I will cut the gravy in half and omit the parsley. We already know that mushrooms and gravy go together like cranberry sauce and celery.

Apple Brown Betty: Best served outdoors

Don't tell anyone I made this just to get rid of the breadcrumbs in the freezer.

Apple Brown Betty 4 cups breadcrumbs 4 cups sliced apples ½ cup brown sugar ½ cup white sugar ½ tsp nutmeg 1 tsp cinnamon ½ tsp salt (if butter is unsalted) ½ to 1 cup water Juice and rind of ½ lemon Heat oven to 350°. Grease a large casserole pan. Mix the sugars, spices, and salt (if using). Sprinkle a third of the crumbs into the pan. Place half the apples on top, then sprinkle with half the sugar. Dot with a third of the butter. Repeat these layers, dotting again with butter. Sprinkle the last of the crumbs on top, then dot with the last of the butter. Pour in enough water to come almost up to the top. Drizzle with the lemon juice and rind. Cover the pan with foil (or a lid if you have one) and bake 45 minutes. Uncover the pan after the first 25 minutes. Serve warm with whipped cream, hard sauce (see recipe here), or lemon sauce. Mrs. Mary Martensen's Century of Progress Cook Book (recipes from The Chicago American), 1933, via The Internet Archive

Mrs. Mary Martensen's Century of Progress Cook Book (recipes from The Chicago American), 1933

Because I hate waste, I've been saving all of the bread that goes stale, letting it harden overnight in the refrigerator, pulverizing it in the food processor, and then dutifully freezing the resulting crumbs. Unfortunately, I had no idea what I was saving all these lovely breadcrumbs for. We don't deep-fry a lot of things here, nor do we make innumerable casseroles that want crumbs on top. You can see why I might make a recipe uses a lot of crumbs.

Brown Betty seemed perfect for the weather. We're in that time of year when the temperature oscillates between late autumn and early summer from one day to the next. You go to bed with an extra blanket (there's no point in running the furnace for a single night), and you wake up gasping in sweat and flinging all the bedclothes to the floor. The next night, you go to sleep with the fan aimed right at you and wake up in shivers. (I also thought the leftovers would pass for a decent breakfast in the same way that extra pie does in the holiday season.)

Yes, we used an orange instead of a lemon. It's always more economical to use what you have in the house.

I have hazy memories of liking brown Betty on camping trips. (Yes, there was a time when I went camping, though it wasn't necessarily my choice.) When told this to some friends while slicing the apples, no one believed I ever went camping. One of them said "I would pay to see you camp." To this I replied that he didn't have the money to pay me enough. (I swore at age fourteen that I would never be more than five minutes on foot from a hot shower and a toilet that flushes.)

Even when cooking in the great indoors, I can see why someone might have made this when Mrs. Mary Martensen's book came out. This dessert is made for cooking on a Depression-era budget. After all, the main ingredients are stale bread, water, and apples. 

After trying this, I could see why I liked it when camping. It's the perfect carb hit for the end of a long day of swatting mosquitos in the great outdoors. And it's really easy to slap together when your "kitchen" is a wobbly picnic table and you have nowhere to wash dishes. But as much as I liked brown betty when it was served out of a cast iron Dutch oven that had been sitting in the campfire (or at least I think I liked it), it wasn't as nice in the house. It tastes like apple pie filling and breadcrumbs. It's not bad. But it is exactly what went into it and nothing more. 

Going back to how perfect this is for a 1930s budget (and quite possibly a 2020s one), I will note that this is very filling. And with a Depression on, going to bed full is worth a lot of money. 

Prune-Pecan Soufflé: It's better than you think

Spring is here, strawberries are in season, and we are stewing prunes!

Pecan-Prune Souffle 1 (8-oz) package prunes 3 egg whites Pinch of salt ⅓ cup granulated sugar ½ teaspoon cinnamon ½ teaspoon vanilla ⅔ cup coarsely ground pecans Cook the prunes in simmering water until very soft. Depending on the prunes, this can take anywhere from five to thirty minutes. When they're done, coarsely chop them in a food processor or hand-cranked grinder. Place in a large mixing bowl and set aside. Heat oven to 325°. Grease a souffle dish (I used the insert from a rice cooker). Beat the egg whites and salt until stiff peaks form. Continue beating while you gradually sprinkle in the sugar. Beat until the whites are glossy and the sugar is dissolved. Fold the egg whites into the prunes in two or three additions. Then fold in the cinnamon, vanilla and nuts. Turn into the dish. Bake 20 to 30 minutes. Serve at once with whipped cream, hard sauce (see below) or a custard sauce made with the egg yolks. For extra presentation, place in sherbet glasses and top each portion with a pecan half. Serves six to eight. Miss Mary Crow, 511 5th ave, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania; Philadelphia Inquirer Recipe Exchange; November 8, 1935; page 14

Hard Sauce ¼ cup butter 1 tsp. vanilla ½ tsp. lemon extract ⅛ tsp. salt 1 tbsp. boiling water About 1¼ cups sifted powdered sugar Cream butter, beating until very soft and light. Stir in the vanilla, lemon extract, salt, and water. (They won't quite incorporate yet, but get them as mixed as possible.) Beat in the powdered sugar a little at a time until you have a very thick mixture. (You basically are making buttercream icing that is too firm to spread on a cake.) Transfer to a plate and shape into a flat patty. Refrigerate at least half an hour. When serving, cut in thin slices and place on top of warm pudding. Mrs. Mary Martensen's Century of Progress Cook Book (recipes from The Chicago American), 1933, via The Internet Archive

Recipe Exchange; Philadelphia Inquirer; November 8, 1935

Mrs. Mary Martensen's Century of Progress Cook Book (recipes from The Chicago American), 1933

Now that we can buy cheap out-of-season produce (or at least, it was cheap-ish before the war), we have more or less forgotten how to turn dried fruit into lovely things. Sure, we still have a few recipes like oatmeal-raisin cookies. But given where global events are headed, we might want to collectively relearn how to expressively use dried fruits. Our half-century run of December blueberries may have been bombed to a halt.

So we meet again: boiled prunes!

At first I thought ramming wet prunes through a meat grinder would only yield a drippy mess on the floor. But (short of getting out and subsequently cleaning the food processor) I couldn't think of any other way. Would you want stewed prunes slithering all over a cutting board?

Just like last time, this step of our prune whip actually looked kind of pretty. I loved the contrast between the dark, shiny fruit pulp and the pure white meringue. I may make a prune pavlova next time the holiday season rolls around. As long as no one asks what's in it until after they've tried it, I think everyone would like it.

As I knew would happen, our beautiful study in color contrast turned into a sand-colored mess with brown stringy bits.

And now we get to our other featured ingredient: pecans! Miss Mary Crow thought we should use walnuts, but I am allergic to them. Walnuts make me break out in rants.

Our sample spoonful tasted a lot better than I expected. Our last prune whip was underwhelming and bland, but this was actually good. Unfortunately, it was about as ugly as the applesauce-date mallow.

The last time we made a souffle, we had to use the insert from a rice cooker. But these days, with a full complement of pans crammed into the cabinets, we were able to select the perfect baking dish for this. It was... wait for it... the insert from the rice cooker.

I made sure our souffle would have plenty of room to rise in its pan. No one wants to clean burnt prunes off the oven floor. (Also, I don't want to break my 7-month streak of not having to take down the kitchen smoke detector.) This souffle barely puffed up, which hopefully meant it wouldn't dramatically shrink.

Don't you love when your dessert matches the table?

Next, it was time to put on the "hard sauce," which apparently is a booze-free brandy butter. In other words, it's buttercream frosting that is too thick to smear onto a cake. 

I borrowed a recipe from our favorite World's Fair giveaway book, Mrs. Mary Martensen's Recipes. She says "The exact amount of sugar cannot be stated, but the sauce must be stiff enough to stand alone." So I added enough to make our tiny little mound of butter hold up a spoon.

Our hard sauce tasted like very lemony buttercream, and was delicious as it melted and soaked into the prunes.

The prune souffle tasted unexpectedly like oatmeal-raisin cookie dough. I shouldn't be too surprised. Prunes taste a lot like oversized raisins, and the pecans and cinnamon completed the flavor.

As an afternote, I put the leftovers in the refrigerator overnight. (We do not have "six to eight persons" eager for prunes.) By the next day, the souffle had shrunk to a little prune puck. 

It's a little hard to appreciate the shrinkage, so let's add a dinner fork for scale.

So if you want to make your prunes serve six to eight, you probably shouldn't make this ahead.