Fear and Loathing of the Suburban Summer; and Oil Slick Lemonade

Oil Slick Lemonade (front); and my beloved woodpile (rear).
I miss winter.

I have always maintained that people with my complexion were never intended to live in this sort of climate.

In fact, I've come to feel (usually on particularly hot days as I sit in a miserable puddle in front of a fan) that my enterprising ancestors who first came from England to Australia were spitting in the face of thousands of years of evolution. And as for the Norwegians - they must have been completely barking mad.

Early European colonists in Australia formed Acclimatisation Societies. These were not, as you might assume, groups of sunburnt Europeans sharing tips on dealing with 40 degree summers. Rather, they were focused on building a replica of European society out here in the sticks. Their main method for achieving this was the import of every non-native plant and animal species imaginable, regardless of how poorly it was suited to the environment (for example, partridges) or what would happen if it turned out to be very, very well suited to the environment (for example, rabbits).

Humans also seem to fall into these two broad categories: those who wither in Australian conditions, and those who thrive. Needless to say, I am firmly in the 'partridge' category.

Pathetic pale specimens such as myself have been moaning about the heat since we arrived.

An early example is in an 1804 letter to the editor, in which "A Regular Passenger" begs local ferries to put up awnings:

"The intense heat of the sun increased by the reflection of its rays, to which with my fellow-passengers I was for several hours exposed, was as may readily be conceived, almost utterly insupportable."

To the Printer of the Sydney Gazette. (1804, January 8). The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1803 - 1842), p. 3. Retrieved October 3, 2015, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article625964

The Colonial era whinge which most spoke to my wretched summer condition is from 1860. Here it is in all its put-upon glory:

THE RECENT HEAT.  

"There be some sports are painful," as Shakspeare says.  

We have heard, for instance, of men so devoted to science as to test newly discovered poisons on themselves in order to be able, the more accurately to note down all the symptoms which such noxious agent are capable of producing.  

In the same manner there may have been amongst our numerous readers some qualified persons who, during the late visitation of heat, employed themselves, whilst the rest of the colonists were stupified by a sort of general sunstroke, in watching the meteorological changes which took place. If any there were who thus devoted themselves to turning the public calamity to the best account we shall be glad to publish a brief statement of the results which they arrived at, for at present we have nothing like a satis- factory record of various peculiarities which marked the progress of the late eventful Saturday.  

That the excessive heat destroyed large quantities of fruit and injured many valuable trees, besides, in numerous instances, causing sickness and sudden death, we have unfortunately abundant evidence. The temporary sufferings of persons otherwise in good health appear also to have been un- usually great— so much so, indeed, that the letters of some of our correspondents from the towns in the north look like the histories of places smitten with the plague, so utterly was business suspended and exertion made impos- sible.  

The people of Gawler especially seem to have caught the very worst of the hot blast which swept over the colony. The thermo- meter there rose to 123° in the shade, and the astonished inhabitants were in a plight not much better than that of the Ancient Mariner and his companions— ' And every tongee, through utter drought, Was withered at the root; We could not speak no more than if We had been choked with soot'

THE RECENT HEAT. (1860, January 25). South Australian Register (Adelaide, SA : 1839 - 1900), p. 2. Retrieved October 3, 2015, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article49895555

So, Cookery Friends, what comforts are there for an English-Norwegian partridge facing yet another blistering Australian summer? Aside from air-conditioning, that is.

Well, summer is prime rice-paper roll season, which is certainly something to get excited about. There are also increased opportunities for barbequing - although this can be done just about year round in our relentlessly warm and dry climate. For me, the real culinary joy of summer is cooling drinks, and I've found a colonial era recipe writer who agrees with me.

The Age's 1860 food writer is that person:

Recipes for Cooling Summer Drinks.— Cream of tartar one ounce, three quarters of a pound of lump sugar, or less of moist, half the rind of a lemon, cut thin, one gallon of boiling water poured on it. When cold it is fit to drink. Corked and bottled it will keep three days. Any flavoring can be added.

(1860, March 10). The Age (Melbourne, Vic. : 1854 - 1954), p. 6. Retrieved December 27, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article154880139

A cooling summer drink. Aaaah!

Take note, this lemonade isn't fizzy, the way we would expect it to be today. The citrus oil from the lemon peel creates a beautiful pattern of refracting swirls in each glass, and a slightly slippery mouth feel. Imagine sending your tongue careering down an ice-covered Slip'n'Slide.

Oil Slick Lemonade

Makes four large tumblers of lemonade.

7g (2 ½ teaspoons) cream of tartar
80g (3 ounces) sugar
½ the rind of a lemon, cut thin
1.1l (2 pints) boiling water

5 minutes of effort, and then waiting for it to cool down (about an hour on a hot day).

Combine cream of tartar, sugar and lemon rind in a heat-proof bowl or a saucepan. Pour over the boiling water, stirring to dissolve the sugar. It will only take a minute, as the boiling water will do most of the work for you. Allow to cool.

If you like, add ¼ teaspoon of any essence (eg. coconut, almond, or lemon) to the whole batch, or a couple of drops to each glass.

It keeps well in the fridge overnight, but will need to be stirred well before serving.

Cookery friends - what is your favourite season? Which foods help you cope with bad weather?

Australia's Love Affair with Beef; and a Topical Recipe

Beef Braised in Vinegar (recipe below)

I have an ambiguous relationship with beef. I know, I know - for an Australian, that's like saying I've never really been keen on oxygen. But it's the truth.

For some reason, my family were avid lamb consumers with a strong sideline in pork and chicken, while beef was often left languishing at the butchers. After an unfortunate stint as a vegetarian (no offence, vegetarian friends!), I found myself further plunged into an even more unpleasant stint as a genuinely poor person to whom meat was a luxury. The upshot of this is that I only learned to cook a steak this year. Grim indeed.

I feel the nation's love affair with beef can best be seen in the slightly forlorn advertising campaigns of its two competitors: pork and lamb.




Please eat our pigs. Our lean, lean pigs. Not that nasty, fatty beef. Please!

Image from http://www.pork.com.au./

We love our lamb. Really!

Image from http://www.youneverlambalone.com.au/

If you're the scientifically-minded type that prefers hard data, this table shows the amount of each meat the average Australian puts away each year. (On a related note, I think the average Australian might need to cut down.)

As you can probably tell from the darker 'chicken' line, this data is from the Auustralian Chicken Meat Federation. Beef consumption is still a lot more than that of its direct rivals, pork and lamb. I have no idea why. Has no one else in Australia tasted pork crackling?

This graph is interactive, by the way. You can play with the original over at http://www.chicken.org.au/page.php?id=4

The population of Australia was actually engineered to be fairly carnivorous. Early Australian activist and social engineer Caroline Chisolm used the promise of three meat meals a day to lure settlers over, making us a self-selecting sample of steak eaters.

The popularity of beef can also be seen in the fact that it is the second largest category of Colonial main meals I have collected (behind vegetarian, strangely enough). Admittedly, my spreadsheet of recipes is drawn from newspaper archives and selected on the basis of what I might conceivably get a family member to taste test for me. But I think it's safe to say that beef was darn popular in the Colonial era too.

That brings us to today's recipe. Despite a rather Italian ingredient list including garlic, onion and bay leaves, this end result is thoroughly English. Thankfully it still went well with polenta and sautéed green beans.

Will this recipe convert vegetarians? Possibly not. But it will make a perfectly acceptable weeknight meal, even for the beef sceptics among us.

Here is the original recipe from 1866, which appears to quote a cooking class lost to the mists of time (perhaps this one in New York?):

BEEF WITH VINEGAR. - For this, a piece of almost any kind of beef that is tender, and has little or no bone, may be used. The piece used for this lesson weighed two and a half pounds, and was nicely tied, put in a pan with four tablespoonfuls of fat, the same of broth fro the "Alphabet Kettle", and fried upon all sides until slightly brown, but not cooked. The broth and fat were then poured off, and a gill and a half of vinegar added, also two cloves, two bay leaves, one stalk of thyme, one onion, and one clove of garlic. After being fried in these seasonings for a few moments, a little over a quart of broth from the "Alphabet Kettle" was added, and the whole left to gently simmer for an hour; at the expiration of which time the meat was placed on a plate in which it was to be served, and the sauce after being thickened with flour and water was strained over it.

Recipes. (1866, June 16). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), p. 6. Retrieved April 16, 2015, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article138047302

Beef Braised in Vinegar

Ingredients
600g stewing steak, or other bone-free cut of beef
2 tablespoons oil
550ml stock, divided
100ml vinegar
2 cloves
2 bay leaves
1 stalk thyme
1 onion
1 clove of garlic
1 tablespoon flour (optional)

Cooking Time
1 1/2 hours

Yield
Serves 4 for dinner, with a vegetable and carb side

Method
Heat 600ml of stock in a small saucepan.
On a moderate stove, heat a large saucepan or a casserole dish with a heavy base.
Add the oil, and sear the beef on all sides.
Remove the beef, and sit it on a plate.
Tip off the oil.
Add a dash of stock from the smaller saucepan to deglaze the large one.
Add the vinegar, cloves, bay leaves, thyme, onion and garlic. Stir well, and cook for a minute until aromatic.
Put the beef back into the large saucepan, and add the rest of the stock.
Simmer for an hour, with the lid on. Add a dash of boiling water if necessary.
When cooked, the beef should be tender and in an aromatic sauce.
Remove the meat, and set it aside while you finish the sauce. (Don't worry - it will only take a minute or two so your meat won't get cold).
Strain the onion and other seasonings out of the sauce. They have done their dash.
Thicken the sauce either by sprinkling in a tablespoon of flour, and stirring vigorously until there are no lumps; or by reducing the sauce at a roaring boil until it is the desired consistency.
Season the sauce with salt and pepper before pouring it over your beef to serve.

Cookery friends, which is your favourite meat? Is it the same as your nation's?

Orgeat: The Scourge of the Cocktail World

Home-made milk Orgeat, with a dash of cinnamon.

Orgeat, an almond-based liqueur, is a source of much consternation in the cocktail world.

It is apparently essential (as the basis of the Mai Thai), but at the same time jolly hard to get a hold of. It lurks at the back of cocktail cabinets. Even bartenders mispronounce it (it's pronounced Or-ZHAT, apparently).

Wild Colonial Grandma, currently enduring a cold with all the grace of the usually healthy, declared it too rich. My wife reacted to a sip with an involuntary shudder and the dark verdict that it was for "the rice pudding set". My toddler literally ran screaming.

It seems that everywhere Orgeat goes it causes trouble, my home being no exception. But despite all this, I'm going to tell you to make it. And what's more, I'm going to tell you to make this particular recipe despite the fact that its inclusion of milk makes it a fringe oddity in the Orgeat family, and renders it not terribly good for keeping.

The recipe at hand is from an 1866 edition of The Australasian, but has much older pedigree. It is closely modelled (cough *plagiarised* cough) on Maria Eliza Rundell's 1808 recipe from her recipe book A New System of Domestic Cookery. This throws us back beyond the Victorian modernism that characterised most of the Colonial era, into the murky depths of the Georgian era and its lingering Medieval influence.

The early origins of this drink saturate the experience of consuming it. With the smooth texture of a creamy winter soup, but the jangling tastes of sweet almonds and spirits, this vintage Orgeat is a delightful oddity.



My Virgin Japanese Cocktail, made with milk Orgeat.

You can drink this home-made version neat, unlike its modern commercial counterpart. Though interesting on the palate it is also mild, and well suited  to being enjoyed in a cocktail glass with a stark dash of freshly ground cinnamon.

Orgeat is also the basis of the Japanese Cocktail, an 1862 invention credited as being one of the earliest modern cocktails. You can read more about its potentially scandalous origins, along with a recipe here. Scroll down for my recipe for a Virgin Japanese Cocktail.

Finally, here are a few serving suggestions straight from Australian Colonial era newspapers:

The Warragul Guardian and Buln Buln and Narracan Shire Advocate suggests in 1886 that Orgeat need only be diluted with ice water.

In 1924, with the world in the grip of the cocktail craze, the Adelaide Advertiser suggests the recipe of 1 measure Orgeat to 3 measures iced seltzer, and decorated with a slice of peach, pineapple or apricot. Exotic!



Orgeat a la Warragul Guardian and Buln Buln and Narracan Shire Advocate.

Here is the original recipe:

ORGEAT.-Boil a stick of cinnamon in a quart of new milk, sweeten to taste with loaf sugar; let it stand till cold; then take 3oz. of Jordan almonds ,and twenty bitter almonds, blanch them, and beat them to a paste with a little water; pour the milk to   these by degrees, well stirring as you proceed; then boil all together, continuing to stir the whole, till it is cold, adding half a glass of brandy.

Recipes. (1866, September 22). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), p. 5. Retrieved July 27, 2015, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article138049214

Orgeat in the pan.

Pre-Modern Orgeat

Ingredients
1 stick cinnamon
600ml milk
¼ cup castor sugar
60g almond meal
¼ teaspoon almond essence
¼ teaspoon brandy essence

Cooking Time
1 hour, largely spent waiting for it to cool (twice)

Yield
Enough for 10 cocktails

Method

Combine the cinnamon, milk and sugar in a saucepan.
Bring to the boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar.
In a large bowl, with plenty of stirring room, beat the almonds with 1 tablespoon of water until they form a paste.
Add the almond essence to the almond paste.
Gradually add the cooled milk, stirring continuously to avoid lumps. If lumps simply will not be avoided, keep stirring vigorously until you have banished them.
Pour the mixture back into the saucepan, and bring once again to the boil.
When cool, mix in the brandy essence.
You're now ready to make any of the cocktails described above or...

My Virgin Japanese Cocktail

Mix 1 part home-made Orgeat with 3 parts Lemon, Lime and Bitters. Stir to combine, and then pour into a large tumbler. Top with tropical fruit and a jaunty umbrella. If you don't have a shot measure, I've found the cap of a baby bottle works well and is about the same volume. You're welcome.

Orgeat mocktails as far as the eye can see.

Cookery friends, what do you think of this divisive drink? What was your favourite cocktail?

Orange Sponge (of the Jelly Persuasion)

Oh, Colonial jelly!

Cookery friends, we are not talking sponge cake here. We are talking Colonial era jelly, in all of its bizarre, wobbly glory.  

Those of you who have read my post on flummery will be well aware of my fascination with historical jellies. Their simultaneous firmness and jiggliness; their utter absence from the modern cookery cannon; the sheer variety of things you can find in your kitchen and then, it transpires, turn to jelly with the addition of gelatine powder.

The taste of Orange Sponge is absolutely identical to that of orange-flavoured Aeroplane Jelly – so much so, that my wife commented, “So this is what they based it on, then.” While I doubt that Bert Appleroth, the splendidly-named creator of Aeroplane Jelly, was poring over 1866 recipe pages in the 1910s when he brewed the first batch in his bathtub,  the similarity in flavour really is uncanny.

For those of you not from Australia who are wondering about Aeroplane Jelly, it is a much-beloved Australian brand that has for years enjoyed a monopoly in its field. We love a good corporate monopoly in Australia, particularly if it has a catchy theme song.

 

What, then, is the point of making this recipe when you can get the same flavour in a little white bag from Woolworths for 99c?

Well, cookery friends, this one is all about the texture. This dessert is whipped just before it fully sets, which creates the impression of a dish frozen in the middle of violent action. Like a geyser with a pause button, the Orange Sponge looks like it will froth over the edges of its mould at any moment.

To turn this dessert from a zany weeknight novelty into the sophisticated belle of your dinner party ball, all you need to do it turn it out onto a plate, whack a lone piece of orange peel artfully on top, and avoid jiggling it suggestively as you place it in front of your guests.

Formal jelly. So fancy!

Here is the original recipe:

ORANGE SPONGE.- To 1oz. of isinglass, dissolved in a point of boiling water and strained, add the juice of six oranges and two lemons, 1/2lb. of sugar, and 1oz. of flour, sifted fine. Mix all well together, and when nearly cold whip it till it becomes a sponge; then put it into a mould. If whipped too warm it will turn to a jelly. It is better to make it a day before you use it.  

Recipes. (1866, September 8). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), p. 5. Retrieved March 7, 2015, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article138048952
 

Holy bubbly jelly, Batman!

"It's About to Escape" Orange Sponge

Ingredients

Aprox. 6 teaspoons of gelatin powder (this might seem like overkill, but you are waging a mighty fight against all the acidity in the citrus juice)
450ml boiling water
6 oranges, juiced OR 350ml orange juice
2 lemons, juiced OR 150ml lemon juice
225g sugar
30g flour

Cooking Time

1 hour, including cooling time (more if you need to readjust the amount of gelatin to get the darn thing to set - if I'm going to be honest, I was mucking about with mine on and off for about three hours).

Yield

6 huge portions (see photo below), or 12 sensible portions

Method

Mix all ingredients together. Stir until the sugar has dissolved and the gelatin is no longer clumping.
If you enjoy jellies that are clear and smooth, strain the mixture at this point to remove pith, the odd seed, and the possible small rouge lump of gelatin.
Allow the mixture to cool until it looks like the blob – in one piece but very, very goopy.
If it hasn't even begun to set after half an hour, add another 2 teaspoons of gelatin, dissolved in 1/4 cup of water.  
Beat until it has doubled in size.
Gently decant into whatever mould or moulds in which you intend to set it.
Keeps for a couple of days in the fridge, if you live in the sort of household where products containing sugar have a chance to sit around unmolested.

To the left, you can see the pointing finger of my indignant toddler, who has just noticed that I've used her little bowls as recipe-testing ramekins.

So, cookery friends, what is your favourite jelly-based desert? What strange things have you used as jelly moulds or ramekins?

Candied Ginger: A Tale of Orientalism, Isolation and Recipe!Fail

Let me begin by saying that Colonial Australia was as racist as Donald Trump singing "Kung Fu Fighting" while wearing blackface.

As a society, we were steeped in the fascinated revulsion with other societies that Edward Said would later describe as "Orientalism": a loathing of the 'other' coupled with an adoration of the fashionably exotic. (If you want to read more about this concept, you can do so here, here or here - where people have more time to write eloquently about theory and are presumably not being pestered by a toddler to peel in succession every piece of fruit in the fruit bowl).

In any case, the Colonial Australian attitude to China can be fairly summed up in the following two images.

Chinese people are scary, slimy monsters. With claws.




The caption of the original cartoon reads, "Hi Yah! Me teachee you. Plenty muchee." I could not make this up.

[No heading]. (1896, July 16). Quiz and the Lantern (Adelaide, SA : 1890 - 1900), p. 9. Retrieved September 9, 2015, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-page19469619

Chinese culture (when used by other white people in ways we're comfortable with) is sooo pretty! And exotic! Oooh, a vase!

From the original article: "Its shape is that of an Oriental water bottle or Carafe".

THE DORE VASE. (1893, December 30). The Bacchus Marsh Express (Vic. : 1866 - 1918), p. 1. Retrieved September 9, 2015, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article88191994

So what does any of this have to do with cooking?

Well, despite the fact that Colonial Australia was home to many migrants from all over Asia, including many Chinese cooks, Chinese recipes were not a common part of cooking columns in newspapers.

This made it all the more surprising when I came across a letter from a woman calling herself Hebe (the Greek goddess associated with youth), asking to be initiated "into that Oriental mystery" of making preserved ginger.

Sir, - I have for along time to get a recipe for making preserved ginger. I never thought of writing to you; neither, after   being advised by a friend, did I care to trouble you about such an insignificant thing, but hav- ing utterly failed in my endeavours to find it out myself, I now appeal to you. My great difficulty has been to make the ginger swell,   and if you would be so kind as to initiate me and all your lady friends into that Ori- entail mystery, you will greatly oblige

Aug. 10 HEBE

PRESERVED GINGER. (1868, August 22). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), p. 25. Retrieved December 14, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article138057871

What struck me most about this letter - aside from a hint towards the deep current of Orientalism in Australian society - was how frustrating and lonely life must have been in the pre-internet age for people whose intellectual curiosity could not be satisfied by their immediate social circle.

I am just old enough to remember the tail-end of this era myself, and how thrilled I was when I realised that I could answer almost any question within seconds using the internet. This excitement arose even though I had been lucky, and my mother (the town librarian) had also put together a large and meticulously organised library in our home.

Despite the fact that Australian society, even in the Colonial era, was largely urban, I think that it still would have been possible to feel isolated in the middle of early Melbourne or Sydney, if you had a question about ginger that nobody could answer for you.

Well, cookery friends, we live in an era where questions can be answered, and I am here to answer the question that is no doubt on your lips by this point: "Did the recipe work?"

Things were initially looking good. My wife, who doesn't like candied ginger, cruised past the jar and said darkly that they looked exactly like the ones from the shop. For a few days, I left the jar on the bench, and snacked on these little bites of gingery goodness as I went about my day.

But after about a week, I noticed something ominous. The ginger was changing colour, and a pool of sugar syrup was gathering in the bottom of the jar. As the old saying goes, with this recipe I managed to snatch failure from the jaws of success. My candied ginger looked and tasted great, but unfortunately didn't keep very well. Which, for a preserve, presents a fairly fundamental problem.

I'm going to give you the recipe as I made it anyway, because if I'd known they weren't going to keep I would have cheerfully eaten the whole tray of these hot, sweet little bundles of sugar on the day. Modern recipes that may prove more fruitful can be found here, here and here.

It all looked so promising at this stage.

Here is the original recipe from the editorial team of The Australasian:

[Green ginger is far the best, and ought to be used for this purpose, but if not to be had simmer the required quantity of dry ginger until tender; then put it to soak for a while in cold water. When quite soft take it out and drain thoroughly. When dry, take sugar of good quality, or better still sugar candy, of equal weight; melt slowly over the fire, and add the ginger before the sugar is too hot.

Then simmer slowly until the sugar has quite penetrated the ginger. With green ginger the process is simple, but great care must be used to make a good preserve with dry ginger.] ED.

 

PRESERVED GINGER. (1868, August 22). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), p. 25. Retrieved December 14, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article138057871

There may have been some wastage in my approach to cutting ginger into 1cm chunks.

 

 

"Oriental Mystery" Preserved Ginger

 

Ingredients
Fresh ginger, cut into 1cm chunks
An equal weight in white sugar
1/4 the weight in water (for water, millilitres and grams are the same)

Cooking Time
1 1/2 hours

Yield
This depends on how much ginger you use.

Method
Slice the ginger, and pat it dry.
Dissolve the sugar in water over a low heat, until the sugar crystals are completely dissolved but the mixture is not yet very hot.
Add the ginger, and bring the mixture to a gentle simmer.
Cook until the sugar syrup has thoroughly soaked into the ginger. This takes about an hour. The syrup will have almost completely dissolved (it will coat the ginger as it cools). If you’re unsure, take out a thicker piece of ginger and cut it in half – it should be dark and glossy all the way through. If there is a lighter bit in the middle it’s not done yet. It should also taste slightly sweet all the way through when done.
Allow the ginger to cool a little in the pot, until the syrup is starting to clump around the pieces.
Tip it all out onto a lined baking tray or chopping board, and separate the pieces quickly using two forks (or your fingers, if you have asbestos fingers)
The ginger is significantly stronger and hotter than modern crystallised ginger.  

A complete waste of a good jar.

So in summary, Australia has always had a problem with racism; life was rough for the intellectually curious before the advent of the internet; and the "oriental mystery" of preserving ginger still eludes me.

What is your experience of Orientalism, cookery friends? Have you had any success with preserved ginger?

Madras Curry, and What it Means to be 'Authentic'

 

‘Authentic’ is a one of those words that’s thrown around a lot, but is surprisingly tricky to pin down. We want our recipes and restaurants to be authentic, in part I think because it demonstrates that we are discerning, educated consumers of food. We don’t often give much thought to the concept of authenticity because, to paraphrase United States Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart's famous quote about pornography, “we know it when we see it”.

But authenticity is a bit more slippery than that. It depends on culture – the culture of the person making the judgement, and the culture of the period and place they are comparing the item to. This might sound like I’m flinging us into the murky waters of complete subjectivity, but really I’m just asking for a bit of pedantry: be specific. An authentic bolognaise in Australia (real parmesan cheese!) might be somewhat different to that in Bologna.

With all that in mind, if I told you that today’s recipe was for Madras curry, which is a hot red curry which has its origins in the 1600s in the city of Madras in India, the word “authentic” would no doubt spring to mind. But what about if I told you that it was a recipe for a curry that was probably a British-Indian dish – and what’s more it evolved in Britain rather than India? Your enthusiasm might dim a bit, as the words ‘derivative’ and ‘authentic’ don’t sit comfortably together in our modern conception of food.

As a17th century Indian curry, Madras probably isn’t authentic. But as a British-Indian dish, Madras curry is a genuine cultural artefact.  British-Indian cuisine has been around for over 400 years, which for comparative purposes is as long as the Italians have been using tomatoes, and twice as long as European settlers have been living in Australia.

The popularity of Madras curry in Australia can be attested to by the fact that, to this day, you can purchase both curry powder and Madras curry powder from iconic brand Clive of India in Australian supermarkets. If you live in a country without the lingering supermarket-selection influence of the British Empire, you can make your own Madras curry powder by using one of these recipes.

This particular recipe produces a slightly tart curry of moderate heat. If you would like to try it but prefer a milder curry, you can slather it with yogurt, which is my wife’s go-to method of eating curry.

Here is the original 1896 recipe:

MADRAS DRY CURRY.—Cut 1lb. of meat into small pieces, slice one onion and fry it in butter to a light brown, then add one table - spoonful of Madras curry powder, one teacup- ful of water, one breakfastcupful of gravy, the juice of one lemon, and a little salt; stew all together till nearly dry, and send it up quite hot.    

RECIPES. (1869, March 6). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), p. 7.

Ingredients

450g of beef

1 large onion, sliced finely
2 t butter to fry
1T Madras curry powder
500ml stock
Juice of 1 lemon (4T)
Pinch of salt
 

Cooking Time

40 minutes. Put the rice cooker on 10 minutes in if you’d like some rice on the side (and who wouldn’t?)

 

Yield

2 hearty serves, with rice and veg
 

Method

Cut the meat into 1 inch cubes.

Melt the butter in a fryingpan, and when it begins to bubble add the sliced onion and beef.

Fry until both are light brown.

Add the madras curry powder, and stir it for a minute until aromatic. If you’re worried about burning it, you can take the pan off the stove for this step. (Burnt curry powder will go bitter. Now that I’ve said that, you’re probably worried about burning it, even if you weren’t beforehand. Sorry.)

Add the stock, lemon juice and salt, and stir to remove the fond from the pan. The fond it’s the delicious crispy bits of flavour that have stuck to the base of your pan. Unless you’re using a non-stick pan, in which case you’re seriously missing out.

Cook, stirring regularly, until the sauce has almost evaporated, and has stuck to the beef.

As in my second illustration, you can serve it with rice and some veggies. I steamed carrots, and then tossed them with 1 t honey and ½ t cinnamon. Then I attempted to ‘plate’ the dish like they do on Masterchef.  Needless to say I’m a better food historian than food stylist.

 

Yellow Flummery

Gaze upon my flummery!

Flummery. What a majestic word.
 

When I read the recipe below, I walked around for a good five minutes saying in delight, “Flummery. Flummery. Flummery.” My wife’s reaction to this excellent new addition to my vocabulary was to say drily: “It sounds like a word for writing your name in pee in the snow. Y’know – ‘I was walking home and saw some dirty so-and-so had committed flummery’.” Right.
 

Well, cookery friends, you can rest assured that flummery has nothing to do with urination in the snow, or anywhere else for that matter. It is in fact a wobbly custard and booze dessert-pudding that flourished in Britain from the 1600s to late 1800s (the period from which our particular specimen is drawn).
 

However, unlike many other dishes from this period, flummery is still rattling around. When I mentioned it to a fellow-foodie friend she said airily that she’d eaten it almost exclusively a few weeks back after a dental operation. Wild Colonial Grandma remembers eating it as a child (and despite the pseudonym I’ve given her, she isn’t actually from the Colonial era!).

 

Interestingly, both my friend and mother report that flummery is made with berries and beaten when partially set. The Oxford Companion to Food reveals that Victorian-era flummery (the wine and custard pudding which is the focus of today's recipe) is in fact the second dish to hold the name, and the modern dessert the third. Originally, flummery ('llymru') was a Welsh peasant dish that involved making a jelly from soaked oats or oat bran.

Even more interestingly, my 1935 edition of the Edinburgh-printed Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary defines flummery as the oldest of the three dishes mentioned above: "an acid jelly made from the husks of oats: the Scotch sowens". Clearly two, if not all three, of these uses for the term were doing the rounds concurrently. (The dictionary goes on to say that flummery can also refer to "anything insipid: empty complement", which I thoroughly encourage you to use in everyday conversation.)
 

It’s fair to say, though, that even the more modern version of flummery has somewhat fallen off the culinary radar. The food bloggers at Savouring the Past humorously recount their efforts to make a 1760 recipe work. Damn you, fish swim bladders! Learning from their tribulations, I went straight for gelatin as a setting agent, with pleasing results. My flummery was perfectly set, but deliciously wobbly, and had a pleasantly tart taste of dry white wine and citrus.
 

 

Please note that the cooking process will not remove all the alcohol from the dish. If you, or someone you are planning on serving this dessert to, doesn’t drink, then consider a different option or an ingredient substitution.

Flummery. Don't you just want to wobble it?

Here is the original recipe:
 

YELLOW Flummery.-Boil 2oz. of isinglass in a pint and a half of water till it is dissolved, and then add a pint of white wine, the juice of two and the outside of three lemons, the yolks of seven eggs well beaten, and sugar to your taste. Mix the whole together and set it on the fire till it boils, stirring it continually; strain it into a basin, and stir it till it is almost cold, then put it into the moulds.
 

Recipes. (1866, September 22). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), p. 5. Retrieved July 27, 2015, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article138049214

 

Ingredients

2 teaspoons powdered gelatin (or as much as the packet suggests will firmly set 500ml of liquid)

300ml of water

200ml white wine

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Peel of 1 lemon

Yolks of 2 large eggs, beaten

¼ cup sugar
 

Yield

Easily enough for six dessert serves
 

Cooking Time

Half an hour, plus allowing it to set overnight
 

Method

Select an appropriately sized mould – the closer to 500ml volume it has, the easier it will be to turn out the flummery. I used an old Bundt tin from Aldi, so don’t feel like you need to rush out and purchase a special flummery receptacle.

Combine the gelatin with the water, following the packet instructions.

Combine the white wine, lemon juice, lemon peel, egg yolks and sugar in a saucepan. Slowly bring to a simmer, while continuously stirring. The sugar should have dissolved, and the whole should be a uniform light yellow colour.

Remove the mixture from the heat, and strain into a bowl to remove the lemon peel and any stray pieces of overcooked egg.

Continue to stir and as you do, pour in the gelatin. Stir to thoroughly combine.

Pour the flummery into the mould. Once it has cooled completely, refrigerate

The next day, gently turn out your flummery onto a flat plate or serving tray. If you’re serving it as part of special dinner, decorate it with edible flowers – a popular Colonial era method of presentation. If you’ve just made it for your own enjoyment, then I strongly recommend jiggling the plate back and forward while saying “Flum-a-lum-a-lum-a-lum-ery” in time to its wobbles.

 

Carrot Jam

When learning how to cook, you learn that there are some combinations that work, and some that just don’t. And then there are the combinations that shouldn’t work – that really shouldn’t – but do.

Carrot jam is one such recipe, and since it has come in to my life I have found myself in a near-constant state of doubt – does it really taste so good, or am I deluding myself?

It wasn’t enough that I liked it, or that my wife said it was “weird, but good”, or even that my mother agreed to take a jar home with her. There was still doubt in my heart.

But finally, I have had confirmation of its goodness in the form of a blind taste test. Unbeknownst to me, my mother served part of her stash to some hapless tradespeople working on her house, on top of freshly baked scones. When she took the dinner tray back off them, the older of the bunch had asked just what type of jam it was, and if he could have the recipe.

So set aside your concerns, push down your misgivings, and join me in making carrot jam. Even the tradies are doing it.

CARROT JAM. - Boil a few carrots until quite tender, rub them through a colander, after- wards through a sieve. To every pound of pulp add one pound of loaf sugar, boil it to a jam, and when nearly cold put in the juice and the rind, finely grated, of two lemons to every pound of the pulp.

RECIPES. (1866, January 13). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), p. 3.

Carrot Jam, from above.

Ingredients

450g carrots

450g sugar

The juice and rind of two lemons

 

Cooking Time

1 ½ hours, plus cooling time

Yield

2 medium jars, to ease you in to the idea. The recipe scales up well once you’re more comfortable.

Method

Chop the carrots into evenly-sized pieces.

Bring a medium-sized pot of water to the boil, and add the carrots.

Boil the carrots until they are quite soft – you should be able to easily squish one against the side of the pan.

Drain away the cooking water.

Blend the carrots until they are pureed.

In your saucepan, combine the carrots and sugar.

Bring to the boil, while stirring to combine the ingredients. Continue heating until the jam reaches 105C.

Remove from the heat, and allow the jam to begin cooling. When it is nearly cold, add the juice and finely grated rind of the lemons.

Put your jam into your two sterilised jars (methods of sterilising summarised here). Remember to always put cold jam in cold jars and hot jam in hot jars, to prevent the glass splitting.

Revel in the fact that you have made jam from the most unlikely of sources, and that the two jars you’re staring at cost you less than $1 to make.

Now go forth, and convert more people to the wonders of carrot jam.