Pluot ... reboot #3. Littleness in all its aspects.

"It was when he saw how self-importance blocked his way to the crucified Christ that he began to thirst for 'littleness' in all its aspects" (Sister Wendy Beckett, The Art of the Saints, on St. Francis of Assisi).

Sunday, January 12, 2014

I simply must be her

Dear things, I write "in a tearing hurry," as Laurie from Little Women would say, but let us employ a Victorian expression on our way to meet a Victorian lady. I ask you. Is she not most striking?
 

She is Mrs. Agnes B. (for Bertha) Marshall, late 19th-century English cooking teacher, domestic service agency CEO -- in other words, she helped you hire a parlormaid -- and, with her husband, kitchen equipment inventress and wholesale entrepreneur. She wrote four cookbooks and gave popular lectures at her own school. Her special subject was cold desserts, especially ice cream. No kidding. She patented a machine which froze a quart of ice cream in five minutes, and is said to have been responsible for Victorian Londoners' new enthusiasm for "ices," and therefore, modern refrigeration very much not being what it should have been then, for the importing of large amounts of ice from Norway. 

Below, chosen at random from her third book, Mrs. A. B. Marshall's Larger Cookery Book of Extra Recipes (London, 1891), is her Potato and Onion salad (from "Dressed Vegetables and Meagre Dishes, part 17"). Shall we want to mix cold boiled potatoes, raw onions, olive oil, tarragon vinegar -- surprisingly modern -- and whipped, salted cream? I am not sure. She had a thing about cream.

Mrs. A. B. Marshall's cold potato and onion salad, 1891

"Cut six or eight plainly boiled, cold mealy potatoes into slices, and if the potatoes are not nice round ones, stamp out the slices with a plain round cutter. Take three or four very finely sliced peeled onions, using Marshall's Vegetable Slicer for the purpose, and season them with salad oil, tarragon vinegar, salt, grated Parmesan cheese, coralline pepper and and finely chopped raw green parsley, arrange a layer on the dish on which the salad is to be served, place on this a layer of the potatoes, then another of the onions, and continue this til the dish is full; cover the top entirely with stiffly whipped cream that is seasoned with a little salt, using a forcing bag and large rose pipe for the purpose, sprinkle here and there a little chopped parsley and coralline pepper, and serve as a dressed vegetable or for any cold collation."

And what was coralline pepper? For help we turn right away to that splendid online food history source, The Old Foodie. In the midst of giving us a recipe for spinach with banana fritters from the Times of India in 1914, she too found herself stumped by "coralline pepper." Was it perhaps paprika? Pink peppercorns? One of her commenters suggests referring back to -- you guessed it -- something called Marshall's Coralline Pepper.  As follows (and it sounds as though we are playing Who am I?):

A pure natural pepper, of delicious, pleasant, and delicate flavour.
It facilitates digestion and imparts vitality, and is much esteemed by epicures.
Being of a most brilliant red colour, it can be used for decoration in place of Lobster Coral.
It is distinct from Cayenne, and is not much hotter than fine ordinary pepper.
It will be found most delicous to use alone as a Curry Powder.
It can be served at table in cellars as Salt is usually served. 
It can be strongly recommended for use in Sauces, Purees, Hors d'oeuvres, Soups, Fish, Hot Entrees, Cold Entrees, and Removes.
It supplies a great want.
Guaranteed free from artificial colouring.

And it cost a shilling a bottle. No size specified. But what was it?


Read more from Mrs. Marshall's book here.


at January 12, 2014
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