Chapter XXXV

MACAROONS—JUMBLES—GENOESE TABLETTES—IRISH STEW.

THE next day Mrs. Welles and Molly were in the kitchen bright and early. She had ordered the day before all she would need for dinner, and did not require to leave the house. They had planned to make macaroons and fancy cakes. For the macaroons, half a pound of almond paste and three quarters of a pound of powdered sugar were weighed carefully, then three large eggs were separated and beaten. Mrs. Welles put the almond paste in the chopping-bowl, and chopped it into fine crumbs (which saves a good deal of mashing with a fork), while Molly beat eggs and added the sugar, making icing, in fact; then the crumbled almond paste was put to it and mashed with the back of a fork into the icing, till it was all smooth and perfectly blended; some sheets of thin paper were rubbed with suet and cut to fit the dripping-pan, on which they were to be baked; half a tea-spoonful was dropped on a bit of paper, and put in to try the oven, and meanwhile a dozen or so of almonds were blanched and each split into six.

The macaroon, when looked at, had flattened down, as it should do, but just a shade more than was just right, and a tea-spoonful more powdered sugar was stirred in. Then the mixture was taken up on the end of a tea-spoon, and bits as large as small nutmegs were dropped on the greased paper,—about two inches apart,—and then on each of them three or four bits of almond were put irregularly. The oven was moderate,—not too cool, nor yet hot enough to color them till they had been in it ten minutes.

“While you bake those, I’ll make some Genoese pastry,” said Mrs. Welles.

“That is a novelty to me; at least, I have heard of it, but not tried it. If I remember rightly you told me you had once tried it, but found it very unsatisfactory.”

“Yes, it was too sticky while warm to cut, and too brittle when cold, but I have now another recipe which I want to try, and if it is good it will be just the thing for your fancy cakes. This is the recipe:

“GENOESE PASTRY.—Four ounces of flour, three of butter, four of almond paste, and five eggs. Melt the butter in a bowl, taking care it does not get very hot. Break the eggs into a bowl, add the sugar to them, stand the bowl in a saucepan of boiling water, and whip eggs and sugar for twenty minutes, but they must not get very hot; take the bowl from the water, add the almond paste, crumbled fine, to it, beat till smooth, then add the butter, and last of all slip in the flour, stirring lightly all the time; bake, in a round jelly-cake-pan lined with buttered paper very neatly fitted and standing an inch above the edge, in a rather quick oven for half an hour. When it is done, no mark should remain on it when pressed with the finger.”

“Has any one you know tried the recipe?”

“Oh, yes; and I have eaten the cake, and found it excellent.”

Molly now opened the oven to look at the macaroons, and found they could be put for one minute at the top, to take a deeper tint, and another pan which she had ready could be put in the bottom of the oven.

Then she prepared one more sheet, after taking the first from the oven. These she left on the pan to cool a few minutes before touching them; then she lifted the paper from it, replaced it by a fresh one, and did not attempt to take the macaroons from the paper till they were nearly cold. She handled them after they were baked, and until cold, as if they were egg shells.

Marta, who had now finished her morning’s work, was told to put on the _bouillon_.

“You must take the largest pot, Marta; that shin weighs eight pounds. It is cut in three, but gash it well, take out the marrow, and put on eight quarts of cold water; when it is near the boiling-point, skim it,—take care the scum does not break. After it is off, throw in a wine-glass of cold water and wait; when it is once again near boiling, skim again; repeat the cold water and skimming twice, then leave it to boil four hours very slowly.”

When separating the yolks of eggs from the whites, for the macaroons, they had been at once beaten with a tea-spoonful of cold water to prevent hardening,—which they are apt to do when waiting even a very short time, if not beaten,—and set aside for jumbles, which Molly made while Mrs. Welles made the Genoese pastry. She used for them six ounces of butter, six ounces of sugar, and half a pound of flour, with the yolks of the three eggs. The butter was beaten to a cream and then the sugar and eggs added, the flour sifted in, a table-spoonful of wine put in, and when all was well mixed a few drops of extract of rose was added, Molly tasting the paste to judge the quantity. It needed to be perceptible, as it goes off in baking. Then she rolled it into little balls about the size of a hickory nut, and on some stuck half a blanched almond, on others a little bit of green citron, and on others a strip of candied lemon peel.

Rolling them thus was much less trouble than cutting them into rings and shaping them in sugar, and quite as sightly, for the balls melt down in the oven into round cakes. They require a moderate oven; if too slow they melt too much, if too quick they burn before they are done.

To keep the oven just right this morning when a steady, moderate heat was required, Molly attended to the fire herself. Having seen that it was solid at first, she kept it so by adding a very few coals _before_ it had shown any signs of going down. As soon as the jumbles were firm and the bright yellow had changed to the palest pine color, they were taken out, without waiting for them to _brown_ at all.

The Genoese pastry was now done; it looked like a thick jelly-cake, and when cool was to be cut and jelly laid between it sandwich-fashion, and some pieces iced plain.

When the macaroons were taken off the papers, there were found to be between seventy and eighty, but as in two pans there were two or three that had sunken somewhat and were less handsome than the rest, those were laid aside. There were also nearly four dozen jumbles, and there would be about three dozen _tablettes_ from the Genoese pastry.

It was getting near luncheon time and they were both rather tired; therefore they gave up till after they had eaten and rested.

“I hope, Molly, you take care of yourself in this way,” said her friend as they sat down to a comfortable lunch. “I remember how you used to horrify me in London by going without food for hours, or only eating cake or pastry, if you had anything on hand to interest you.”

“Yes, nowadays I do, whether I feel hungry or not: I sit down and force myself to eat, and I do it leisurely also, for if I finish eating in ten minutes I take a book or newspaper and spend the full hour resting, then I go to work fresh again; although I confess I do it often in spite of my nerves, which urge me to finish. But I do it, and I know that eating nothing at all or a mere snack in a hurry, at noon, and then keeping on with the sewing, or preserving, or shopping, is what wears out half us American women. I used to get tired and faint about three o’clock, after doing very little, and was almost ashamed that I, a healthy young girl, should do so when I saw elderly women keep on from morning till night. You and your mother first awakened me to the fact that it was lack of food. My own dear mother had been like myself all her life, neglecting her noon meal, simply because she never felt hungry. _Now_ I get a meal of some substantial kind, and I make Marta do the same, for she also is inclined to take a standing lunch,—just a bit of bread and cheese, she likes best.”

“Well, I don’t believe people can work well if they do not eat sensibly. I can eat three meals comfortably, but I agree with Dr. Richardson: we could do without both the others better than the mid-day meal. I suppose if you and I had kept on for a couple of hours longer we should have been a pair of wilted beings.”

“Yes, there is nothing like leaving off and resting _before_ one is really tired, if one wants to get through a great deal without feeling it; but it is a very difficult thing to do.”

“I know it; especially difficult to those who need it most,—the nervous, energetic women; to the phlegmatic ones it comes easy enough, and they seldom overwork.”

“I have eaten the last of your ‘weal and hammer,’ my dear, and I agree with Silas Wegg: ‘it mellars the organ,’—and now I am ready for work. The next thing is to ice those cakes, I suppose, and I will put on the sugar to boil.”

“No, I have French icing ready, but I forgot until this minute to make some coloring; I bought the cochineal yesterday.”

“Well, there’s plenty of time; it will only take a few minutes; I’ll put it to boil and we will both get the Genoese cakes ready while it does so.”

Molly handed to her a packet containing an ounce of cochineal and one of cream of tartar, mixed; this was put to boil in half a pint of water, and was to reduce to half. While this was going on Molly got out some raspberry jam and the lemon paste she had made.

“I wonder what I should have done if these good things had not come so apropos!”—alluding to her mother-in-law’s gift.

“Done, my dear? You would not have felt the lack of them; you would just have made your jumbles and some cocoanut macaroons and cones; made some sponge drop-cakes, which you would have iced, and would have forgotten to wish even that you had not the other things; I know you, Molly.”

Molly laughed. “To tell the truth, I had thought the matter over, and decided to make some orange paste, for which I have a very old recipe, and as two oranges are enough, it would not have been very costly.”

“Before I go away I want to try it, if oranges are to be got yet, out here.”

“I saw a few pale things, but Harry can bring some early Floridas.”

As they talked they worked. The bread-board was put between them, and the Genoese cake was split carefully into four even layers. The rounded sides were trimmed off wide enough to cut into odd-shaped pieces to be dipped into icing.

The cochineal had now boiled fast about ten minutes uncovered, and by the rim round the little saucepan showed it had diminished to one-half.

“Now if one can avoid getting one’s fingers in it, and looking like an executioner for a day or two, it will be very nice; where’s the alum, Molly?”

Molly handed the tiny packet containing two drachms of alum to Mrs. Welles. It was put into the cochineal, stirred, and then a small strainer was put on a cup, a piece of muslin laid in it, and the coloring poured through it; then the ends of the muslin were gathered together and the sediment gently pressed with a spoon and then thrown away.

Molly, meanwhile, had been spreading one of the layers of cake with the lemon paste, very thinly, and laid another on top of it,—this was one cake; the other layer was spread with raspberry jam, and on that also a slice was laid. I have said that the rounded sides were cut off, leaving the centre square. These sides were cut into three-cornered pieces; there were, consequently, a number of these corner pieces, and two square cakes,—one with raspberry jam, one with lemon. Molly had brought out the French or _fondant_ icing, the vanilla flavoring, the bitter almond, and the caramel coloring. She divided the icing, putting one part into a small bowl which she set in a saucepan of boiling water, stirring it till it was creamy. Mrs. Welles had laid a sheet of confectioner’s paper on the board, and when the icing was melted, Molly brought it to the table and put to it a very small half tea-spoonful of vanilla, and stirred it; then she dipped a table-spoon in the boiling water, shook the water from it and then took it full of the icing from the bowl and poured it on the layers of cake containing the lemon, and spread it, using more icing as she needed it, smoothing it with a knife dipped into boiling water and shaken.

When it was done, Mrs. Welles warmed a knife and cut the cake into neat _tablettes_ an inch wide and two inches long, while Molly put the same icing over the fire, stirred it slowly till the water under it was boiling, and the icing creamy. She took it to the table, colored it a beautiful creamy coffee color with a few drops of caramel, and then dropped the corner pieces, one by one, as fast as she could, into it, taking them out as soon as they were covered, and laying them on the waxed paper with a fork. Before half were done the icing got stiff, and she had to put it on the fire once more; and this time, as each heating up made the icing a degree higher candy, she put in a few drops of water from the end of a spoon,—a dozen drops perhaps in all,—then the icing became creamy again. She finished dipping the cakes, all but three or four, for which the icing fell short. Now the other portion of icing was put in a bowl, melted to cream in boiling water, a few drops of cochineal added to it, and a few drops (very few) of almond flavoring. The cochineal made it a beautiful pale pink. This was laid on the _tablette_ of cake in which was raspberry jam, in the same way as the white, and it also was cut into _tablettes_ while Molly dipped the rest of her three-cornered pieces of cake into the pink icing.

There was now a plate of pink, almond-iced _tablettes_ with raspberry jam; one of white, vanilla-iced _tablettes_ with lemon filling, and on the sheet of waxed paper lay several that looked like large, oblong, French candies, pink and pale coffee-colored,—being completely covered with icing, no one could tell they were cake.

“Now the cakes are all made, are they not?” asked Mrs. Welles.

“Yes; but I’m sadly afraid people will think they have cost much more than is usually spent at these meetings; but I know they have not. Mrs. Framley had sponge cake only, yet the eggs alone for the five loaves she made would cost more than these cakes.”

“Well, it can’t be helped,” said Mrs. Welles.

“No,” laughed Molly; “I meant only to have the iced jelly cakes, and though Genoese is so delicious I don’t know that that difference will be understood, but your bringing the almond paste tempted me into the macaroons, and then to make use of the yolks; of course they led to the jumbles.”

“Yes, but they would pass; it is the ‘Frenchy’ look of the iced cakes that will seem costly, but you can tell your friends what the cost really is.”

“I know, only I hate to seem to lay myself out; yet when things can be made so pretty one can’t resist doing it.”

“You can’t, because you love the work as others love Kensington stitch and can’t resist adding to the beauty of their surroundings in that way. You and I resist that temptation very well, but this makes one understand it. All work is pleasure if you love it and _know how_ to do it.”

“Now I’ll see the dinner on and we’ll adjourn and leave Marta in possession,” said Molly.

Molly looked at the _bouillon_, which had been simmering four hours; and Marta asked if she should put in the vegetables.

“No; this is to be extra strong, in fact _consommé_,—which means _bouillon_ very much reduced,—so this can simmer two hours more; then strain the meat from it, and to-morrow you can take off all fat; and then put to it two carrots cut up small, two turnips, two onions, and let them boil in it two hours; this will reduce it enough; then it can be strained and cleared.”

Molly had arranged to have for dinner just such things as Marta could cook, but the substantial part of it was to be Irish stew, that good old savory dish. Excellent as it is when well made, there is nothing more “poverty seeming” than the same thing carelessly done; therefore she meant to see it all on to cook before leaving the kitchen.

IRISH STEW.—Half a dozen lean chops from the neck were floured and put in a saucepan with two onions and a tea-spoonful of butter, and quickly browned; but the onion was not allowed to burn, and therefore it was all kept moving about. A pint of cold water was then put to it, and the fat that this brought to the surface skimmed off and a tea-spoonful of salt and one third of a tea-spoonful of pepper added. It was put where it would simmer _very gently_ for an hour and a half, when it was to be again skimmed, and a tea-spoonful of Worcestershire sauce put to it; the gravy tasted to see if salt enough, and half a dozen large potatoes (or more if small) cut in half; then it was to be closely covered and was to simmer for another hour. Molly cautioned Marta against adding more water.

“When you put the potatoes in, never mind if the gravy does not cover them; they are to stew over the meat; sufficient good gravy to serve is all that is necessary, if you cover the potatoes with liquid as often is done, you get a good deal of broth, but no gravy.”