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Dessert

Jellies Without Fruit

A gelatin-based confection made with sugar, lemon, orange, calf's feet stock, and eggs, without fruit.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Sterrett, Laura C · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 23 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Jellies Without Fruit

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gelatine jelly

  1. Dissolve one-fourth pound gelatine in one and a half pints water, then add one-fourth ounce pulverized alum and four pounds brown or white sugar; boil eight minutes, and when nearly cool flavor with two ounces of extract of any flavor you may desire.

Make the filling

  1. Juice and grated rind of one lemon, tea-cup white sugar, yolks of two eggs, butter the size of two eggs; boil ten minutes. This can be made up in quantity, kept for a long time in bottles or jars, and used as needed for filling tarts, etc.

  2. Grated rind and juice of one lemon, one egg and yolk of another, lemon, small piece of butter, scant tea-cup sugar, one tablespoon water; beat all together, and boil till thick.

Make the isinglass jelly

  1. Three good-sized lemons sliced, half a pound white sugar; two ounces isinglass or gelatine dissolved in two quarts cold water, a stick of cinnamon, and a little grated nutmeg. Beat the whites of three or four eggs, and when the gelatine is all dissolved stir them well with the other ingredients; boil five minutes, strain through a flannel jelly-bag into moulds and set on ice; or the eggs, cinnamon and nutmeg may be omitted.

Make the calf's foot jelly

  1. Simmer 4 calf's feet with 2 pounds loaf sugar, juice of 6 lemons, 12 oranges, rinds of 8, and whites of 3 eggs to produce stock.

  2. Add the sugar, juice of lemons, the rinds of eight and juice of twelve oranges to the stock. Stir in the whipped whites of eggs; set where it will simmer slowly until the eggs set. Put in a few drops of cochineal, and pour through a bag into a mould.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

309Calories
8 gProtein
17 gFat
34 gCarbs

Counts 6 of 7 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 6 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Orange1 medium (131g)62
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Cinnamon1 tsp ground (2.6g)6
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Sterrett, Laura C. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures. See the original page.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Cinnamon + orangetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Cinnamon + lemontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Cinnamon + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Gelatine
Sets the liquid into a firm, tender jelly as it cools.
Egg whites
Whipped whites rise and bind with the liquid, clarifying it as they set.
Egg yolks
Thicken the filling and give it a rich, smooth body as they cook.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, tender mouthfeel to the filling.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweetness and balances the jelly.
Sugar
Sweetens the jelly and helps it set firm when boiled.

The step that matters

Stirring the whipped egg whites into the hot stock. Egg whites clarify the jelly as they set, but if they are not stirred in evenly and kept at a gentle simmer, they can cook into lumps and leave the jelly cloudy.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cinnamon, lemon, egg, butter):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Orangethe original
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Figfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, lemon, egg, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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