Historic Cookery

For quite some time, I’ve wanted to make syllabubs during a session
of my Fireside Feasts program out at Wyckoff Farmhouse Museum.
Problem is, wine is a main ingredient. Now, normally that’s not a bad
thing, but for us it is, because families make up the majority of our
participants. Families with kids of all ages, from toddlers to teens.
So, I’ve asked a few fellow hearth cooks how to make syllabubs
more “kid-friendly,” but unfortunately, no one seemed to know.

Luckily, I found my answer several months ago. You may recall
that late last year (see 12/31/2009), I directed everyone to this
video from the NPR blog Soapbox, wherein Liane Hansen travelled
to Colonial Williamsburg where she made syllabubs with CW’s
Supervisor of Historic Foodways, Frank Clark, in the kitchens
of the Governor’s Palace. Note that Frank states at one point:

If you want to do this version so
kids can have it…substitute, say,
apple juice for the white wine….

HUZZAH! Finally! An answer. Thanks, Frank!

So I immediately (yes, that very day) went down to my kitchen
to test it out. Now, I didn’t have any apple JUICE, but I did have
apple CIDER. No problem, it worked perfectly.

And so, at this coming Thursday’s session of Fireside Feasts,
we’ll be making syllabubs, with wine for the adults and juice
for the children.

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All the necessary utensils and ingredients:

Grating the lemon rind:

Squeezing out the juice of the lemon:

In goes the apple cider:

Add the cream:

Then the sugar:

And whisk for five to ten minutes:

Pour; now, I don’t have any historically-correct syllabub glasses,
but these that were my mother’s should suffice:

TA-DA!

The next day…WOW! look at that!

So cool!

Mighty tasty, too. And soooo refreshing on a hot summer day.
Huzzah! (I’m gonna have to make these often):

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So, YES, apple cider (or juice) can be “substituted for the white wine.”
Of course, then I began to wonder, “So, will it work with other acidic
liquids, such as….”

Hmmm…Stay tuned!