Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without any presents,” said Jo of Little Women many years ago. Or she might have said, without any Christmas tree, or without any candy—and especially candy! Christmas ahear! Let sweet stuff occupy the mind.
It was only a prune, but it rated the attention of Catherine the Great in that long ago when she was Empress of Russia. It was a prune stuffed with marzipan cooked in a thick syrup that an old Russian book has described as the confection most highly favored by Her Majesty.
It was Dr. David S. Isrin, a Russian Chemist, reading for ideas that might be developed in his laboratory for the food markets here, who noted the marzipaned prune formula and decided it deserved trial. Today you can buy Catherine the Great's famous prune, packed forty to a pound jar, price ＄1.26, at B. Altman and Company, 34th Street and Fifth Avenue. It is a medium-sized prune of small seed, of extra tenderness, which Dr. Isrin Chose as being to the queen's taste. The fruit is washed and hand pitted, then processed under ultra-violet ray to keep it from fermentation. The filling is a blend of marzipan with dehydrated banana powder and orange peel finely ground, all held together with a mild-flavored honey. A nice sweet for the tea table; good muchiing any time.
A Christmas stollen is traveling direct by mail to all parts of the country from the Farm & Home Foods kitchen of Watertown, Wis. This stollen is baked in loaf form rather than the usual flat oval, since it's easier packing that way. It journeys postpaid, ＄1.50 a loaf weighing one pound and ten ounces. It is a typical stollen of sweet yeast dough made with sugar and eggs, with candied peels and raisins mixed into the batter, like a rich coffee cake.
Farm & Home Foods again features popcorn balls for the holiday, the price as last year—＄1.75 per dozen, postpaid. And the Watertown geese! But only four hundred are available for the Great Day dinner. The price is ＄9.75 for a 13-15 pound goose, express prepaid; spices and cooking directions included with your purchase.
There is a sauce in the Lewis and Conger spice and condiment collection dedicated to the wisdom and memory of Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, the French gourmet and scholar whose life was one glorious and delicious meal. This man ate not merely to satisfy hunger, but for the actual joy he derived from food carefully selected, well prepared, intelligently served, and eaten with understanding. This sauce, which we accidentally discovered in an afternoon's exploration along the “aisle of spice,” has the most spellbinding list of ingredients we have ever encountered on a single jar label.
Take a deep breath—ready? Here goes! Aged vinegars, Indian tamarinds, garden-grown mushrooms, finest brushed French truffles, fresh tomatoes, peppers, and other fruits and vegetables; this conglomeration spiced with Spanish paprika, frankincense, chervil, salt, marjoram, sugar, sweet basil, Lampong black pepper, Cayenne, cloves, nutmeg, ginger, coriander. The sauce is blended and spiced by a master saucier—you know what that is? In the hierarchy of the big-time hotel kitchen, the chef is the colonel and the next-in-line is the saucier, a man who does nothing but see to sauces and soups. The sauce is a dark, mysterious-looking stuff, and long aged, but don't ask us to describe the actual flavor, except to say it has a real affinity for meat, poultry, fish, and eggs. An ardent sauce hound of our acquaintance lapped it up by the spoonful. Disconcerting, considering the cost—＄1.75 for a not very tall bottle.
One trial of the Barra sauces and vinegars out of California, and you are a Barra fan from now into forever. The Burgundy wine vinegar, that's something by itself, and it's also used in the dressings for its bouquet and mellowness and a strength outstanding for its subtleness. This vinegar is made of 1940 Burgundy, then long aged, and as surely superior to the ordinary run of vinegars as fine wines are superior to the lesser vintages. The tarragon vinegar of the line is 60 per cent of the Burgundy type, with 40 per cent pure distilled vinegar, this seasoned with tarragon, oregano, and garlic, then aged in the wood.
The dressings are the firm's special pride, and French-Italian in type. The plain dressing is made from a recipe of M. Rene Ard, chef de cuisine to H.R.H. the Sovereign Prince of Monaco—that is, if you care. What does matter is that the dressing is a clever blending of the Burgundy wine and distilled vinegars with vegetable oils, yes, and pure olive oil. Honey is the sweetening. The spicing includes mustard, paprika, and peeled cloves of garlic freshly ground. No tomato is in the product, no water, no filler.
A second dressing is made exactly the same, but with a big swig of Sherry to give extra zing. This Sherry addition is more than just Sherry, it is a chef's Sherry sauce—a non-alcoholic beverage produced by the firm for hotel kitchen use. The dressing can be used over greens, over shrimp, or with any fish cocktail.
Spiced wine sauce is our pick of the pack. This is a concentrate planned to serve as a base for dressings homemade. It is like the French-Italian dressing (the one without the Sherry) minus the oil, which the cook is to add. This concentrate may be used as a seasoning to enrich the flavor of a meat sauce, it works its little magic splashed into an egg dish, and it's nice going over fish.
Twang is the ready-mix of the line, a combination of the various dry ingredients that make the salad dressing. Place two tablespoons of the mix in a bowl, and add just enough water to make a thick paste. Beat in one-half cup vinegar and one-half cup water, stir in one cup of olive oil, and the dressing is ready—easy, quick, never-failing! The flavor is improved if the dressing is allowed to stand several hours, to let the ingredients intermingle.
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