[Sca-cooks] SUGAR ICING/17th C.-- 1st part

[johnna holloway]

Greetings to the List:

As promised Sugar Icings: selected version.
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We'll start with one more 16th century selection.

The Good Huswifes Handmaide for the Kitchin of
1594 concludes a recipe for "a rare Conceit,
with Veale baked." with the words:
"when it is baken drawe it foorth, & cast Sugar
& Rofewater, upon it, and ferve it in." [p.30]
"A Tart of Creame" concludes with:
"and when it is baked, fprinkle a little Rofewater
and Sugar, and a little Butter molten upon it."
[p.31] "A Tarte of Cheefe" instructs one
"clofe it up with a cover, and with a feather lay
fweet molten Butter upon it, and fine Sugar, and
bake it in a foft Oven." [p.31]
"Ice" and "icing" are not used as terms in these
recipes, but they pose interesting questions.
Is the sugar strewn on and rosewater sprinkled
on separately or are they combined? Would the butter
be combined with the sugar? Was the lid just buttered
and then sugar strewn over? What was the intent of the
author and how was his recipe used in actual practice?

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 Here are some additional 17th century recipes or
mentions for sugar icing.
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1609 edition. Plat. Delightes for Ladies.  recipe 16,
 To make Iumbolds
"..when they are baked, yce them with
Rosewater and Sugar, and the white of an egge beeing
beaten together, then take a feather and gild them,
then put them againe into the oven, and let them stand
in, a litle while, & they will be yced cleane over with
a white yce, and so boxe them yp, and you may keep them
all the yeere." (Fussell reprint, 1948, p.27)

If royal icing is a mixture of sugar beaten with egg
white to which a small amount of flavoring
is added, then this recipe by definition is royal icing.
It will not be a royal icing made with powdered or
confectioners sugar. The sugar would be sugar scraped
from a sugar cone and pounded fine in a mortar and pestle.
Normally today we don't dry our icings in an oven, but
if the humidity were high it might be prove useful to do so.

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Recipes from Murrell are omitted.
Recipes from Markham are omitted.
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A late 1636 edition of the unpaged A Closet for Ladies
and Gentlewomen, gives a recipe titled as:
"To make a March-pane, to ice it, and garnifh it after the
Art of Comfit-making."

"then ice it with Rofe-water and Sugar, made as thick as
batter for Fritters: when it is iced, garnifh it with
conceits, and ftick long Comfits in it, and fo gild it,
and ferve it."
This is the earliest instance that I have located where
the term icing occurs in an actual recipe title,
instead of being appended to the end of another recipe.
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Recipes from Jos. Cooper are omitted.
Recipes from Lord Ruthuen are omitted.
Recipes from A True Gentlewoman's Delight are omitted.
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The Compleat Cook by W.M. was published in 1655
as a part of the trilogy entitled The Queens Closet
Opened which appeared in numerous editions up until
1713. The recipes were said to have drawn from the
recipe books of the widowed Queen Henrietta Maria.

"To make a very good great Oxfordfhire Cake."
ends with the words:
"it will take three hours baking; when baked, take
it out and froft it over with the white of an Egg
and Rofewater well beat together, and ftrew fine Fugar
upon it, and fet it again into the oven, that it may
ice." [pages 13-14]

This may be the earliest use of the word "frost" meaning
to ice. OED lists 1756 as their earliest quotation for
"frosting" and 1832 for the verb "frost" meaning "to give
a frosted surface to". Frosting as an American term for
icing is normally thought to be 19th century in origin.
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Recipes from A Queens Delight are omitted.
Recipes from Woolley are omitted.
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The Closet of the Eminently Learned Sir Kenelme Digbie, Kt.
Opened of 1669 contains what many culinary scholars consider
a breakthrough in the creation and use of icing.
His instructions are longer and more precisely
worded. Many feel this is start of true "royal icing."

"To Make A Plumb-Cake" concludes:
"Then to Ice it, take a pound and half of double refined
Sugar beaten and searsed; The whites of three Eggs new-laid,
and a little Organe-flower-water, with a little musk and
Ambergreece, beaten and searsed, and put to your sugar;
Then strew your Sugar into the Eggs, and beat it in a stone
Mortar with a Woodden Pestil, till it be as white as snow,
which will be by that time the Cake is baked;
Then draw it to the ovens mouth, and drop it on, in what form
you will; let it stand a little again in the oven to harden.
[pages 182-183]
These instructions given above that instruct one to drop
the icing "on, in what form you will" argues Simon Charsley, are
the beginning of not only royal icing, but of cakes being
decorated with formed stiffened icing. He suggests that Digbie
may have learned this method from his travels in France in the
time of La Varenne.


"My Lord of Denbigh's Almond March-pane" states:
"Then you must Ice them thus: Make a thick pap with Orange
flower or Rosewater, and purest white Sugar: a little of
the whites of Eggs, not above half a spoonful of that Oyl
of Eggs, to a Porrenger full of thick Pap, beaten
exceeding well with it, and a little juyce of Limons. Lay
this smooth upon the Cakes with a Knife, and smoothen it
with a feather. Then set the pan over them to dry them.
Which being if there be any unevenness, or cracks or
discolouring, lay on a little more of that Mortar, and
dry it as before. Repeat this, till it be as clear and
smooth, and white, as you would have it. Then turn the
other sides, and do the like to them. You must take care,
not to scorch them: for then they would look yellow or
red, and they must be pure, white and smooth like Silver
between polished and matte, or like a looking Glass. This
coat preserves the substance of the Cakes within, the
longer moist. You may beat dissolved Amber, or Essence
of Cinnamon, with them." [pages 185-186]


[Prospect Books edition, 1997. Edited by Jane Stevenson and
Peter Davidson.]
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Recipes from Robert May are omitted.
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I will include the references and manuscript
material in the second posting.

Johnna Holloway

This is the work of Johnnae llyn Lewis//Johnna H. Holloway
4 November 2001. Please credit the author when using her comments.