[Sca-cooks] A bit more about Whipped and Beaten Creams

[Johnna Holloway]

I suppose this is one of these questions that revolves around
what one means by whipped cream. Was it whipped or beaten or eaten  
clouted in a sillabub?

I did some searching tonight.

OED lists the relevant definition under cream
3. Confectionery, etc. Beaten into a froth: see whip v. 7[ see below].

Hence in figurative expressions denoting something `frothy', flimsy,  
or unsubstantial.
1673 Dryden Marr. à la Mode iv. iii, The dull French Poetry,..so thin,  
that it is the very Leaf-gold of Wit, the very Wafers and whip'd Cream  
of sense.
1691 Shadwell Scourers ii. i, To make clouted cream, and whipt  
Sillabubs.
Under Whip definition 7.
a. Confectionery, etc. To beat up into a froth (cream, eggs, etc.)  
with a fork, spoon, or other instrument; to prepare (a fancy dish) in  
this way; also fig.
Then it lists the 1673 and 1691 quotations seen above.

Under
whipped cream, etc.: see clouted.

It becomes clear that it becomes connected with the making of and the  
growth of sillabub and syllabub making.
  Again OED--

   c1537 Thersytes (1848) 79 You and I..Muste walke to him and eate a  
solybubbe.

1628 WITHER Brit. Rememb. IV. 1186 Some, Sulli-bibs among the Milk- 
maids, making.

1668 SEDLEY Mulberry Gard. IV. Wks. 1778 II. 52 Then they must..have  
the Sullabubs and Tarts brought into the Coach to 'em.

1570 in J. J. Cartwright Chapters Hist. Yks. (1872) 55 They brough  
this examynent a selybube to drynk.

1584 COGAN Haven Health cc. (1636) 190 A posset or Selibub made of  
Verjuice, is good to coole a cholerick stomacke.

1601 HOLLAND Pliny I. 348 They vsed to thicken their milk into a kind  
of pleasant soure curd in manner of a Sellibub.

1591-2 NASHE Prognostication Wks. (Grosart) II. 165 Maides this  
quarter shall make sillyebubbes for their Louers.

To make a sillibub appearing in The Cook’s Guide of 1664 calls for   
cream and whites of eggs whipped to a froth.

In EEBO-TCP,  comes this quotation
"are a sort of people that would be good at the putting off of whipp'd  
Cream and Syllibubs"

from  Scarron's novels ... rendred into English, with some additions,  
by John Davies ...

By Monsieur Scarron, 1610-1660.   London : Printed for Thomas  
Dring ..., 1665. This is earlier again than the quotation offered by  
OED.

Whipped cream also turns up in Digby.

My Lord of S. Alban's Cresme Fouettee.
Put as much as you please to make, of sweet thick cream into a dish,  
and whip it with a bundle of white hard rushes, (of such as they make  
whisks to brush cloaks) tyed together, till it come to be very thick,  
and near a buttery substance. If you whip it too long, it will become  
butter. About a good hour will serve in winter. In summer it will  
require an hour and a half. Do not put in the dish, you will serve it  
up in, till it be almost time to set it upon the table. Then strew  
some poudered fine sugar in the bottom of the dish it is to go in, and  
with a broad spatule lay your cream upon it: when half is laid in,  
strew some more fine sugar upon it, and then lay in the rest of the  
Cream (leaving behinde some whey that will be in the bottom) and strew  
more sugar upon that. You should have the sugar-box by you, to strew  
on sugar from time to time, as you eat off the superficies, that is  
strewed over with sugar.

If you would have your whippedcream light and frothy, that hath but  
little substance in the eating, make it of onely plain milk; and if  
you would have it of a consistence between both, mingle cream and milk.

The closet of the eminently learned Sir Kenelme Digbie Kt. Opened. 1669.

Holme in the Academy of Armory of 1688  defines whiptcream as
WhiptCream, it is beaten thick with a Whisk, then eaten with Cream and  
Sugar.

  and again we have those snow recipes as in

To make Snow.

TAke the whites of fiue or sixe egs, a handfull of fine sugar, and as  
much rose water, and put them in a pottle of cream of the thikest that  
you can get, beat them all together, as the snow riseth, take it off  
with a spoone, you must beat it with a sticke clouen in foure, then  
must you take a loafe of bread and cut away the crust, and set it  
vpright in a platter, then set a faire rosemarie branch in the loafe,  
and cast your snow vpon it with a spoone.

A closet for ladies and gentlevvomen. 1608

OR this one that doesn't include egg whites----

Source [Das Kuchbuch der Sabina Welserin, V. Armstrong (trans.)]: 55  
To make snow. Dilute cream and put it in a pot. And take an eggbeater  
and stir it thoroughly, until it forms snowy foam on top. And toast a  
Semmel and lay it in a bowl and sprinkle sugar over it and put the  
foam on the bread, then it is ready.


Oh and Markham takes cream and beats it well for a number of his  
recipes.


Johnnae



On Dec 12, 2009, at 8:21 PM, Antonia Calvo wrote:

> Stephanie Yokom wrote:
>> Is "whipped cream" period?
>>
>> Is "alfredo sauce" period?
>>
>
> Probably not, and no. Antonia di Benedetto Calvo