Fritters are crisper if fried in clarified fat than in lard.
In making fruit fritters dip each piece of fruit into batter. See that it is well covered.
Drop fritters, a few at a time, into smoking hot fat, being careful that they do not touch each other; fry a rich yellow. Take out with a skimmer and set in the oven for a few minutes on soft paper to drain. Sift sugar over the fritters and serve with a wine or fruit sauce.
(French Receipt)
2 eggs
¹⁄₂ lb. flour
1 table-spoon olive oil
1 table-spoon brandy
¹⁄₂ cup water, milk or beer
Mix the flour and water, milk or beer, perfectly smooth. Add the well-beaten yolks, the oil and brandy (which is optional) and a little salt. Mix well and set aside for two or three hours. When the batter is wanted, beat the whites until stiff and dry and add them.
9 ozs. flour
1 table-spoon powdered sugar
4 eggs
8 table-spoons butter (melted)
¹⁄₂ cup white wine
2 table-spoons brandy
Mix the flour, sugar and well-beaten yolks together. Beat until smooth, adding a little salt. Stir in the melted butter, white wine and brandy, and, just before using, the whites beaten until they are stiff and dry.
Fritters may be made of apples, bananas, oranges, apricots, pine-apple, peaches, etc. The fruit should be ripe and perfect.
Cut apples across in slices about a third of an inch thick. Take out the core from the centre of each piece.
Cut each slice of pine-apple into four pieces.
Slice bananas lengthwise, cutting each slice in half if too long.
Cut peaches and apricots in quarters.
All fruit for fritters is best soaked for a couple of hours in well-sweetened brandy, rum or kirsch, to which a little ground cinnamon and the finely grated peel and the juice of a lemon have been added. The fruit must be well drained before it is dipped in batter.
When this is not done each piece of fruit should be sprinkled with sugar, a very little lemon juice and spice.
For frying see general directions.
1 egg
¹⁄₂ gill cream
Salt
1 salt-spoon baking-powder
¹⁄₂ tea-spoon vanilla
1 tea-spoon brandy
Flour
Beat the yolk and white separately. Mix all smoothly together with sufficient flour to roll out. Roll as thin as possible, and cut into squares and ribbons. Fry in boiling lard. Drain and sprinkle with flavoured sugar .
Peel and divide several sweet oranges into sections. Scrape off all pith with a sharp knife. Take out the seeds. Drop them into a syrup made of water, sugar and a table-spoon of brandy, and let them simmer for a few minutes. Take out and drain on a sieve. Dip in batter and fry . Put in the oven to drain and sprinkle with orange sugar .
1 pine-apple (fresh or tinned)
2 cups flour
1 table-spoon melted butter
1 egg
Water
Pare and grate the pine-apple. To the juice add the flour. Mix perfectly smooth. Add the well-beaten yolk, a little salt and the butter. If fresh pine-apple is used add sufficient water to make the batter thin enough to drop from the end of spoon. Beat the white of egg to a stiff froth and stir it in quickly and lightly when ready to fry. Drop into the boiling fat by the table-spoon and fry a golden brown. Drain on paper in the oven and dust with lemon sugar .
(Pain Perdu)
1 pint milk
1 yolk
2 table-spoons sugar
Bread
2 ozs. butter
1 dessert-spoon orange-flower water
Boil the milk with the sugar, grated rind of a lemon, and orange-flower water until it is reduced one half.
Cut several slices of bread half an inch thick. Take off the crust and cut the bread into rounds about the size of the top of a tumbler. Dip these in the milk and then in the well-beaten yolk. Fry in butter. Sprinkle with lemon sugar or put on each one a spoonful of jam. Serve very hot.
(Beignets Soufflés)
1 cup water
2 ozs. butter
4 ozs. flour
1 tea-spoon powdered sugar
6 yolks
3 whites
Set the water on the fire. Add the sugar, butter and a little salt. As soon as it boils add the flour all at once. Work it smooth with a wooden spoon, and stir it over the fire for two or three minutes. Take off the fire and add the yolks of six eggs, one after the other, beating hard all the time. Beat the whites of three eggs to a stiff froth. Add this to the batter stirring it lightly in. Divide into pieces about the size of an egg, sprinkle them with flour and fry them in a very large saucepan of clarified fat, giving each fritter room to swell without touching another. The fat should not be too hot at first, but as the fritters swell the heat should be increased. When a good colour take them out, drain them and sprinkle them with sugar. Serve at once very hot.
Dip whole strawberries into batter No. II. Fry a good colour. Drain. Sprinkle with sugar and glaze with a salamander.