Monday, April 09, 2012

A Junketing We Will Go.


It seems that no-one makes junket anymore. The milk-based dessert has gone the way of dodo-steaks and passenger-pigeon pie. Perhaps it is because the essential ingredient of a piece of calf’s stomach is not easy to come by these days? Even the modern supermarket version of neatly packaged, pastel coloured and artificially flavoured junket tablets are almost as impossible to find.

Modern junket – the sort made with flavoured tablets – is a little like the modern supermarket version of neatly packaged, pastel coloured and artificially flavoured blancmange. It is a lightly set, somewhat custardy dessert, supposedly easy to digest and therefore useful for the very young, the very elderly, and the slightly unwell.

Junket has two big differences from other pudding mixes: the milk must be slightly warm when it is made up, or it won’t set, and once the set pudding is broken up with the spoon, it quickly turns into a watery mess with lumps. The watery mess is whey, and the lumps are curds. Yes, folks, the original junket  was ‘curds and whey.’ The magic curd-inducing ingredient is rennet, a digestive enzyme found in the mammalian stomach (in practice, usually that of the calf.)

In medieval times junket was a dish for the well-to-do, made with cream, sweetened with very expensive sugar, and flavoured with spices. By modern times it had become a cheap milk pudding. Throughout all this time – and still – curdling milk or cream with rennet or something similar was the first step in making cheese.

We had a seventeenth century recipe for ‘angeletts’ – a type of cream cheese made with ‘runnet’ several years ago, so today I want to remember with fondness - flavoured junket tablets. The recipes coe from A Dozen New Ways to Use Milk (a promotional booklet for a proprietary brand of flavoured junket tablets), circa 1920’s.

Junket Milk Shake.
A delicious milk drink can be made either by dissolving in cold milk and serving immediately, or by making junket in any flavour with skimmed milk, adding Junket to one-half the required amount of lukewarm milk in regular directions. Let it set until firm, then chill.
Beat with an egg-beater until smooth, and mix with equal quantity of cold skimmed milk.

Junket Custard.
Beat two eggs with 2 teaspoons sugar and gradually blend in a cup of hot milk. Add a pinch of salt. Cook in a double boiler until well thickened, then remove at once from the fire and cool to lukewarm. Warm slightly 1 ½ cups milk, add to the cooled custard and mix thoroughly. Add 2 packages of Vanilla Junket to custard mixture, stirring quickly for only one minute. Pour at once into dessert glasses. Let set until firm in a warm room
Place in ice-box to chill. This Junket custard is also delicious poured over stewed dried fruit cooked without sugar.

Quotation for the Day.

I'll make you feed on berries and on roots,
And feed on curds and whey, and suck the goat,
And cabin in a cave, and bring you up
To be a warrior, and command a camp.
William Shakespeare; 'Titus Andronicus' Act IV Scene II

11 comments:

carolina said...

Ahh, junkets. I made one a couple of years ago, using Rundell's receipt in her "New System of Domestic Cookery' (I think that's the name of her book?)of 1806 or thereabouts. Was delicious. But, yeah, it's no longer something people make, or even know about. And here in the States, perhaps it never was? We're missing out on a great dish! HUZZAH!

Marina@Picnic at Marina said...

What an interesting post! I love history of food, and find your blog quite an interesting place to be. Thank you!

Elise Fleming/Alys K. said...

Junket was certainly in the US in the 1940s when my mother made it for us. Can't say that I was overly fond of it - the whey part was a bit...disconcerting.

Anonymous said...

I'm a 50-something American... When I was a little girl I was often sick with strep and tonsillitis, frequently with a terrible sore throat. Junket was one of the few foods that I could eat and enjoy when I was so sick. My dear mother made it for me often. It used to be in our supermarkets in little boxes with envelopes of powder- chocolate, vanilla, or strawberry.

Judy said...

My mother used junket tablets to make a custard ice cream when I was a kid. What a delicious memory!

Shay said...

There is a small grocery store in a town about 12 miles from here, over the county line. The bulk of their trade is with farm families, most of them from a religious sect that's the offshoot of the Amish. They carry a lot of stuff you can't find in the average American supermarket anymore, and that includes junket.

The Old Foodie said...

Thanks all. It seems from your comments and emails that junket has triggered a lot of memories for you. I am going to search for some junket powder or tablets locally just to experiment. I agree with you though, Alys, the whey is a bit disconserting.

Unknown said...

my grandfather used to make a type of pudding that my Dad used to love when he was a boy during the 1930's my mother called it junketts but my grandfather made it with cornstarch..Cornstarch pudding..It was my favorite..my grandpa made it for my dad when he was well into his fifties...I now make it myself theres a rough recipe on the side of the Argo cornstarch box I add sugar an vanilla.. Thanks for your posts..I thought I was the only person on earth who knew about junkett..

Unknown said...

my grandfather used to make a type of pudding that my Dad used to love when he was a boy during the 1930's my mother called it junketts but my grandfather made it with cornstarch..Cornstarch pudding..It was my favorite..my grandpa made it for my dad when he was well into his fifties...I now make it myself theres a rough recipe on the side of the Argo cornstarch box I add sugar an vanilla.. Thanks for your posts..I thought I was the only person on earth who knew about junkett..

BettyB said...

I love junket but the problem is finding the rennet which is essential. Most supermarkets don't sell it.

Rowena said...

In Sydney, Australia Junket is available in tablets from Woolworths Supermarkets. I love it and so does my cat. When the milk is just warm, put 1/2 a cap of vanilla in. Lovely with stewed fruit.