Blancmange

The medieval 'white dish': almond milk set delicately with rice and rose water, a fast-day pudding of the great hall

Origin: Medieval England and Northern France

From the journey of Almond.

The blancmange, the blanc manger or 'white dish', stood among the most prestigious preparations of the medieval European table, served from England to Italy at the feasts of the aristocracy. Its foundation was almond milk, the pale liquor pressed from ground almonds that the medieval kitchen used in vast quantity, above all on the many fast days of the Church calendar, when milk, butter, and eggs were forbidden and the rich almond stood in for them all. Thickened with rice and sweetened, sometimes enriched on flesh days with the shredded white meat of a capon, the blancmange was a study in whiteness, a colour prized as pure and noble, and it was often parted into halves and gilded or coloured for show. The dish is a direct inheritance of the Arab almond kitchen, the almond-milk-and-rice puddings of the medieval Mediterranean carried north into Christian Europe by way of Moorish Spain, Norman Sicily, and the returning Crusaders. The great cookery manuscripts of the age, the English Forme of Cury of around 1390 and the French Ménagier de Paris, give recipes for it under a dozen spellings. Over the centuries the meat fell away and the dish became wholly sweet, the ancestor of the cold, moulded almond-and-milk puddings that still bear the name blancmange in English and French. The sweet version given here keeps the medieval makings, almond milk, rice, sugar, and rose water, in their original purity, a pudding of great delicacy that tastes, above all, of almond.

Ingredients

Blancmange

100 g pudding rice (or ground rice)
900 ml unsweetened almond milk
100 g sugar
1 tbsp rose water
pinch of salt

To finish

40 g blanched almonds, slivered and toasted, to garnish
a little sugar mixed with cinnamon, to dust (optional, medieval)

Method

If using pudding rice, rinse it well. Put the rice and almond milk in a heavy saucepan with the pinch of salt and bring slowly to a gentle simmer.
Cook very gently, stirring often, until the rice is completely soft and the mixture has thickened to a loose porridge, 25 to 35 minutes. Do not let it catch on the base.
Stir in the sugar and rose water and cook a further 2 minutes to dissolve.
For a smooth pudding, blend the mixture until silky; for a traditional, slightly grainy blancmange, leave the rice whole. It will thicken further as it cools.
Pour into a wetted mould or into individual bowls and chill until set and cold, at least 3 hours.
Turn out if moulded, scatter with toasted slivered almonds, and dust with cinnamon sugar if you wish. Serve cold.

Notes

For a firmer set that turns out cleanly, dissolve a little (about 5g) leaf gelatine or agar in the hot mixture before chilling. To make the savoury medieval version (blancmange of capon), omit the rose water and sugar, reduce them sharply, and stir in finely shredded poached chicken breast. The pudding keeps for 2 days, covered, in the refrigerator.

The Gastrographer

Name: Blancmange
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 35 min
Total time: 50 min
Yield: 6
Cuisine: Medieval England and Northern France
Ingredients: 100 g pudding rice (or ground rice); 900 ml unsweetened almond milk; 100 g sugar; 1 tbsp rose water; pinch of salt; 40 g blanched almonds, slivered and toasted, to garnish; a little sugar mixed with cinnamon, to dust (optional, medieval)

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Ingredient originTrade or transit route

Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control