Nesselrode Pudding
Nesselrode Pudding is a chestnut-based frozen dessert invented in the first half of the 19th century and named after Russian diplomat Karl Nesselrode. Variations include Nesselrode Pie, consommé, and sweetbreads. In literature, the dessert is served at a dinner party in Proust's Remembrance of Things Past, eliciting a positive reaction from a guest.
Origin
The invention of Nesselrode Pudding is generally attributed to Chef Mony, who invented the basic idea sometime before 1840 while working for the Russian diplomat Karl Nesselrode. Patricia Bunning Stephens dates the invention by Mony to the Congress of Vienna in 1814–15. According to Jane Grigson, Mony passed the recipe to Jules Gouffe, who published it in his 1867 book Livres de Cuisine and attributed it to Mony. Ian Kelly also attributes the invention to Mony.However Gail Monaghan attributes the creation of the pudding to Antonin Carême, chef to another diplomat Charles Talleyrand, also involved in the Congress of Vienna. Carême himself claims that his good friend Mony obtained the idea from a recipe already published by Carême in the first edition of Le cuisinier parisien, ou l'art de la cuisine française au 19e siècle, which was published in 1828. Historian Annie Gray reports that in the French edition of Le cuisinier parisien, Carême attributes the pudding to Mony, but in the English edition claims it as his own invention, which may account for the confusion over its origins.
Preparation and consumption
The dessert is generally agreed to contain pureed chestnuts, mixed with cream or egg custard, flavoured with dried fruit, including currants, raisins and dried cherries, candied peel and brandy or other spirits. While it was generally presented as a frozen dessert, in some recipes it was set with gelatin instead. An 1897 recipe published in The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book by Fannie Farmer was a pineapple–chestnut icecream with candied fruit and raisins, served with maraschino syrup. The Joy of Cooking, first published 1931, contained a recipe using gelatin-thickened whipped cream with crumbled macaroons, and omitted chestnuts entirely.Variations
The dessert was popular in Victorian times. English writers Eliza Acton and Isabella Beeton published recipes for Nesselrode Pudding, Nesselrode Cream and iced Nesselrode.In the 1950s, the pudding was adapted into Nesselrode Pie or Nesselrode Chiffon Pie, in America. Some recipes for this pie omitted chestnut flavouring entirely, relying on cherries, rum and sherry for flavour. Other dishes with the name Nesselrode include sweetbreads Nesselrode, venison steaks Nesselrode, and consomme Nesselrode, the common feature to all being that they are flavoured with chestnuts.
In culture
Nesselrode Pudding is served at a dinner party in Proust's Remembrance of Things Past. According to P Segal, it is "one of the few dishes served at Proust's interminable dinner parties in Remembrance to merit an exclamation of approval from a guest.", with that approval being: "Ah, what’s this now? What, another Nesselrode pudding! After such a feast of Lucullus, it will behove me to take the waters at Karlsbad!"Novelist Susie Boyt, eating Nesselrode Pudding for the first time in 2016, reported that "It tasted of Christmas, without any of the disappointment."