The encyclopædia of practical cookery

COMMANDERIA. — A famous wine of Cyprus, so called from a commandery once possessed by the Knights Templars at Colossi, near Limasol. It is described as a sweet Malmsey variety, very strong in alcohol. When newly made it is as dark as brown sherry, growing paler as it matures, and then darkening again with age until it becomes almost black. This wine rarely reaches our coast, the greater quantity being supplied to Austria, France, and Italy. COMPOTES.— A very extensive use of this expressive term is made by Continental cooks ; whereas among our native cooks Compotes signify little more than dishes of stewed fruits and syrup. Savoury Compotes are not much practised by them, although many of our small birds, some kinds of fish, and tasty meats can be turned to good account in this way. Compotes of fruit and other things are fully described under their various headings, but there are a few special Compotes that will be better given here. Compote de Seville. — Put in a basin the yolks of twelve eggs, 2 table-spoonfuls of cream, and 2 teaspoonfuls of vanilla sugar, and beat them well. Put some syrup of about 20deg. in a saute-pan, and let it simmer ; drop in 1 dessert-spoonful at a time of the cream mixture, thus making small round pats ; turn them, and when done on both sides, drain them. Stick two of these pats together with orange marmalade, stamp them out with a circular tin cutter, and place each one as it is done on a clean baking-sheet. Dust some cinnamon sugar over the top, lightly colour them with a red-hot Compotes — continued. salamander, arrange them spirally on a Compote-dish, and pour round a little orange syrup, flavoured with rum to taste. Cremona Compote.— Boil 1 pint of syrup to 28deg., mix in 1 teacupful of vinegar, boil up again, and let it cool. Drain off the syrup from 41b. of mixed newly-preserved fruits, and put them in a jug. Mix 1 teaspoonful of powdered mustard with not quite i pint of water, stir it in gradually with the syrup, pour the whole over the fruit, and let it remain for twenty-four hours. Pour out when required, and serve in a Compote-dish, Golden Compote. — Turn a small fancy mould of either currant, quince, raspberry, or other jelly into the middle of a dish, and make a circle round it of preserved peaches and apricots, cut in halves and trimmed, and boiled in syrup coloured with saffron. Cut some imitation leaves out of candied angelica, arrange them on the top of the circle of fruit, surround the base with a wreath of preserved cherries (see Fig. 509), and serve. The jelly can be decorated if desired, and the summit crowned with crystallised fruit. Grecian Compote. — Cut some stale cake of any kind into pieces about the size and shape of small fowl’s eggs, put them in a saute-pan with a little thick syrup, warm up sharply so that the syrup shall come to the caramel degree, and glaze one side of the cakes only. Take them out before the sugar burns, and drain them on a wire sieve, with the glazed side uppermost. In the centre of a Compote-dish pile some Spanish Compote (Branco), and build the caramelled pieces of cake round the branco, sticking them together with apricot marmalade. Strew cinnamon sugar over the tops of the cakes, pour strongly-flavoured orange syrup round the Compote, and serve.