From: "Bonne of Traquair", oftraquair@hotmail.com
Modernly: Beat egg whites until stiff (the powdered kind works and gets rid of that nasty salmonella risk) brush the petals with the eggwhite using a brand new brush (the colorings in paints can be nasty poisoning risks) then dip or sprinkle with sugar. Place on waxed paper to dry.
In period (or close enough): from "Elinor Fettiplaces' Receipt Book" created for Lady Fettiplace 1605, published by Hilary Spurling 1986.
pp. 99 CANDIE FLOWERS
take your flowers, & spread them abroad on a paper, then clarifie sugar as you doo for rock candie, let it boile till it bee more than candie height, then put in your flowers with the stalks upward, & the flowers downeward, as soone as they be through wet in the syrupe take them out, & with a knife spread them abroad on a pieplate, & set them where they may dry.
Ms. Spurling interprets as follows:
Take a pound of sugar for the syrup with just enough water--say a quarter of a pint--to moisten it (again moder refined suage makes the preliminary clarfication unnecessary.) Heat gently, stirring occaisionally, until the sugar has dissolved, then boil hard until the syrup passes 'candie heigh' (240 F, 115 C on the sugar thermometer), which is when it will form a soft
ball in cold water, or a short thread between your thumb and forefinger. Lady Fettiplace gives admirably clear directions for gauging this stage of syrup in her reipe for Rock Candie: 'let it boile till it bubble up in great bubbles, then dip your finger in it, & pull them asunder, & when it drawes out in a string betweene your fingers, & breaks in the middle,
& shrinks upward like a worme, it is inoughe.' Let the syrup cool before you dip the flowers if you want them to keep their shape.
My notes: when working with candy, hot and humid air is your enemy!
Turning the AC up a bit will help. Depending on the airflow in your house, you may have to avoid other heat/steam producing tasks in the background:
Baking in the oven or a pot simmering on the stove may make the kitchen too warm and steamy.
Enjoy!
Lady Bonne de Traquair
Windmasters' Hill, Atlantia
