book: Fannie's Last Supper; jellies; gelatin(e)

[Jean B.]

I guess this would fit in here....

Has anyone read Fannie's Last Supper? If so, what did you think?
I gave it a rather negative review on librarything. However,
some of the recipes sound interesting.

I am especially intrigued by the jellies, although I don't think I
would make my own gelatin(e)* from animal parts. Has anyone here
tried constructing jellies with a design? I assume that one would
need to build up the supporting gelatin(e) gradually (e.g., if one
was making a spiral of colored gelatin(e) inside. I need to go
look at my Victorian cookbooks.

[*Gelatin(e)--how did that "e" get dropped in the United States?
I need to look at my booklets to see when that happened too.]

[h***@gmail.com]

Hello from Atlanta. Fannie's Last Supper is a real favorite of mine. For Christmas, I gave the book and the video (recorded off TV) to some ten (selected) friends that have an appreciation for such things. I sent the book in early December and then followed it up with the video closer to Christmas. I wanted the friends to read the book first and did not tell them in advance that the video would follow. I wrote a letter that accompanied the book to get them excited enough to read it. I pointed out that the book is not necessarily a book of recipes ...more of a book of both Boston as well as late-Victoria era culinary history. Most everyone had parents or grandparent s that had grownup in the era; so, they all had some direct knowledge of the way it was back in the day. All were also familiar in some way with Christopher Kimball. In short, this is a niche book and is not for everyone and the reader has to approach it as a report of the writer's journey to produce the meal. Everyone that received the book pretty much read it through or finished it before seeing the video and each said that they are glad that they had read the book first before seeing the video which really brings the book alive.