To make Furmity is a traditional Stuart recipe for a classic carbohydrate staple of cooked barley finished in cream flavoured with spices and thickened with egg yolks and pounded almonds. The full recipe is presented here and I hope you enjoy this classic Stuart version of: To make Furmity.
Take a quart of Creame, a quarter of a pound of French-barley the whitest you can get, and boyle it very tender in three or four severall waters, and let it be cold, then put both together, put in it a blade of Mace, a Nutmeg cut in quarters, a race of Ginger cut in three or five pieces, and so let it boyle a good while, still stirring, and season it with Sugar to your tast, then take the yolks of four Eggs and beat them with a little Cream, and stir them into it, and so let it boyle a little after the Egs are in, then have ready blanched and beaten twenty Almonds kept from oyling, with a little Rose-water, then take a boulter, strainer, and rub your Almonds with a little of your Furmity through the strainer, but set on the fire no more, and stir in a little Salt and a little sliced Nutmeg, pickt out of the great peices of it, and put it in a dish, and serve it.
Modern Redaction
All the way from the Middle Ages, through Tudor times to the end of the 18th Century, where potatoes became more popular, various versions of this dish were the carbohydrate staple and would have been served with every meal.
Ingredients:
1l cream
120g pearl barley, well washed
1 blade of mace
1 nutmeg, quartered
3cm piece of ginger, peeled and cut into four slices
50g sugar (or to taste)
4 egg yolks, well beaten
20 blanched almonds
1 tsp rose water
Method:
Wash the barley well, place in a pan, cover with water and bring to a simmer. Cook for 10 minutes then strain the barley and discard the cooking liquid. Replace the barley in the pan, cover with more water and bring back to a simmer. Cook for about 15 minutes more, or until the barley is tender then drain and mix in a pan with the cream.
Add the spices, bring the mixture to a boil, cover and cook for 20 minutes. Whilst the mixture is cooking, pound the blanched almonds to a paste in a mortar, adding a little of the rose water now and then to prevent the almonds from oiling.
When the barley mixture has cooked, beat the egg yolks in a bowl. Add a generous ladleful of the cream mix to temper and beat to combine. Now add the egg mix to the cream and barley mix and beat well to combine. Stir in the sugar to taste and cook gently (do not boil) until the mixture is thick.
Take off the heat. Take a ladleful of the liquid and mix with the pounded almonds. Pass this mixture through a fine-meshed sieve then beat the almond mixture into the main pan.
Remove the pieces of whole spices, turn into a dish and serve.
