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In this Issue: Refrigerator Cakes Strawberry Refrigerator Cake, Luscious Chocolate Icebox Cake Celebrity Citing James Cagney's Chowder, Bruce Dern's Stew, Kirk Douglas' Meatloaf, Telly Savalas' Lamb Bread Baked in Cans Date Nut Bread two waysButtery Meringue Crescents Yugoslav Kifle, Sweetheart Crescent Flowerpot Breads Herb and Onion, Plain Reader favorites Brazilian Beef, SeaFoam Brown Sugar Divinity, Sea Foam Frosting, Pepper-Cheese Bread Convito-style, Apple-Nut Cake two ways Better Left Lost Corned Beef Jello Salad

Since the egg whites won't be cooked, use pasteurized.This is an intensely chocolatey mousse.

Luscious Chocolate Icebox Cake

Dreamy, chilled desserts full of cream, marshmallow, or mousse were very popular with housewives of the forties and fifties when the potential of the home refrigerator was still being explored. From bombes and baked Alaskas, to mousses, meringues, marlows and mallobets-- refrigerator cookbooks celebrated them all. Steering around more-dubious creations like the Fig Banana Brick (!) we revisit the Luscious Chocolate Icebox Cake which layers creamy fillings over ladyfinger cookies that soften as the dessert sets. Interestingly, this recipe appears in both the 1941 CAI Refrigerator Desserts book, and, a 1958 Baker's Favorite Chocolate Recipes handbook from General Mills.

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Adapted from Culinary Arts Institute "Refrigerator Desserts," 1941. Serves 10 to 15
(Note: This recipe has been doubled, to make enough to fill a large mold)
Ingredients
  • 6 squares Baker's Unsweetened Chocolate
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 cup hot water
  • 2 Tbsp cold water
  • 3 tsp granulated gelatin
  • 8 egg yolks
  • 2 tsp vanilla
  • 8 pasteurized egg whites, stiffly beaten
  • 1 cup cream, whipped
  • 4 dozen lady fingers
Instructions
  1. Whip 8 egg whites until they hold a peak. Set aside, keeping cool. Whip cream. Set aside, keeping cool.
  2. Melt chocolate in top of double boiler. Add sugar, salt and hot water, stirring until sugar is dissolved and mixture blended. Add cold water to gelatin and mix. Add to hot chocolate mixture and stir until gelatin is dissolved; then cook until mixture is smooth and thickened.
  3. Remove from boiling water. Add egg yolks, one at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition. Once all are incorporated, place over boiling water and cook 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Add vanilla; cool.
  4. Fold cooled chocolate mixture into egg whites. Chill for about 20 minutes. Fold in whipped cream.
  5. Line bottom and sides of mold with waxed paper, making sure waxed paper pieces are large enough to have excess hanging over the edges of the mold. Put a little of the chocolate mousse in the bottom of the mold. Stand ladyfingers around the inside of the complete circumference of the mold. Then, line bottom of mold with several rows of lady fingers laid flat, cutting some to fit the circular shape of the bottom of the mold. Fill mold halfway with mousse. Arrange another layer of ladyfingers over this, cutting them to fit. Fill the rest of the mold with the remainder of the mousse. Cover with plastic wrap and chill for 12 to 24 hours. Mousse will firm up nicely and lady fingers will soften, but hold their shape.
  6. Unmold by inverting onto a cake plate and removing waxed paper.

Trying to get ladyfingers lined up around the inside rim of a wax-paper-lined dessert mold without having them topple is nearly impossible. What I learned? Pour a little mousse in the bottom of the mold first to give the ladyfinger tips something to stick to and help stabilize them. Also I used a very large mold, so doubled the mousse recipe in order to fill the entire mold.
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