Delight Evans' Turkish Delight

Karie Bible
33 minutes ago
2 min read

I went down a rabbit hole to learn about this forgotten figure from Hollywood history.

Cordelia D. "Delight" Evans fell under the spell of movies and became an important film critic in the 1920s. By 1926 she became the youngest and only female film editor of a fan magazine. Evans served as the head editor for Screenland Magazine from 1928 until 1948. In 1938 she partnered with the American Stove Company for a radio show called Food Secrets of the Hollywood Stars. It lasted for 13 weeks, but is sadly not available in any archive today. She also had a small cookbook based on the radio series as well.

Recipe

Every episode sends me down a rabbit hole and this one was no different. Click HERE to see an article about the history of Turkish Delight.

Ingredients:

3 tablespoons Gelatine

1/2 cup cold water

2 cups granulates sugar

1/2 cup boiling water

Grated rind of one orange

Juice of one orange

Juice of one lemon

Red coloring

1/2 cup of nut meats

Directions:

Soak gelatine in cold water ten minutes. Put sugar and boiling water in saucepan, bring to the boiling point, add soaked gelatine and let boil twenty minutes. Add flavorings and coloring, strain, add nut meats and turn into a bread pan (first dipped in cold water) to one inch in depth. Let stand until firm, remove to board, cut in cubes and roll in powdered sugar.

Special Guest

Mary Mallory is a film historian and author of Hollywoodland, Hollywood Celebrates the Holidays, Hollywood at Play and Living with Grace: Life Lessons from America's Princess. She also blogs about Los Angeles and film history at LA Daily Mirror.

Video

Final Result

In spite of my difficulties, these turned out reasonably well. I am eager to try Turkish Delight in a candy store or restaurant where it is presumably made by people who know what they are doing. This is pretty much like wiggly pieces of jello covered in powdered sugar. It tastes good and is edible, so I'm going to chalk this up as a win.