Fee, Fie, Foe, Friday: Remember Junket Desserts?

Junket Chocolate Custard. Those three words were just about my favorite answer when I asked my Mom what we were having for dessert. It wasn't too sweet, and not terribly chocolatey, but it was creamy and delicious. It was hugely popular through the 1960's but seemed to just slide over the horizon. I hadn't seen those iconic Junket boxes in the supermarket in years. Until today.


For those of you not born around the middle of the last century, Junket custard is a milk custard that is thickened using rennet. Rennet is an enzyme that causes milk to coagulate and separate into curds and whey. Most cheeses generally are made with some sort of rennet. Rennet can come from animal sources, vegetable sources and microbial sources and others  Junket is not made form animal rennet, but vegetable rennet. The topic came up a couple of weeks ago while my friend Sue and I were trying to come up with a vegetarian panna cotta. Most of them are made with commercial gelatin, which is an animal product. We were speculating if the rennet in it would thicken cream, but neither of us had any Junket to try it.

So as Chuck and I were tooling down the baking aisle in our local Wegman's, what should I spot out of the corner of my eye above the myriad of pudding mixes, but those little iconic boxes. Not the dessert mix, but Junket Tablets. Now I can experiment. Except that I forgot to buy cream....  So when I get something good going, I'll let you all know.

Just when we'd given up hope of finding Junket...there it was1