04 February 2010
Recipe for Traditional Pudding: Queen of Puddings
I was listening to Radio 4 the other day and they were talking about steam puddings and how it is a truly English traditional that is not found anywhere else. One of the puds they were talking about was Queen of Puddings which was being made at Riverford Farm Shop (I think).
This is one of our firm family favourites and used to be my grandfather's favourite pudding, as well. I made it the other weekend for my parents as my dad says he never gets it cooked for him. Here's how we did it:
Ingredients
290ml / ½ pint full fat milk, ideally organic
15g / ½ oz butter, ideally organic
30g / 1 oz organic Fairtrade caster sugar
60ml / 4 tablespoons white breadcrumbs
Grated rind of 1 lemon
2 free range eggs, separated into whites and yolks
1tsp Steenbergs organic Fairtrade vanilla extract
30ml / 2tbps raspberry jam or raspberries in a sauce, warmed to make runny
110g / 4 oz organic Fairtrade caster sugar
Preheat the oven to 180oC /350oF.
Warm the milk then add the butter and sugar. Stir it all with a wooden spoon until the sugar has all dissolved, then add the breadcrumbs and lemon rind.
Seperate the eggs. Whisk the eggs gently by hand and add the Steenbergs organic Fairtrade vanilla extract into this. When the breadcrumbs mixture has cooled down a bit, stir in this egg yolk mixture thoroughly. Pour the breadcrumb custard mix into a pie dish and leave to stand for 30 minutes somewhere cool.
Put into the preheated oven and bake for 25 minutes, or until set. This can be done in a bain marie for even more exacting results, but it doesn't need it if you watch over it. Remove and allow to cool.
Reduce the oven to 150oC /300oF.
Using the warmed jam, spread this over the top of the set breadcrumb-custard base. At my parents, we used some frozen raspberries from the garden which we warmed through and then added some sugar to; this was less sweet than using raspberry jam and had a better mouth feel or texture, but maybe are less close to hand.
Whip the egg whites until stiff and then whisk into this about 2 teaspoons of the caster sugar. Whisk again until very stiff and then fold in all but ½ teaspoon of caster sugar. Pour this over the top of the base, then sprinkle over the remaining caster sugar.
Bake in the oven for about 10 minutes until the meringue is set and lightly brown at the edges.
You could serve this alone, as we do, or with a luxurious clotted cream or even vanilla infused whipped cream.
