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Marrow Pudding
Arrange in layers, in a buttered mould, a quarter of a pound of bread, cut in thin slices, three ounces of marrow, chopped fine, an ounce of citron, cut small, and two ounces of pounded sweet almonds. Cover with a sauce made of half a pint of milk or cream, three eggs, well beaten, and a sufficient quantity of sugar and nutmeg to flavour the whole. Boil for an hour, or bake for forty minutes, turn the pudding out of the mould, and serve with a little sifted sugar over it. The almonds may be left out, and raisins or currants substituted. Probable cost, with cream, 1s. 8d. Sufficient for four persons.
A Victorian bread-and-butter pudding enriched with beef marrow in place of butter. It is straightforward, but two things in the text need translating: the marrow itself, and the instruction to "boil" a pudding.
- "Boil" means steam in a water bath"Boil" here is done in a covered mould set in water rather than dropped naked into the pot: butter the mould, cover it (greased paper or foil, tied down), stand it in a pan of water and keep the water at a steady simmer for an hour. Gentle heat is what protects the custard. The recipe gives no oven setting for the baked version; a moderate oven, around 350F, with the mould standing in a tin of hot water, is a reasonable modern equivalent rather than anything the book specifies.
- Imperial measuresCassell's is a British book, so half a pint is 10 fl oz, or a scant 1 1/4 US cups. A quarter pound of bread is about 4 oz, roughly four thin slices from a sandwich loaf with crusts.
- Beef marrowAsk a butcher for marrow bones and scoop the raw marrow out, or buy canoe-cut bones and push it free with a thumb. Yield varies with the bone, so weigh it; you may need more than one or two. Chop it cold and firm, straight from the refrigerator; at room temperature it smears. Butter substitutes at the same weight if marrow is unavailable, though the result is lighter and less savoury.
- CitronCandied citron peel, the same product sold for fruitcake, not the citrus fruit itself. Chop it fine. Candied orange or lemon peel is a fair stand-in.
- Sweet almondsSimply ordinary blanched almonds. The Victorian distinction was against bitter almonds, which contain amygdalin and were used sparingly as a flavouring. "Pounded" means worked in a mortar to a coarse paste, not milled to flour; pulse briefly in a processor.
- Let it soakThe recipe does not say so, but give the assembled pudding 20 to 30 minutes before it goes near heat so the bread absorbs the custard. Otherwise the top layer stays dry and the bottom sets solid.
- Sugar quantity"A sufficient quantity" is left to the cook. Two ounces (about 1/4 cup) suits the citron and almonds; go to three if you use currants instead, which need a little more support than their own sweetness suggests.
- Turning outRest the cooked pudding five minutes before inverting, and butter the mould generously with attention to the rim. The quantities fill a basin or charlotte mould of rather more than a pint; allow for it. Serves four as written.
Bone marrow was a standard enriching fat in British kitchens well into the nineteenth century, valued because it was cheap, came free with the bones, and gave puddings and forcemeats a richness butter could not match. Marrow puddings appear in English cookery books from the seventeenth century onward, usually in this form: bread or biscuit layered with marrow, dried fruit and candied peel, bound with an egg custard and boiled in a cloth or mould. The alternative offered at the end, raisins or currants in place of the almonds, may well be the tell: almonds were the expensive option, and the recipe appears to be written so it can be made either way.