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Military Puddings
Mix well together half a pound of bread-crumbs, half a pound of moist sugar, and half a pound of finely-chopped suet. Mince the rind of a good-sized lemon, squeeze the juice out and stir it into the mixture. Place the puddings in small buttered cups or moulds, and bake for half an hour in a tolerably quick oven. If preferred, military puddings may be boiled; if so, they must be made into small balls. In either case serve with lemon or wine sauce. Probable cost with sauce, 1s. Sufficient for five or six persons, or to fill six or seven cups.
A plain Victorian suet pudding of the cheapest kind — four ingredients, no eggs, no flour. It is easy to make well, but the proportions assume things about the suet and crumbs that are worth spelling out.
- The mixture is meant to be stiffEqual weights of crumbs, sugar and suet bound only by the juice of one lemon gives a barely cohesive mass. Press it firmly into the moulds so it holds together; if it will not hold at all, a beaten egg or a spoonful of milk will bind it, though this recipe does not call for one.
- Moist sugarLight brown soft sugar. Victorian "moist" sugar was unrefined or partly refined and slightly damp, quite unlike modern white granulated, and it contributes both colour and a little of the binding moisture the recipe relies on.
- SuetHalf a pound of beef suet, finely chopped — shredded packet suet is the direct modern equivalent, and vegetarian suet behaves much the same here. If using a piece of raw kidney suet, chill it hard and grate it, discarding membrane.
- BreadcrumbsSoft fresh white crumbs, not dried or golden crumbs. Dried crumbs will absorb what little liquid there is and give a sandy pudding.
- "A tolerably quick oven"Somewhere in the region of 400F (200C). Half an hour at that heat in small cups is about right; the tops should be set and lightly browned.
- The mouldsDariole moulds or ovenproof teacups of roughly 4 fl oz each. Butter them well — the sugar content makes them stick. Six or seven is the stated yield.
- If boiling insteadNo time is given for the boiled version, which is a real gap. Suet balls of this size would need something in the region of 45 minutes to an hour, tied loosely in floured cloth or wrapped in scalded muslin to allow for swelling.
- Lemon rind"Mince the rind" means pare the zest thinly and chop it fine; a microplane does the same job faster. Avoid the white pith, which is bitter and does not soften in half an hour.
- The sauce is not optionalThe pudding itself is dry and one-note. A lemon sauce (sugar, water, lemon, thickened with a little cornflour or butter and flour) or a sweet wine sauce supplies the moisture the batter lacks.
Suet puddings of this type filled the cheapest pages of Victorian cookery books, and the cost with sauce is given as one shilling — modest even then, feeding five or six. The name is traditional rather than documented. The recipe belongs to a family that includes college pudding and the various "plain boiled" puddings, all built on the same trio of breadcrumbs or flour, suet and sugar, and distinguished chiefly by their flavouring — here lemon, elsewhere currants, treacle or jam.