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Queen's Pudding
Butter a plain mould or basin rather thickly with butter, flour it well, and stick raisins, slices of candied peel, or dried fruit over the inside in rows. Fill the basin with layers of bread and butter, and put between each layer sugar flavoured with lemon-rind, blanched and sliced almonds, and candied peel. Pour over the whole a pint of milk which has been mixed with four well-beaten eggs. Cover the basin closely, and boil or steam the pudding. Time to boil the pudding, half an hour. Probable cost, 1s. 2d. Sufficient, if made in a quart mould, for five or six persons.
A steamed bread-and-butter custard turned out of a lined mould. Nothing here is difficult, but the original assumes a Victorian steamer and leaves the sugar quantity to your judgement.
- The hinge: keep the water below a boilAlthough the recipe says "boil," what matters is that the custard sets gently. Keep the water in the pan at a bare simmer around the mould; a hard rolling boil curdles the egg and the pudding weeps when turned out.
- Imperial pintA pint in this book is 20 fl oz, or 2 1/2 US cups. With four eggs that gives a soft custard, about right for a quart mould packed with bread.
- TimingThe recipe says half an hour, which may be short for a full quart mould. Check at 30 minutes and give it longer if needed, up to about an hour; the centre should be set at roughly 170-175F, or a skewer should come out with no liquid custard clinging.
- Sugar, unspecifiedThe original gives no quantity. Three to four tablespoons of sugar rubbed with the zest of one lemon, scattered between the layers, suits this amount of milk and bread.
- Lining the mouldButter thickly, dust with flour, then press the raisins and peel firmly against the sides before any bread goes in, or they slide down as you fill. Chilling the buttered basin for ten minutes helps them stay put.
- Covering closelyPeriod boiled-pudding instructions commonly call for a floured cloth tied over the basin. Use a round of buttered parchment and a sheet of foil pleated across the middle to allow rise, tied under the rim with string; condensation dripping in makes a sodden pudding.
- Bread and butterDay-old bread, crusts off, buttered on one side. Fresh bread collapses into paste and loses the layering the recipe is built around.
- Standing and turning outRest the pudding 10 minutes off the heat before inverting, so the custard firms enough to hold the pattern of fruit. Serve warm, with a lemon or wine sauce if you want it less plain.
- Yield and costFive or six servings from a quart mould, as stated. The "probable cost, 1s. 2d." is a period price note and no guide to anything today.
This belongs among the domestic steamed puddings that carried the name of royalty freely and loosely: there is a Queen's Pudding, a Queen of Puddings, a Queen Cake, and no reliable documentation tying any of them to a particular queen. The construction here is simply a bread-and-butter pudding turned out of a lined mould rather than baked flat in a dish, and the lining of raisins and candied peel in rows is the trick that makes a cheap pudding look like a set piece on the table. Candied citron and orange peel were among the standard store-cupboard luxuries of a late Victorian household, bought by the piece and sliced as needed, which is why they appear in so many of these recipes alongside blanched almonds. Steaming rather than baking produces a moister, paler pudding than an oven ever will.