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Gooseberry Pudding
1 cupful sweet milk, 1/2 cupful sugar, 2 eggs beaten separately, 2 tablespoonfuls melted butter, 1 teaspoonful baking-powder sifted with 1 pint flour, vanilla. Butter a pudding-dish, pour in 1 1/2 cupfuls gooseberry jam (and add 2 tart apples, sliced fine, if you choose). Pour batter over and steam one hour, or bake.
Sauce.--3/4 cupful sugar, 1/2 cupful of butter, beaten together; add 1 well-beaten egg, juice and a little grated rind of 1 lemon, teaspoonful grated nutmeg. Mix thoroughly, add 1/2 cupful boiling water, set bowl in top of boiling teakettle. Stir constantly till done, but do not boil.
A steamed or baked jam pudding of the plainest kind, saved by its lemon-nutmeg sauce. The only tricky part is the sauce, which is a stirred custard by another name and will curdle if it is allowed to boil.
- A pint of flourFlour was still measured by volume in a pint measure: reckon it at 2 cups, about 9 oz / 250 g. Sift it with the baking powder as directed, since one teaspoon for that much flour is a modest amount of lift and needs to be evenly distributed.
- Steamed or bakedTo steam, cover the buttered dish tightly with foil or a cloth, stand it on a rack in a covered pot with water halfway up the sides, and keep the water at a bare simmer for the full hour. The recipe gives no temperature or time for baking; a moderate oven of around 350F for 40 to 50 minutes, until the batter is set and springs back, works in practice.
- Pudding-dishA deep ovenproof bowl or baking dish of about 2 quarts. The jam goes in first and the batter over it, so the pudding turns out with a sauced top; leave at least an inch of headroom for the rise.
- Gooseberry jamGreen gooseberry preserve is now a specialty item in most of the United States. Any tart, firm jam works in the same role -- red currant, damson, or sour cherry -- and the two sliced tart apples are worth adding, since they absorb some of the sugar and keep the base from going syrupy.
- Eggs beaten separatelyYolks go into the batter with the milk, butter and sugar; the whites are whipped to soft peaks and folded in last. The whites contribute much of the lift, since the baking powder is used sparingly.
- The sauce is a custardButter, sugar, egg, lemon and boiling water thickened over steam is a foaming sauce, and "do not boil" is the hinge of the whole recipe. Set the bowl over simmering water rather than balancing it on a kettle spout, stir without stopping, and take it off when it thickens enough to coat a spoon -- around 170F on a thermometer.
- NutmegA full teaspoon of grated nutmeg is assertive by current taste. Half that, freshly grated, suits most palates, and the lemon rind should be finely zested so no bitter pith gets in.
- YieldServes six to eight, warm, with the sauce poured over at the table. Both pudding and sauce are best the day they are made; the sauce will separate if reheated hard.