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Baked Indian Pudding
1 quart rich milk 6 tablespoons cornmeal 6 tablespoons flour 1/4 cup sugar 1/2 cup cold milk 1/4 cup molasses 1/2 cup raisins 1 egg, beaten 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon ground caraway seed, if desired Heat the milk in a double boiler, then stir into it the cornmeal and flour, which have been previously mixed together, and cook, stirring till the milk is thickened. Then add the other ingredients, mix well, and turn into a pudding dish. Set the dish in a pan of water in the oven, cover, and bake three hours. At the last the pudding may be removed from the water and baked with the cover off to brown the top of the pudding slightly. Serve plain or with cream or whipped cream or with apple juice boiled down with sugar to a thick sirup, using two cups sugar to one quart of apple juice.
A baked cornmeal pudding of the New England type, thickened on the stove first so that it sets reliably in the oven. Nothing here is obsolete, but the oven instruction and the long bake need translating.
- Oven temperatureThe recipe names no temperature. A three-hour covered bake in a water bath implies a slow oven; around 300F suits it. Much hotter risks curdling the custard and boiling the water jacket dry, so check the water level as it goes.
- The water bath is not optionalThe water bath -- The recipe calls for it and it is worth keeping: three hours of direct oven heat can curdle the egg and milk at the edges. Use a deep pan, fill it with boiling water to roughly halfway up the pudding dish, and top it up if it drops.
- CornmealStone-ground yellow or white meal, medium grind, is what this expects; the older books call it Indian meal. Instant or degerminated meal absorbs differently and gives a thinner set.
- Mixing meal with flourCombining the cornmeal and flour dry before they hit the hot milk is what keeps the mixture from lumping. Add the mixture in a slow stream and keep stirring over the double boiler until it visibly thickens, as the recipe directs; over indirect heat this can take a good while.
- The half cup of cold milkIt is listed separately and goes in with the other additions, so it is not a duplication or an error. It loosens a base that has stiffened on the stove, and it may also have been meant to cool the mixture before the beaten egg goes in.
- CarawayAn optional period flavouring that reads as distinctly old-fashioned now. A quarter teaspoon of ground caraway is assertive against molasses; cinnamon or nutmeg is the more familiar substitution if you would rather.
- Browning at the endLift the dish out of the water and take the cover off, as the recipe allows, and give it long enough to colour lightly -- the recipe wants only a slight browning. If the top stays pale, a brief turn at higher heat will do it, but watch it closely.
- The apple syrupTwo cups sugar to one quart apple juice, boiled down, makes a thick pouring sauce, as the recipe says. Boil until it visibly thickens and expect it to thicken further as it cools; keep it refrigerated and use it up within a few days.
- YieldA quart of milk plus the additions fills a two-quart dish and serves six to eight. It is better warm than hot, and it firms considerably overnight.