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Steamed Pudding
1/2 1/2 pound of seeded raisins. 4 eggs. 2 cupfuls of sugar. 3 cupfuls of flour. 1 cupful of sour cream. 1 teaspoonful of soda. 2 teaspoonful of cream tartar. Let it steam two hours. Have the water boiling fast, and don't open till it has boiled two hours.--Mrs. Dr. J.
A plain steamed batter pudding of the sort that filled out a winter dinner. The instruction that matters most is the last one: the steam must not be interrupted, or the pudding sinks and sets heavy.
- Keep the lid onA steamed pudding rises on trapped steam and expanding gas from the soda. Lifting the lid drops the temperature and collapses the crumb, which is exactly why the original insists on two hours undisturbed with the water boiling hard. Check the water level only if the pot is small, and top up with boiling water poured down the side.
- The vesselUse a 2-quart pudding basin, mold or coffee can, well buttered and filled no more than two-thirds. Cover with buttered parchment and foil tied under the rim, and set it on a rack or folded cloth in a deep pot with water reaching halfway up the mold.
- Sour cream in 1877This meant cream soured naturally, thinner and less uniform than today's stabilized sour cream, though not necessarily more acidic. Cultured buttermilk is a reasonable stand-in; commercial sour cream thinned with a few spoonfuls of milk works and gives a richer pudding.
- Soda and cream of tartarTogether they are homemade baking powder, and 1 teaspoon soda with 2 of cream of tartar works out to roughly 4 teaspoons of baking powder, about the usual amount for 3 cups of flour. If you substitute commercial baking powder, about 4 teaspoons is the nearest equivalent. Mix the leaven into the flour and get the pudding into the steam promptly.
- What the list omitsThere is no salt and no spice. Half a teaspoon of salt is worth putting in; a teaspoon of cinnamon or a grating of nutmeg would not be out of place.
- Flour and sugarNineteenth-century soft Southern flour was lower in protein than modern all-purpose. A cup of it weighed about 4 oz, and a cupful of sugar about 7 oz. Measure by scooping and leveling rather than packing, or the batter turns stiff.
- Raisins"Seeded" means the seeds have been removed, which modern raisins already are. Toss them in a spoonful of the measured flour so they do not sink to the bottom of the mold.
- Doneness and yieldAfter two hours a skewer should come out clean and the pudding should have pulled slightly from the sides. Let it stand 10 minutes before turning out. It serves 8, and expects a sauce -- hard sauce, or a thin boiled sugar-and-butter sauce with a little brandy.
Housekeeping in Old Virginia, compiled by Marion Cabell Tyree and published in 1877, gathered contributions from some 250 Virginia housekeepers, which is why so many recipes arrive signed with an initial or a title rather than a full name -- "Mrs. Dr. J." is typical of a period when a married woman's name in print was often her husband's. The recipe itself is the barest kind of note, a memory aid for a cook who already knew that a batter goes into a buttered mold and the mold into a covered pot. Steamed puddings were the practical dessert of a kitchen with an unreliable oven: the boiling water holds a fixed temperature no wood fire can guarantee, and a pot on the range needs no attention beyond keeping it full. The sour cream is a farm detail as much as a leavening one, since cream that had turned was too good to waste and its acid did useful work against the soda.