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Raspberry Dumpling
Prepare in the same way as Steamed Blueberry Dumpling, using four cups of raspberries instead of blueberries.
This is a one-line variation, so everything hinges on the recipe it points to: Steamed Blueberry Dumpling earlier in the Desserts chapter. A few notes on making the swap work.
- Find the parent recipe firstNothing here stands alone — the flour, fat, sweetening, liquid and steaming time all come from the blueberry dumpling. Read that recipe through before you buy fruit, since the substitution is the only change being asked for.
- Four cups of raspberriesThat is roughly 1 lb to 1 lb 4 oz, or about three to four standard 6-oz supermarket clamshells. Frozen berries work but should go in still frozen and unrinsed, or they will slump into the batter.
- Raspberries are wetter than blueberriesBlueberries hold their skins through a steaming; raspberries collapse and release a great deal of juice. Toss them with a tablespoon of the recipe's flour before folding them in, and fold no more than a few strokes.
- Steamed, not bakedA steamed dumpling of this period means a buttered mold or basin filled about two-thirds, covered tightly with a lid or pleated foil, set on a rack in a covered pot with boiling water reaching halfway up. Keep the water at a steady simmer and top it up with boiling water, never cold.
- TimingThe blueberry recipe's own steaming time governs; steamed puddings of this size commonly ran somewhere around 1 to 1.5 hours. Test with a skewer in the center; the raspberry version reads wetter than the blueberry one, so judge by the crumb between the fruit rather than by clean-skewer alone.
- Sauce was assumedSauce -- Steamed dumplings of this era were commonly sent to table with a sauce, though the recipe here says nothing about one. Hard sauce, a foamy egg sauce, or plain cream all suit raspberries.
- YieldA single molded dumpling of this size would likely serve about six, depending on the parent recipe's proportions. Individual custard cups or ramekins work as well and will steam in considerably less time.
Lowney's Cook Book was compiled by Maria Willett Howard and published in 1907 for the Walter M. Lowney Company, a Boston chocolate manufacturer — one of the many turn-of-the-century cookbooks issued by a food business to keep its product in American kitchens. Steamed puddings and dumplings fill a large part of its dessert chapter, which reflects a period when a pot on the range was more reliable than an unregulated coal or wood oven; steam holds a fixed temperature whatever the fire is doing. Terse cross-referenced variations like this one were standard editorial practice, letting a book cover blueberry, raspberry, blackberry and cherry versions of the same dumpling in a few lines. New England raspberries were a short high-summer crop, generally picked locally and cooked within a day or two, which is part of why so many of these fruit desserts are built to use several cups at once.