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Graham Puffs
2 cups graham flour 1 teaspoon sugar 1/2 teaspoon salt 2 cups milk 3 eggs, well beaten Mix dry ingredients; beat eggs until very light; add milk to dry ingredients; slowly beat in eggs, and continue beating for 3 minutes. Turn batter into well greased warm muffin pans and bake in moderate oven for 30 minutes. If taste of rye is liked, 1 cup rye meal may be substituted for the graham.
This is a popover batter made with whole-grain flour rather than white, baked in muffin tins. There is no baking powder or soda in it; all the lift comes from steam and beaten egg, which makes the handling of the pans and the oven heat the whole point.
- The hinge: hot, greased pansGrease the tins and heat them in the oven before the batter goes in, as the recipe implies with "warm muffin pans." Batter poured into cold tins sets before it can climb and you get dense little cakes instead of puffs.
- Oven temperatureA moderate oven of this period is usually given as somewhere around 350-375F. At that heat over 30 minutes you will get a moist, custardy popover with modest rise; most current popover practice starts nearer 425F for the first 15 minutes to force the steam, then drops to 350F to set the walls.
- Graham flourGraham flour is coarsely ground whole wheat, including the bran and germ. Ordinary stone-ground whole wheat flour is the closest supermarket equivalent. The batter will look thin, which is correct.
- Rye mealThe rye variation calls for rye meal, a coarse rye grind rather than the fine light rye flour sold today. Substituting fine rye flour works but gives a smoother, slightly gummier crumb, since rye forms little useful gluten to hold the structure.
- BeatingThe recipe asks for three minutes of beating after the eggs go in. A stand mixer on medium or a few minutes of steady whisking both do the job. Rest the batter 15 minutes if it looks lumpy.
- Filling and yieldFill the cups about two-thirds. Two cups of flour with two cups of milk and three eggs gives roughly 12 standard muffin-tin puffs, or 6 to 8 in deep popover cups.
- Don't open the doorLeave the oven shut for the first 20 minutes. A draught of cool air collapses the steam structure and it will not come back.
Graham flour takes its name from Sylvester Graham, the 1830s American temperance preacher and diet reformer who argued that unsifted whole-wheat meal was morally and physically superior to the fine white flour of commercial bakers. By the time this book was written the crusading edge had worn off and graham flour had settled into ordinary use as a wholesome, high-bran staple. The batter itself belongs to the popover and Yorkshire pudding family, leavened by steam alone.