Bachelor's Pudding
INGREDIENTS for small pudding.-4 oz. of grated bread, 4 oz. of currants, 2 apples, 2 oz. of BACON, BOILED. sugar, 3 eggs, a few drops of essence of lemon.
AVERAGE COST, 8d.
Pare, core and chop the apples finely, add the currants, bread-crumbs and sugar, beat the eggs and add to them the flavouring; then mix all well together and put in a buttered basin. Tie a cloth over this and boil for 3 hours.
TIME.-3 hours to boil.
SEASONABLE at any time.
A plain boiled suet-less pudding built on breadcrumbs rather than flour, and one of the simplest in the book. The whole thing hinges on keeping the water at a steady simmer for the full three hours.
- Quantities in brief4 oz grated bread is about 2 cups of fresh crumbs; 4 oz currants is roughly 3/4 cup; 2 oz sugar is a scant 1/3 cup. Two apples means cooking or eating apples of ordinary size, around 8 oz total once pared and cored.
- Grated bread, not dried crumbsVictorian "grated bread" is slightly stale crumb grated on a box grater, soft and moist. Packaged dry breadcrumbs will absorb the egg differently and give a dense, sandy pudding; use day-old bread and grate it yourself.
- Essence of lemonEssences of this period were oil of lemon dissolved in spirit, and strength varied a good deal between makers. The recipe asks only for a few drops, so start with a scant 1/8 teaspoon of modern lemon extract, or use the finely grated zest of one lemon instead.
- The basin and the clothA 1 1/2 pint pudding basin, well buttered, filled no more than two-thirds. A pleated sheet of buttered baking parchment under the cloth, both tied under the rim with string and a string handle across the top, makes it far easier to lift out.
- Boiling methodStand the basin on a trivet or folded cloth in a deep pan, with water coming halfway up the sides, and keep it at a bare simmer rather than a rolling boil. Top up with boiling water as it drops; a basin that boils dry will scorch and crack.
- Three hours is realThree hours -- this is what the recipe specifies, and it is a long boil for a mixture of this size, which would set sooner. Keep the heat gentle rather than fierce; it is done when a skewer comes out clean and the pudding shrinks slightly from the basin.
- Yield and servingThe recipe calls this a small pudding; three or four portions. Turn out onto a warm dish and serve with custard, cream, or a sweet wine sauce; it eats well cold the next day, sliced.
- Average cost, 8d.The recipe's own costing, eightpence, for a pudding made of stale bread, dried fruit, two apples and three eggs.
The name belongs to the Victorian habit of labelling plain, thrifty dishes for the solitary eater. What the recipe reflects is the treatment of stale loaf as an ingredient rather than waste, before commercial crumbs and cheap flour, and the place of boiled puddings in cloth-tied basins in ordinary family cookery.