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Steamed Date Pudding
1½ cups graham flour, 1/2 tsp. salt and 1 tsp. soda sifted into flour; 1/2 cup molasses, 1/4 cup melted butter, 1/2 cup milk, 1 cup dates cut in pieces, and rolled in flour. Turn into buttered mold, cover tight, and steam 2½ hours. Serve with whipped cream. Never let the water stop boiling.
— Mrs. I. Tunison
A plain steamed molasses pudding of the sort that needed no oven and no eggs. The method is sound; only a few conventions need translating.
- The hinge: never let the water stop boilingThe original says it and means it. A steamed pudding rises on soda and steam alone; if the water goes off the boil the batter collapses and sets heavy. Keep a kettle of boiling water beside the pot and top up the steamer with boiling, never cold, water.
- Graham flourCoarsely milled whole wheat, named for Sylvester Graham. Modern whole wheat flour works directly; a stone-ground whole wheat gives the closer texture. Do not substitute graham cracker crumbs.
- Soda and molassesThe teaspoon of soda is leavening only because the molasses is acidic. Use an unsulphured dark molasses; blackstrap is more bitter and better avoided here, and golden syrup, which is not acidic, risks a soapy taste from unreacted soda.
- The moldA 1 1/2 to 2 quart pudding basin, coffee tin or straight-sided bowl, so the batter fills it no more than two-thirds. Butter it well and cover tight with buttered foil or a cloth tied under the rim so condensation cannot drip in.
- Setting up the steamerStand the mold on a rack or a folded towel in a deep pot, add boiling water to come halfway up the sides, and keep it at a steady low boil with the lid on for the full 2 1/2 hours. A slow cooker on high with water to the same depth also holds the temperature well.
- Flouring the datesTossing the cut dates in flour keeps them suspended rather than sunk. Take the coating flour from the measured 1 1/2 cups so the batter does not tighten.
- Batter consistencyWith 1/2 cup molasses, 1/2 cup milk and 1/4 cup butter to 1 1/2 cups flour this is a soft, just-pourable batter, which is why the original says to turn it into the mold.
- Yield and servingServes six to eight. Let it stand ten minutes before turning out, and serve warm with whipped cream as written, or with a hard sauce or thin lemon sauce.
Steamed puddings belong to the era of the wood or coal range, when a pot on the back of the stove was cheaper and more reliable than holding an oven at temperature for hours, and compiled community cookbooks are full of them. The graham flour is a mark of the same period: milled whole wheat carried the name of Sylvester Graham, the antebellum dietary reformer, and by the turn of the century it had settled into ordinary American baking as a plain, wholesome-tasting flour rather than a health regimen. Dates came through the dried-fruit trade and were among the sweet, keeping ingredients a household could count on out of season, alongside raisins and figs. The recipe carries a contributor's name, as entries in compiled cookbooks generally do; the signature was both a credit and a small guarantee that the dish had been made and eaten in someone's kitchen.