No. 3101

Italian Pudding

Pouding a l'Italienne

Soften in boiling water half a pound of Smyrna raisins and half a pound of candied orange peel cut in small dice. Place them in a vessel with half a pound of candied cherries washed in hot water and pouring over a few spoonfuls of rum leave them to marinate for one hour. Prepare a small quantity of Genoese cake preparation (No. 3239) finished with orange and spread it on a sheet of paper in a quarter of an inch thick layer, then bake it in a hot oven. As soon as done turn it over on a table, remove the paper and cover with a layer of apricot marmalade (No. 3675), then cut it up into inch and a half in diameter round pieces. Butter and sugar a cylindrical timbale mold (Fig. 150) and lay in the bottom a circle of these pieces, overlapping each other; scatter over the marinated fruits into which have been mingled a few crushed macaroons and on top dress another circle of the cake the same as the first, then more fruits and macaroons, and continue thus until the mold is full. Put into a vessel six egg-yolks, two whole eggs and four ounces of sugar, having a part of it flavored with orange; beat the whole well to mingle properly and dilute with a pint and a half of double cream and half a gill of rum; pass this through a wire sieve and pour it slowly into the mold until full, then cook the pudding in a bain-marie in a slack oven, and just when ready to serve unmold on a dish and pour over a frothy rum sauce (No. 3103), serving more of it separately.

← No. 3100 Humboldt Pudding Hot Entremets — Puddings, Fritters & Soufflés No. 3102 Peach Pudding a la Cleveland →

For the Modern Kitchen

Ranhofer's pudding is a cabinet pudding built in layers: glazed genoise rounds, rum-soaked candied fruit, crushed macaroons, and a rich custard poured in to fill every gap. Nothing here is difficult, but the custard sets the pace.

The hinge: bake the custard low and take its temperatureA "slack oven" is usually taken to mean roughly 300°F, and the water in the bain-marie should stay around 180°F, never simmering. Pull the pudding when the center reads 170–175°F; if the custard boils it curdles and weeps, and a weeping pudding will collapse the moment it is unmolded.
Oven for the cake sheet"A hot oven" for a quarter-inch genoise sheet means 425–450°F, and it will be done in 6–8 minutes. Watch it — at that thickness it goes from set to dry very quickly.
Gill, pint, and double creamA gill is half a cup, so half a gill of rum is 1/4 cup. A pint and a half is 3 cups by American measure. "Double cream" here simply means a very rich cream — modern British double cream runs about 48% fat; heavy whipping cream (36%) is the closest supermarket equivalent and works, though the set is a little softer.
Smyrna raisinsThese were the pale seedless raisins shipped from Izmir; golden sultanas are the direct descendant. Ordinary dark raisins will do but muddy the color of the layers.
MacaroonsNot coconut macaroons. Ranhofer means the crisp almond macaroon — Italian amaretti are the practical substitute, crushed coarsely so they retain some texture in the custard.
Apricot marmaladeThis is a smooth, thick cooked apricot purée, not a chunky preserve. Warm apricot jam with a spoonful of water and push it through a sieve; brush it on while the cake is still warm.
The moldA "cylindrical timbale mold" is closest to a charlotte mold or any deep metal mold of roughly two quarts; the recipe gives no size. Butter it, then dust with sugar rather than flour — the sugar caramelizes lightly and helps release.
Let it settle before unmoldingThe instruction to unmold "just when ready to serve" is sound, but give it 10–15 minutes out of the water bath first so the custard firms. Run a knife around the rim, invert onto a warm dish, and pour the rum sauce over at the table.
YieldA mold of this size serves roughly 10 to 12 as a dessert course.

A Little History

This is No. 3101 from Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894), the enormous compendium he assembled from more than thirty years as chef at Delmonico's in New York. It belongs to the family of molded cabinet or diplomat puddings /em>sponge, dried and candied fruit, and a baked custard binder u2014 that filled the hot entremets course of a formal nineteenth-century menu, where a sweet arrived after the roast rather than at the very end. The name \, often taken to signal the ingredients rather than any Italian recipe: candied orange peel, candied cherries and almond macaroons were the stock in trade of Italian confectioners, and the Smyrna raisins came through the same Mediterranean trade routes into American kitchens. Ranhofer's habit of cross-referencing (the Genoese cake at No. 3239, the apricot marmalade at No. 3675, the rum sauce at No. 3103) is a reminder that the book was written for a brigade working from a shared repertoire of components, not for a home cook starting from scratch.

Century Old Kitchen · Puddings

Every pudding, printed twice.

You just read one recipe three ways — as it was printed, made cookable for today, and set in its history. This book does exactly that for 120 vintage puddings, gathered in one place.

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