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Rice Pudding Without Eggs
Mrs. C. H. Wheeler and others.
Two quarts of milk, half a teacup of rice, a little less than a teacup of sugar, the same quantity of raisins, a teaspoon of cinnamon or allspice; wash the rice, and put it with the rest of the ingredients into the milk; bake rather slowly from two to three hours ; stir two or three times the first hour of baking. If properly done, this pudding is delicious.
A true oven rice pudding: no eggs, no custard, just rice, milk and a very long slow bake. Nearly everything depends on the oven being low enough that the milk reduces rather than boils.
- Oven temperature"Rather slowly" points to what these books called a slow oven, somewhere around 275-300F; go to the lower end if your oven runs hot. Much hotter and the milk is likely to boil hard and catch at the edges before the rice has softened.
- The teacupA Victorian teacup is usually reckoned at about 3/4 cup, though these books are inconsistent and some intend a full half-pint. Half a teacup of rice is roughly 1/3 to 1/2 cup, which is deliberately small against two quarts of milk.
- Rice to useOrdinary long- or medium-grain white rice. Parboiled (converted) and instant rices release less starch and will not thicken the milk as well; brown rice is slower to soften and less reliable over the time given.
- MilkWhole milk is best. The pudding sets by starch and reduction alone, with no egg to help, so lower-fat milk tends to give a thinner result.
- The stirringStir two or three times in the first hour only, as the recipe directs, to keep the rice from settling on the bottom. After that it can be left alone, and a browned skin will form on top.
- VesselUse a wide, shallow buttered baking dish of at least 3 quarts; a deep narrow one steams rather than reduces. A tray underneath is sensible in case it bubbles over.
- RaisinsThey will sink and some will scorch against the base. Stirring them down during the first hour helps, or hold them back and fold them in after an hour of baking.
- Doneness and yieldDone when the rice is fully soft and the milk has thickened to a loose cream that will set further as it cools; it should still wobble coming out of the oven. Serves eight to ten, warm or cold.
Baked rice pudding without eggs is the thriftier sort of English baked pudding, standing apart from the rich egg custard puddings of the same period: it asks only for milk, a handful of rice and a slow oven. By the 1870s, when The Home Cook Book appeared -- published in Toronto and closely related to the Chicago book of the same name, both made up of contributions credited to named local women -- rice was cheap and reliable grocery stock, and puddings like this one filled the space between company baking and plain family food. The credit to "Mrs. C. H. Wheeler and others" suggests more than one contributor sent in a version of the same thing, and the closing line, that the pudding is delicious if properly done, reads as a nudge that the skill required is patience with a slow oven.