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Steamed Pudding (II)
Mrs. Snider.
One cup molasses, one cup suet, three cups flour, one cup sour milk, one teaspoon soda, two teaspoons cream tartar, one teaspoon ginger, one cup each of currants and raisins; steam two hours.
A plain nineteenth-century steamed suet pudding, given in the shorthand of a contributor who assumed you already owned a pudding mould and a pot with a lid. A few things need translating.
- SuetBeef suet, the hard fat from around the kidneys, shredded or chopped fine rather than melted. Butchers will often supply it on request; packaged shredded suet (beef or vegetarian) works directly. One cup is roughly 4 oz shredded. Cold butter grated on the large holes of a box grater is the usual substitute, though it gives a denser crumb.
- Sour milkNot spoiled milk from the refrigerator but naturally soured raw milk, acidic and slightly thickened. Buttermilk is the standard modern stand-in; a cup of whole milk with a tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar stirred in and left ten minutes also serves.
- Soda and cream of tartar togetherThe soda is there to react with the sour milk; the cream of tartar is a second acid, effectively making the mixture a homemade baking powder. The total leavening is generous by modern standards. Combining chemical leavening with sour milk was common in recipes of this period.
- CupsCup and teacup measures varied in the 1870s, and a teacup was often nearer 6 fl oz than the modern 8; a standard cup will serve, but treat the proportions as approximate. The batter should be a thick, dropping consistency; add a little more milk or flour to get there.
- The mould and the steamingGrease a 1.5-2 quart pudding basin or mould, fill it no more than two-thirds, and cover tightly with pleated parchment and foil or a tied cloth so condensation cannot get in. Stand it on a rack in a deep pot with boiling water reaching halfway up the sides, lid on, and keep the water at a bare simmer, topping up with boiling water as it falls.
- Two hoursAccurate for a mould of this size. The pudding is done when a skewer to the centre comes out clean and the top springs back. Undercooking shows as a wet, gummy core, so give it the full time before checking.
- FruitCurrants and raisins should be tossed in a spoonful of the measured flour before going in, or they sink. Steaming plumps them; no soaking is needed.
- Yield and servingServes six to eight. Turn out hot and serve with a hard sauce, a thin lemon or vanilla sauce, or plain cream. It reheats well by steaming for twenty to thirty minutes.
Steamed suet puddings were the workhorse dessert of the English-speaking kitchen through the nineteenth century, and community cookbooks like The Home Cook Book — compiled in Toronto in 1877 from recipes contributed by named local women, and one of the earliest Canadian fundraising cookbooks — usually carry several, distinguished only by numerals and the contributor's name. The appeal was practical: a pudding steamed over the fire needed no oven, which mattered enormously when the oven was part of a wood-burning range that had to be coaxed to a steady heat. Molasses, suet, dried fruit and sour milk were all pantry staples that kept without refrigeration, and the sour-milk-and-soda leavening let a cook use up milk that had turned rather than throw it out. Mrs. Snider's version is a modest one, a plain cousin of the richer steamed puddings brought out for Christmas.