Cakes & Bakes: St Stephen’s pudding

If Christmas pudding is too rich or stodgy for your taste, we have a delicious alternative for you to try… St Stephen’s pudding.

It’s also a whole lot quicker to prepare than Christmas pudding. There’s no soaking of fruit in alcohol overnight or resting it before steaming. And besides, Stir up Sunday was last week and I’ve missed it!

As the name suggests, St Stephen’s pudding is eaten on the “Feast of Stephen” – Boxing Day. Apparently, it was eaten at St John’s College, Cambridge on this day. I’ve only managed to find mention of this pudding on Delia’s website and the Cooking with the Saints cookbook. There’s also fleeting mention of the dish in The Ordinary, a 17th century play by William Cartwright where the character, Slicer utters, “Let the Corporal Come sweating under a breast of mutton stuff’d With pudding”.

I combined all the ingredients, pressed the mixture into a pudding bowl and secured the lid before putting it in the fridge to cook the following day. There’s no reason why it couldn’t stay in the fridge for up to a week before whipping it out for its 2-hour steam.

When I prepared it, I followed Delia’s recipe to the letter. However, if I was going to make this again (and I probably will) I’d add an extra 25 grams of sugar and only include the zest of half a lemon.

Save the recipe to Pinterest for later!

St Stephen’s pudding

Delia Smith

Print recipe Pin recipe

Course Dessert

Cuisine British

Servings 4 servings

Ingredients

110 g/4oz white breadcrumbs
50 g/2oz self-raising flour sifted
50 g/2oz light brown soft sugar
75 g/3oz shredded suet Vegetarian options are widely available
pinch of salt
110 g/4oz seedless raisins
2 medium Bramley cooking apples peeled & grated
grated zest of 1 lemon
3 tbsp milk
1 large egg

Instructions

In a large mixing bowl, combine all the breadcrumbs, flour, sugar, suet and salt
Add the raisins, grated apples and grated lemon zest
Stir thoroughly to combine well
Beat the egg into the milk and stir into the mixture
Pack the mixture into a well-greased pudding basin
Cover the basin tightly with a sheet of baking parchment, then with a sheet of foil, make a pleat in the centre and secure with string
Boil a kettle and pour the boiling water into a saucepan, about half full, place it on a medium heat and, when it comes back to the boil, fit a steamer over the top
Steam the pudding for 2 hours, checking every so often that the water in the saucepan hasn't all evaporated away
Remove the sheets of foil & baking parchment. Place an upturned plate on the top, quickly flip over and carefully lift off the pudding bowl

Serve with custard or rum butter

Keyword apple, Christmas, Christmas pudding, pudding

Cakes & Bakes: Apple and sultana crumble

When I was buying ingredients for last week’s apple and raisin puff pastry tart I needed two cooking apples. However, the Bramley apples in the supermarket were being sold in packs of four. I’m making an apple and sultana crumble this week to use up the two that were left over.

I may have mentioned before that fruit crumble isn’t one of Justin’s favoured puddings – he thinks the crumble topping is too often soggy, floury and not very nice – especially if too thick or a bit undercooked.

I think my crumble topping recipe is none of those things; it forms large, crunchy, nutty morsels.

Sprinkle granulated sugar over the top of it just before it goes into the oven for extra sweetness and crunch. You can serve it with thick, cold cream, hot creamy custard or a scoop of vanilla ice cream – they’re all good!

Click here to pin the recipe for later!

Apple and sultana crumble

2017-05-17 12:55:12

Serves 4

Cook Time

20 min

Cook Time

20 min

For the fruit filling

2 Bramley (or other cooking) apples, peeled, cored & roughly chopped
25g/¾oz butter
100g/3½oz sultanas
50g/1¾oz Demerara sugar

For the crumble topping

50g/1¾oz plain flour
50g/1¾oz porridge oats
50g/1¾oz flaked almonds
50g/1¾oz Demerara sugar
75g/2⅔oz cold butter, cubed

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Instructions

Preheat the oven to 175ºC/350ºF/Gas mark 4
In a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan over a medium heat, melt the 25g of butter
Add the chopped apples, sultanas and Demerara sugar and stir until the apples are just beginning to soften (about 5-10 minutes)
Put the mixture into a greased baking/pie dish
In a large mixing bowl, add the flour, oats, almonds and Demerara sugar
Add the cold, cubed butter and rub into the dry ingredients - but not to much - you want the mixture to have quite large lumps
Spoon the crumble evenly over the apple and sultana mixture so that it's completely covered
Sprinkle a little golden granulated sugar over the top for added crunch (optional)
Put the dish into the oven and bake for 20-30 minutes or until the crumble topping turns a lovely golden brown

Notes

Serve with custard, thick pouring cream or a scoop of vanilla ice cream

H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/

Cakes & Bakes: Plum pie

British Pie Week has rolled around once again – an annual event in which we enjoy getting involved in wholeheartedly!

I use the week as an opportunity to make a kind of pie that I’ve never made before. This year, it’s a home-made plum pie.

I used one of my favourite sweet pastry recipes that I borrow from Dorie Greenspan, pairing it with a James Martin spiced plum filling recipe from in a 2008 copy of BBC Good Food Magazine.

I’m not the world’s biggest fan of cloves, but it works amazingly well with the plums.

A drizzle of pouring cream or ladle-ful of custard over the top or on the side… a perfect cold weather pudding!

Click here or on the image below to pin the recipe for later!

Plum pie

2017-03-07 16:33:00

For the pastry

400g/14oz plain flour
120g/4oz icing sugar
pinch of salt
250g/9oz very cold butter
2 egg yolks

For the filling

750g/oz ripe plums stoned & thickly sliced
140g/oz golden caster sugar, plus extra
½tsp ground cloves
1 heaped tbsp cornflour

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For the pastry

Put the flour, icing sugar and salt in the bowl of a food processor and pulse a couple of times to combine
Scatter the pieces of butter over the dry ingredients and pulse until the butter is cut in coarsely - you'll have pieces the size of oatmeal flakes and pea-size pieces and that's just fine
Stir the eggs, just to break them up, and add it them little at a time, pulsing after each addition
When the eggs are in, process in long pulses - about 10 seconds each - until the dough, which will look granular soon after the egg is added, forms clumps and curds
Just before your pastry reaches this clumpy stage, the sound of the machine working the dough will change, so listen out
Turn the dough out onto a work surface. Very lightly and sparingly - make that very, very lightly and sparingly - knead the dough just to incorporate any dry ingredients that might have escaped mixing
Butter the pie dish and press the dough evenly along the bottom and up the sides of the dish and over the rim. Don't be stingy - you want a crust with a little heft because you want to be able to both taste and feel it. Also, don't be too heavy-handed - you want to press the crust in so that the pieces cling to one another and knit together when baked, but you don't want to press so hard that the crust loses its crumbly shortbread-ish texture
Freeze the pastry for at least 30 minutes, preferably longer, before baking
Preheat the oven to 175ºC/375ºF/Gas mark 4
Butter the shiny side of a piece of aluminium foil and fit the foil tightly against the pastry
Bake the pastry for 25 minutes, then carefully remove the foil. If the pastry has puffed up, press it down gently with the back of a spoon
Bake for another 3 to 5 minutes. Allow to cool before adding the pie filling

For the filling

Put the plums, sugar and ground cloves in a pan
Simmer until the sugar dissolves and the plums are juicy (8-10 minutes)
Combine the cornflour with a little of the syrup, then mix well into the fruit
Boil for another few minutes, stirring until thickened
Allow to cool completely
Roll out the remaining piece of pastry into a round and, using the rolling pin, carefully lower the pastry over the filling
Press the pastry lid into the pastry bottom either with your thumbs or a fork. Trim the excess and brush the top with a little beaten egg
Make a slit in the pastry lid to allow steam to escape
Bake at 175ºC/375ºF/Gas mark 4 for 20-25 minutes or until crust is brown and juice just begins to bubble through the slit in the crust
Allow to cool for a few minutes before slicing & serving

Notes

Serve with pouring cream or hot custard

H is for Home Harbinger https://hisforhomeblog.com/

Cakes & Bakes: Blueberry pie

It’s been almost six months since I last posted a pie recipe on Cakes & Bakes. I’ve righted that wrong this week with a blueberry pie.

My recipe is a hodgepodge of three others. The blueberry pie filling is from my vintage 1950s Betty Crocker cookbook, Dinner for Two; the sweet pastry is from Dorie Granspan’s Baking: From My Home to Yours and the crème Anglaise is from that catering college staple, Ceserani & Kinton’s Practical Cookery.

Much as I enjoyed this bake, if I were to make another blueberry pie, I’d do it a little differently.

Firstly, the blueberry pie filling was WAAAAY too sweet for my taste. Perhaps it wouldn’t have tasted so sweet if the pastry I’d used had been just a plain shortcrust.

Secondly, the filling recipe calls for ½ teaspoon of cinnamon; Justin liked it, but it just didn’t work for me.

Thirdly (and lastly), I had my first slice with crème Anglaise and my second (not straight after, obviously 🙂 ) with double cream. I much preferred the latter version.

Perhaps I’ll test my 3rd portion with vanilla ice cream – all in the name of research on behalf of our readers, of course!

Blueberry pie

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Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Ingredients

For the pastry

400 g/14oz plain flour
120 g/4oz icing sugar
pinch of salt
250 g/9oz very cold butter
2 egg yolks

For the filling

125 g/4½oz caster sugar
30 g/1oz plain flour
½tsp teaspoon ground cinnamon
375 g/13oz blueberries
2 tbs butter

For the crème anglaise

300 ml/½pt milk
25 g/1oz caster sugar
2 egg yolks
2-3 drops vanilla extract I used ¼tsp vanilla bean paste

Instructions

For the pastry

Put the flour, icing sugar and salt in the bowl of a food processor and pulse a couple of times to combine
Scatter the pieces of butter over the dry ingredients and pulse until the butter is cut in coarsely - you'll have pieces the size of oatmeal flakes and pea-size pieces and that's just fine
Stir the eggs, just to break them up, and add it them little at a time, pulsing after each addition
When the eggs are in, process in long pulses - about 10 seconds each - until the dough, which will look granular soon after the egg is added, forms clumps and curds
Just before your pastry reaches this clumpy stage, the sound of the machine working the dough will change, so listen out
Turn the dough out onto a work surface. Very lightly and sparingly - make that very, very lightly and sparingly - knead the dough just to incorporate any dry ingredients that might have escaped mixing
Butter the pie dish and press the dough evenly along the bottom and up the sides of the dish and over the rim. Don't be stingy - you want a crust with a little heft because you want to be able to both taste and feel it. Also, don't be too heavy-handed - you want to press the crust in so that the pieces cling to one another and knit together when baked, but you don't want to press so hard that the crust loses its crumbly shortbread-ish texture
Freeze the pastry for at least 30 minutes, preferably longer, before baking
Preheat the oven to 175ºC/375ºF/Gas mark 4
Butter the shiny side of a piece of aluminium foil and fit the foil tightly against the pastry
Bake the pastry for 25 minutes, then carefully remove the foil. If the pastry has puffed up, press it down gently with the back of a spoon
Bake for another 3 to 5 minutes. Allow to cool before adding the pie filling

For the filling

Combine the sugar, flour and cinnamon
Stir in the blueberries
Turn into pastry-lined pie dish and dot with butter
Roll out the remaining piece of pastry into a round and, using the rolling pin, carefully lower the pastry over the filling
Press the pastry lid into the pastry bottom either with your thumbs or a fork. Trim the excess and brush the top with a little milk
Bake at 175ºC/375ºF/Gas mark 4 for 25-30 minutes or until crust is brown and juice just begins to bubble through slits in the crust

For the crème anglaise

Boil the milk in a medium-sized saucepan. Allow to cool a little
Mix yolks, sugar and vanilla in a basin before adding to the milk
Put the saucepan back on a low heat and stir with a whisk or wooden spoon until the desired thickness. Do NOT boil
Pass through a fine sieve into a serving jug

Keyword blueberries, blueberry, fruit pie, pastry, pie