Part 37 (1/2)
SAGO AND FRUIT CUSTARD PUDDING.--Soak six table spoonfuls of sago in just enough water to cover it, for twenty minutes. Meanwhile pare and remove the cores from half a dozen or more tart apples, and fill the cavities with a mixture of grated lemon rind and sugar. Place the apples in the bottom of a pudding dish, with a tablespoonful of water; cover, and set in the oven to bake. Put the soaked sago with a quart of milk into a double boiler. Let it cook until the sago is clear and thick; then add three fourths of a cup of sugar and two well-beaten eggs. Pour the sago custard over the apples, which should be baked tender but not mushy. Put the pudding dish in the oven in a pan of hot water, and bake till the custard is well set. Serve cold.
s...o...b..LL CUSTARD.--Flavor a pint of milk by sleeping in it three or four slices of the yellow rind of a lemon for twenty minutes or more.
Skim out the rind; let the milk come to the boiling point, and drop into it the well-beaten whites of two eggs, in tablespoonfuls, turning each one over carefully, allowing them to remain only long enough to become coagulated but not hardened, and then place the b.a.l.l.s upon a wire sieve to drain. Afterward stir into the scalding milk the yolks of the eggs and one whole one well beaten, together with two tablespoonfuls of sugar. Stir until it thickens. Pour this custard into a gla.s.s dish, and lay the white b.a.l.l.s on top.
TAPIOCA CUSTARD.--Soak a cup of pearl tapioca over night in sufficient water to cover. When ready to prepare the custard, drain off the water if any remain, and add one quart of milk to the tapioca; place in a double boiler and cook until transparent; then add the well-beaten yolks of three eggs or the yolks of two and one whole one, mixed with three fourths of a cup of sugar. Let it cook a few minutes, just long enough for the custard to thicken and no more, or it will whey and be spoiled; flavor with a little vanilla and turn into a gla.s.s dish. Cover the top with the whites beaten stiffly with a tablespoonful of sugar, and dot with bits of jelly, or colored sugar prepared by mixing sugar with cranberry or raspberry juice and allowing it to dry. For variety, the custard may be flavored with grated lemon rind and a tablespoonful of lemon juice whipped up with the whites of the eggs, or other flavor may be dispensed with, and the meringue flavored by beating with a tablespoonful of quince jelly with the whites of the eggs.
TAPIOCA PUDDING.--Soak a cupful of tapioca over night in just enough water to cover. In the morning, add to it one quart of milk, and cook in a double boiler until transparent. Add three eggs well beaten, one half cup of sugar, one half cup of chopped raisins, and a very little chopped citron. Bake till the custard is set. Serve warm or cold as preferred.
VERMICELLI PUDDING.--Flavor two and one half cups of milk with lemon as directed on page 229. Drop into it, when boiling, four ounces of vermicelli, crus.h.i.+ng it lightly with one hand while sprinkling it in, and stir to keep it from gathering in lumps. Let it cook gently in a double boiler, stirring often until it is tender and very thick. Then pour it into a pudding dish, let it cool, and add a tablespoonful of rather thick sweet cream if you have it (it does very well without), half a cup of sugar, and lastly, two well-beaten eggs. Bake in a moderately hot oven till browned over the top.
WHITE CUSTARD.--Beat together thoroughly one cup of milk, the whites of two eggs, one tablespoonful of sugar, and one and one half tablespoonfuls of almondine. Turn into cups and steam or bake until the custard is set.
WHITE CUSTARD NO. 2.--Cook a half cup of farina in a quart of milk in a double boiler, for an hour. Remove from the stove, and allow it to become partially cool, then add one half cup of sugar, the whites of two eggs, and one half the yolk of one egg. Turn into a pudding dish, and bake twenty minutes or until the custard is well set.
STEAMED PUDDING.
The following precautions are necessary to be observed in steaming puddings or desserts of any sort:--
1. Have the water boiling rapidly when the pudding is placed in the steamer, and keep it constantly boiling.
2. Replenish, if needed, with boiling water, never with cold.
3. Do not open the steamer and let in the air upon the pudding, until it is done.
_RECIPES._
BATTER PUDDING.--Beat four eggs thoroughly; add to them a pint of milk, and if desired, a little salt. Sift a teacupful of flour and add it gradually to the milk and eggs, beating lightly the while. Then pour the whole mixture through, a fine wire strainer into a small pail with cover, in which it can be steamed. This straining is imperative. The cover of the pail should be tight fitting, as the steam getting into the pudding spoils it. Place the pail in a kettle of boiling water, and do not touch or move it until the pudding is done. It takes exactly an hour to cook. If moved or jarred during the cooking, it will be likely to fall. Slip it out of the pail on a hot dish, and serve with cream sauce.
A double boiler with tightly fitting cover is excellent for cooking this pudding.
BREAD AND FRUIT CUSTARD.--Soak a cupful of finely grated bread crumbs in a pint of rich milk heated to scalding. Add two thirds of a cup of sugar, and the grated yellow rind of half a lemon. When cool, add two eggs well beaten. Also two cups of canned apricots or peaches drained of juice, or, if preferred, a mixture of one and one half cups of chopped apples, one half cup of raisins, and a little citron. Turn into a pudding dish, and steam in a steamer over a kettle of boiling water for two hours. The amount of sugar necessary will vary somewhat according to the fruit used.
DATE PUDDING.--Turn a cup of hot milk over two cups of stale bread crumbs, and soak until softened; add one half cup of cream and one cup of chopped and stoned dates. Mix all thoroughly together. Put in a china dish and steam for three hours. Serve hot with lemon sauce.
RICE b.a.l.l.s.--Steam one cup of rice till tender. Wring pudding cloths about ten inches square out of hot water, and spread the rice one third of an inch over the cloth. Put a stoned peach or apricot from which the skin has been removed, in the center, filling the cavity in each half of the fruit with rice. Draw up the cloth until the rice smoothly envelops the fruit, tie, and steam ten or fifteen minutes.
Remove the cloth carefully, turn out into saucers, and serve with sauce made from peach of apricot juice. Easy-cooking tart apples may also be used. Steam them thirty minutes, and serve with sugar and cream.
STEAMED BREAD CUSTARD.--Cut stale bread in slices, removing hard crusts. Oil a deep pudding mold, and sprinkle the bottom and sides with Zante currants; over these place a layer of the slices of bread, sprinkled with currants; add several layers, sprinkling each with the currants in the same manner. Cover with a custard made by beating together three or four eggs, three tablespoonfuls of sugar, and one quart of milk. Put the pudding in a cool place for three hours; at the end of that time, steam one and a quarter hours. Serve with mock cream flavored with vanilla. Apple marmalade may be used to spread between the slices in place of currants, if preferred.
STEAMED FIG PUDDING.--Moisten two cupfuls of finely grated Graham bread crumbs with half a cup of thin sweet cream. Mix into it a heaping cupful of finely chopped fresh figs, and a quarter of a cup of sugar.
Add lastly a cup of sweet milk. Turn all into a pudding dish, and steam about two and one half hours. Serve as soon as done, with a little cream for dressing, or with orange or lemon sauce.
PASTRY AND CAKE.
So much has been said and written about the dietetic evils of these articles that their very names have been almost synonymous with indigestion and dyspepsia. That they are prolific causes of this dire malady cannot be denied, and it is doubtless due to two reasons; first, because they are generally compounded of ingredients which are in themselves unwholesome, and rendered doubly so by their combination; and secondly, because tastes have become so perverted that an excess of these articles is consumed in preference to more simple and nutritious food.
As has been elsewhere remarked, foods containing an excess of fat, as do most pastries and many varieties of cake, are exceedingly difficult of digestion, the fat undergoing in the stomach no changes which answer to the digestion of other elements of food, and its presence interferes with the action of the gastric juice upon other elements. In consequence, digestion proceeds very slowly, if at all, and the delay often occasions fermentative and putrefactive changes in the entire contents of the stomach.