Pudding Club

Proud me.

This post brought to you by my parents’ trip to Oxford, and by Lindsay’s failure to ever hear about Pudding Club in all the years she lived in Oxford.

My parents came to spend a couple of weeks with me last month, and stayed in an apartment, rather than a hotel, near where I live. Not only did this afford them enough room to sprawl out for the duration of their stay, but they also had enough room to entertain.  Just after they arrived, we had a dinner party for my housemates, where my Mom cooked a couple of my childhood favourites: sweet and sour sausage, and pink lady for dessert.  I think the sausage dish (basically, a bowl of sausage smothered in ketchup and curry sauce, and served over rice) might have been a touch too sweet for the delicate English palates of my housemates, but the pink lady (a proper graham cracker crust topped with a mixture of gelatin, rasperries and cream) hit exactly the right note.  Given that this was the first time I’ve eaten either of these dishes in approximately a hundred years, I felt like I was in heaven.  

Not only was my parents’ visit a chance to finally spend time with them after a year of being apart, and to enjoy the food they were able to smuggle carry into the UK, but it was also a chance to revisit my family’s food history.  I grew up on a grain farm, which did not translate into a taste for gourmet food.  What it did was lend itself to long hours of physical labour, and the development of a huge appetite for hearty stick-to-your-ribs food and big, stodgy desserts.  When I heard about Pudding Club, I knew this was something I would have to experience with my folks.  

Pudding club is an evening of entertainment smothered in custard and toffee sauce.  We spent the afternoon working up an appetite while adventuring in the Cotswolds.  When we finally arrived at the Four Corners House in Mickleton, it was already dark and we were starving.  We were greeted by a gregarious man wearing a pudding-print tie, and offering us glasses of elderberry fizz.  We were then treated to a speech about the history of steamed puddings and their social and cultural significance to the British way of life.  The menu was then described: we were to be served our choice of starter: braised beef, pasta, or crab cakes, followed by the glorious main event, the Parade of the Seven Puddings.  Each of the puddings was then named and briefly described:

I posed for this before we sat down.

The Pudding List:

Sticky Toffee and Date Pudding

Very Chocolate Pudding

Spotted Dick

Syrup Sponge Pudding

Lord Randall’s Pudding

Bread and Butter Pudding

Passionfruit Charlotte

We were led into the dining hall and seated at numbered tables. We sat next to two couples who were taking in the entire pudding experience: sleeping in one of the hotel's pudding-themed rooms, and looking forward to their full English breakfast (featuring black pudding) the next morning.

Beef and two veg.  Where's my pudding?!?

 

An air of anticipation filled the room as we finished our starter of braised beef and a few veggies.  The dishes were cleared away and the Parade of the Seven Puddings began.  Each pudding was announced and carried around the room for everyone to see, before being placed in the centre of the room next to oversized bowls of pouring cream, warm custard, chocolate sauce and toffee sauce. 

All of the pudding.  All in one place.

Bowls and spoons were distributed before we were called up one table at a time to collect our puddings.  Strict rules were followed: you were allowed to choose only one pudding at a time and you had to empty your bowl before being allowed a new pudding.  We were advised to get to know the people sitting next to us, in case we came across a pudding we didn’t like.  I didn’t come across a pudding I didn’t like.

Every time our table number was called, Dad and I raced to be first in line.  I let him win most of the time, because I know how to respect my elders.  Several of the other diners dropped off after about 4 or 5 servings of pudding, but we persevered until we’d tasted each of the seven puddings.  Then we went back for one more helping of our respective favourites.  

Eight servings of pudding... hoofta!  Me and my Dad with our sinning puddings.  Passionfruit Charlotte was my surprise favourite, while Dad liked the Syrup Sponge Pudding.  

Shortly after the certificates were distributed, we waddled out to the car.  Fat and happy.  And haggard.  That was a lot of spoon lifting for just one night, and more sugar than I ever thought I could consume at one sitting.  

Apparently, they change up their pudding menu for the summer.  Who’s up for a gluttony road-trip in June?

New Teaser

The Pudding Club was founded in 1985 to prevent the demise of the great British Pudding!

Here is my score card.  It's alphabetized, as you can see.  I numbered each pudding in the order that I consumed it, and put a check next to the number if I was able to have a second helping.  My scores are out of 10, and I put a star next to my score if a pudding was eaten and had to be replaced.

The Sticky Toffee Pudding won the popular vote, and I liked it quite a lot.  However, the Passionfruit Charlotte pulled out a surprise victory.

Teaser

Calista and I have had a history with Ethiopian food.  A few years ago, an Ethiopian restaurant opened in Regina when we still lived there, and we discovered how fantastic it is.  Similar to Indian food, but less spicy, we tried everything on the menu at Selam in Regina and then hit up Ethiopian joints in London and wherever else we could get it.  We discovered that beef is amazing served spiced and raw, that you can do phenomenal things with lentils, and that Ethiopian cabbage and carrot stirfry makes a delicious hangover cure.

There is no Ethiopian food in Barrie.  Adam and I make the odd trip to Toronto to get our fix, but it's not terribly convenient, so I finally decided to make it at home.  What we do have in Barrie is Bulk Barn, and they carry Teff flour, which is the basis of Injera, a flatbread that forms the the plate, tablecloth, and utensils that you use to eat the rest of the meal.  I started three days ago, when I made a sourdough starter for Injera.  I had been warned by the Internet that Injera takes time to master and doesn't necessarily work terribly well in North America.  I threw caution to the wind and...well, you'll notice there is no Injera recipe posted here.  My Injera was edible but not shareable.  I'll keep trying and post when I get it.

The rest, however, came out really well.  I did Kik Alecha, which is a mild split pea paste, and Mesir Wot, which is a spicy red lentil paste, along with Cabbage, Carrots, and Potatoes.  I used way less butter than was called for in the recipes because I'm in recovery mode from Christmas, and though it was less creamy the result was still pretty good.  The great thing about it this way, too, is that it's crazy healthy - low in fat and high in protein and fibre.

If you'd like to try, you can get Berbere at any Ethiopian or African grocery.


All of the recipes below are for two to four people, but they would double easily.

Ethiopian Cabbage, Potato and Carrot Stir-Fry

(Adapted from http://www.howtocookgreatethiopian.com/ethiopian-cabbage-potato-and-carrot-stir-fry)
Ingredients

• 1 Tbsp butter
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 2 carrots, thinly sliced
• 4 cloves garlic, chopped
• 1-inch piece fresh, peeled ginger chopped, or 2 tsp jarred ginger
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 3/4 teaspoon turmeric
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 head cabbage, chopped
• 1 medium potato, peeled and cut into cubes
• berbere to taste

Heat the butter in a large pan over medium heat.  Add the onion, ginger, and garlic and cook until the onion is softened.  Add the carrots and potatoes and cook and for another 5 minutes.  Add the cumin, turmeric, berbere, salt and cabbage and stir to coat the cabbage with the spices.  Add a small amount of water if needed, cover, and allow to sweat until the potatoes and carrots are softened.

Mesir Wot (spicy red lentils)

(Adapted from http://stephfood.com/tag/berbere/#MesirWat)


Ingredients

• 1 onion or 3 shallots, chopped
• 3 cloves of garlic, crushed or finely minced
• 2 tsp ginger, peeled and minced or grated
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 and a half teaspoons berbere
• 1 cups red lentils, rinsed
• 1/2 small can of tomato paste
• 3 water or broth
• salt to taste

Place the onion, garlic and ginger in a food processor or blender and puree. Add a little water if necessary.  Melt the butter in a pan over medium flame.  Add the berbere and stir for about 30 seconds to cook the spices and colour the butter.  Let it get all frothy.  Ad the onion puree and saute for about 5 min until the onion is cooked.  Add the lentils and water or broth, bring to a boil, and cook, covered for about 40 min until the lentils are cooked and start to get mushy.  About halfway through, add the tomato paste.  This is best if made early in the day and then reheated just before you eat it.

Kik Alecha (mild yellow split peas) 

(Adapted from http://www.howtocookgreatethiopian.com/alitcha-aterkik-yellow-split-peas-2)

• 3 cups vegetable stock
• 1 cup dried yellow split peas
• 1 tbsp water
• 1/2 small onion or 3 shallots, chopped
•  4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 inch of fresh ginger peeled, finely chopped, or about 1 tbsp jarred
• 1 tsp or more ground turmeric
• salt

Place 3 cups water (or a stock if you wish) and the yellow split peas in a pot and bring to a boil on high heat.  Once boiling, reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until most of the water has absorbed, about 40 minutes.  Drain the split peas and mash a little in their pot.

Place the onion, garlic, and ginger in a food processor or blender and puree.  Melt the butter in a frying pan and add the turmeric.  When frothy, add the onion puree and cook for 5 min.  Add to the split peas
Saute your onion until clear, 5 minutes. Then add ginger, garlic, and turmeric and cook 1 minute.   Add to the cooked peas.  Add a little more water and simmer again until the peas are very soft.  Add salt to taste.  As with the Mesir Wot, this is best if you make it in the afternoon, then add water until it's soupy and re-boil it until it gets thick again.
 

Going clockwise starting from the bottom:  Cabbage, potatoes, and carrots, Mesir Wot, Kik Alecha.

 

Ziplist, a saviour for foodies on the go

(Note: this is not a sponsored review.  I'm just writing about this because it's an app that I use a LOT because I find it really useful.  Maybe you'll find it useful, too!)

For the past several months, I've been using Ziplist to collect recipes from around the web, save them in my personal recipe book, and ease the creation of shopping lists.  It's a fantastic little app.

One of my favourite features is the recipe clipper, which sits in the bookmarks toolbar in your browser.  When you select the bookmark, it scans the page you're on for anything that looks like a recipe.  It then saves the recipe title and ingredients list in your personal recipe box, which is accessible when you log into Ziplist.  You can add tags and categories to optimize searchability.  For example, you may want to add tags with the main ingredients, or identifying the dish as a side, a main or dessert.

I think the feature which makes my life the easiest is that my recipe box is accessible from my smartphone, through the ziplist mobile app.  I can read the ingredients list of any of my recipes wherever I need them.  Or, I can use the app to auto-populate a shopping list for me, based on the recipes I've selected.

I don't use the features relating to stores at all.  There is an option to teach the app to arrange your shopping list according to your local supermarket's layout.  This would be a useful option for someone who goes to big shops, and buys a lot of food, but for a single girl with only one mouth to feed, it's not worth setting up.  There are other couponing and bargain hunting features, which don't seem to apply outside of the USA, so I hunt my own bargains.  (or rather, I let the bargains hunt me)

The only thing I really think is missing from Ziplist is internal share-ability.  You can share your shopping lists with other Ziplist users, but not your recipe box.  I understand why they've chosen to only allow users to share recipes via existing social networks, but I happen to know that most of the people in my social networks don't give a monkey's left nut what I cooked for dinner last night, and I'm not about to bore them with the details.  I would like my friends to opt in to hearing about my foodie adventures, and the easiest (from my perspective) way to accomplish this is to turn ziplist into a social network.  Ziplist, on the other hand, would rather I group my contacts and manage my social networks like everyone else.  I'm still reluctant to do so; I think enough of my time already goes into managing my Facebook page.  Maybe I need to reconsider.

Check Ziplist out for yourself here.

After a brief hiatus from Das Salz in meine Suppe and then an even briefer visit with Calista this summer, in which I was reminded of how awesome she actually is, I have been thinking that it's time to start the blog back up.

And what better way than...Souffle!

I've been experimenting with souffles recently, mostly because I have a link through Adam's work to farm fresh eggs, and plenty of them.  Souffle is surprisingly easy for something that looks and tastes difficult.  I've done two kinds so far - the nut-based souffle and the sauce-based souffle.

The nut-based one was a chocolate almond souffle.  It uses ground almonds as its base, and comes out with a consistency a lot like a flourless chocolate cake but a bit lighter.  It's got a nice flavour, and would be even better with a bit of a sauce to it.  I'm still working on this recipe because it came out slightly heavier than I would have liked, but I'll let you know if I get it right.

The other two I've made were a pumpkin souffle and a cheese souffle. 

 Cheese Souffle
To make the cheese one, you need:
2 eggs
1/4-1/2 cup milk
2 tbsp butter
1 tbsp flour
about 1/2 a cup of any cheese you like, grated or in small pieces
 A pinch of mustard, paprika, nutmeg, or your favourite cheese-related spice

 Preheat oven to 350.  Place a baking pan with some hot water in it into the oven. There should be enough water that it will come about 1/4 to half way up the sides of the ramekins, but not so much that it will get into them.

1.  Grease two or three ramekins with a generous coating of butter.
2.  Separate the eggs.  Put the whites into a large mixing bowl.  Save the yolks.
3.  Make a thick cheese sauce.  Melt the butter in a saucepan and add the flour.  Add in  1/4 cup milk, and cook until thick.  Add in the cheese and spices, cook until melted and smooth, and then add a little extra milk if you need it.  The consistency should be still liquid, but very thick, sort of like half-cooked pancake batter.  Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly.  When still warm but not boiling, stir in the egg yolks.
4.  Whip the egg whites to stiff peak, then take about 1/3 of the whites and stir them quickly into the cheese sauce.  Pour that mixture back into the rest of the whites, and combine with as few strokes as possible.
5.  Pour the mix into the greased ramekins.  Wipe the edges to make sure the batter is smooth or it won't rise nicely.
6.  Place the ramekins in the oven in the hot water bath, being careful not to let any water into the batter.
7.  Bake for 30-40 minutes until brown on top, risen, and not jiggly.

If you only make 2 servings, fry up the extra batter in a frying pan.  It comes out like a delicious cheesy pancake.

 Low Fat Pumpkin Pie Souffle
You can use that same technique to make a pumpkin souffle that takes just like pumpkin pie.  The best thing is, it's really healthy, with almost no fat and surprisingly little sugar.  They're also gluten free if that's a concern to you.  I greased the ramekins with a very small amount of butter, but you can use cooking spray if you prefer.  Omit the sugar in the ramekins if you use spray.

2 egg whites
1 tbsp white sugar
1 egg yolk
1/4 cup pumpkin
1 tbsp maple syrup
1-2 tbsp low fat sour cream
Whatever spices you like to make it taste like pumpkin pie - I went with nutmeg, ginger, and cinnamon.

1. Put a baking pan of water into the oven and preheat to 350. 
2. Grease 3 ramekins and sprinkle the inside with a little white sugar. 
3. Warm the pumpkin up in a frying pan.  Add the sour cream and syrup.  Add the spices until it tastes how you like your pumpkin pie.  Again, the consistency should be like thick apple sauce or half cooked pancake batter.
4.  Remove from heat and let cool for a few seconds, just enough so that the yolk won't cook when you stir it in, then add the egg yolk.
5. Whip the whites to stiff peak, then add the sugar.  Stir about 1/3 of the meringue into the pumpkin mixture, then pour that back into the meringue and stir gently with a spatula until it's just mixed. 
6. Pour into the ramekins, then clean the rims so it will rise evenly.   Bake in the water bath about 30 min until brown on top and not jiggly.

Enjoy!  Awesome with a little whipped cream - especially if you put Irish cream into it while you're whipping.  If you're keeping to the healthy thing, cool whip will do too.

Aloha from Brandon, in cake form

After four hours, I have just finished decorating one of the fanciest cakes I've ever done. I'm taking a cake decorating class at Michael's, and although it's a bit basic (they have designed the first course for people who have never before decorated a cake, and there are some in the class like that), I've learned some new things. These include the recipe for white icing that uses vegetable shortening and gets solid without getting hard, how to flatten and torte a cake properly, and how to use some of the odder icing tips in my arsenal. The cake is to celebrate my dad's wedding - I'm planning to show up with it at his house for the pre-wedding fiesta tomorrow. The wedding is Hawaiian themed, and so is the cake. I did the hibiscus in a smooth, colouring-in technique that I'm not sure I'd use again, but it's good to know. What I did learn that was valuable is how to transfer a pattern; you find an outlined pattern, trace it onto parchment, turn that over and trace along its mirror-image with decorating gel (like Dairy Queen uses), and then put that on the top of the cake and press it in with a paint brush. Then when you lift off the paper, it's just a matter of colouring. The palm trees were super fun and let me use some of the tips I've never tried before. Ditto for the grass.The cake itself is butter pecan (mix, I'm ashamed to say), with a rum butter pecan filling.