English pudding-Daring Baker

A few years ago, Mr. G and I went shopping in the gourmet section of Foodland. We saw a can of spotted dick and like the unsophisticated people that we are, we had a giggle fit! Guess what this month's Daring Baker challenger is? It's spotted dick!!

The April 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Esther of The Lilac Kitchen. She challenged everyone to make a traditional British pudding using, if possible, a very traditional British ingredient: suet.

We were able to choose between a boiled pudding or a steamed pudding. I decided to make the steamed pudding and make the spotted dick variation. I've never had spotted dick before and not sure what it's supposed to taste like, but I wasn't thrilled about this dessert. The sponge by itself is very dry. It's a better with the custard sauce, but overall, not really my cup of tea. I have to say though, it was really easy to make. The time consuming part is the steaming. I let my sponge steamed for about 2 hours.

Here's the recipe.

Spotted dick

(100 grams/4 ounces) All-purpose flour
(1/4 teaspoon) salt
(1.5 teaspoons) Baking powder
(100 grams/4 ounces) breadcrumbs
(75 grams/3 ounces) Caster sugar
(75 grams/ 3 ounces) Shredded suet or suet substitute (i.e., Vegetable Suet, Crisco, Lard)
(1) large egg
(6 to 8 tablespoons) Cold milk

1. Sift flour, salt and baking powder into bowl.

2. Add breadcrumbs, sugar and suet.

3. Mix to a soft batter with beaten egg and milk

4. Turn into a buttered 1 litre/ 2pint pudding basin and cover securely with buttered greaseproof paper or aluminum foil.

5. Steam steadily for 2.5 to 3 hours

6. Turn out onto warm plate, Serve with sweet sauce to taste such as custard, caramel or a sweetened fruit sauce.

Mango pudding

My coworker gave me some mangoes, so I thought I would make some refreshing mango pudding. There's a local dim sum restaurant called Panda Cuisine that has the best mango pudding. I tried looking online for a similar recipe, and found one at Saffron Trail. The mango pudding came out really well, it's really refreshing for a hot summer day. Here's the recipe:

Mango pudding
adapted from Saffron Trail

ingredients:
2 cups mango puree (Peel the mangoes, cube and puree )
1 cup evaporated milk
1 envelope of gelatin
200 ml water

1. Add the mango puree and milk into a bowl. Mix well.

2. Dissolve the gelatin in 200 ml hot water thoroughly.

3. Add the gelatin mixture to the mango mixture and stir.

4. Divide the mixture between 5 ramekins and refrigerate for an hour. The pudding should look set and jiggle when shaken.

5. To unmould- dip the bases of ramekins in warm water, run a knife blade to free the pudding from the sides, shake gently and upturn onto a plate.

Note:

• The original recipe called for 1/3 cup of sugar, I didn't add it because after tasting the mixture, I thought it was sweet enough.
  
• I think next time I will use less water, I felt it diluted the mango puree too much.