Hubby’s only attempt at making Yorkshire puddings was a bit like that - when the fat’s not hot enough you end up with the puddings absorbing too much oil, which does stop them from rising.
I’ll confess - I use a Yorkshire pudding mix that comes in a packet. I know that the ingredients of Yorkshire puddings are dead simple, but it just makes me feel that bit more confident to make it from the pack. Plus I don’t have to measure, and the instructions are right on the back so I’ve got all the info I need right there. And according to hubby that puts me one-up from his mum, who just buys the frozen Yorkshire puddings and heats them in the oven
My mom is somewhat of an expert on the Yorkshire pudding (in my opinion, anyway), but like most, uses what may be a variation on the regular recipe.
One variation that has not yet been mentioned is - she uses a dab of butter in each hole in a muffin pan, not beef drippings or vegetable oil. Melt the butter in the pan in the oven first, then add the batter to each hole. So bad for you yet so good.
Also, she’s found that doubling the recipe makes for flat puddings - no idea why, maybe it’s our location, we’re pretty much at sea level.
Finally, room-temperature eggs and milk will help the batter to rise properly (as is called for in the recipe she uses).
My mother used to make them from scratch, until she used the kind in the packet for some reason or another and realized they came out IDENTICAL, so there wasn’t really much point. (Actually, they came out identical to the ones her father made from the same recipe she used…I don’t know if they came out identical to how they did when she was making them or not. This revelation came before I was born.)
No need to measure, I never have. Eggs, one per two people, adjust according to greed. White flour, mix in until it feels stiff when stirring with a spoon. Milk (full cream, no half-and-half nonsense!) stirred in until it coats your finger, i.e. dip it in, and on taking it out there’s no part of the finger which doesn’t have a translucent covering. Add some salt and you’re done.
Tell hubby to tell his mum that you can cook them properly, and see what her reaction is
Maple syrup? I can only remember her using golden syrup in her cookbooks and shows- and once on Nigella Bites, her having to take the syrup bottle away from Bruno because he had completely drenched his pudding.
(As a sadly pudding-less American, I got the feeling that her use of any syrup at all was pretty much abnormal and one of her many food quirks. But it still looked delicious.)
It could have been golden syrup. Recently on “Nigella Feasts” she’s been on a very “make this american friendly” kick, which is where she’s used maple syrup in things that would otherwise call for golden. I think that’s where I’ve gotten a bit confused on it.
But still, SYRUP!
Also - dinner tonight is roast lamb (at hubby’s insistence), roast potatoes and pumpkin with Yorkshire puddings and gravies. Mmmmm.
What is the method of preparation? - I ask because some of the batter mixes I’ve seen (I think they were for pancake batter, although they might have been multi-purpose) say ‘just add eggs and milk!’ - which is another way of saying ‘sucker! - you just bought a very expensive little bag of flour!’
I don’t understand how the term “pudding” in American English has come to mean what it does, if in Britain it’s something like a popover. The Spanish cognate “puddin” also has greatly varying meanings in throughout Latin America.
I don’t know the answer to that, but ‘flan’ is similar - in Britain, a flan is a shallow pie with no top crust - and can be filled with just about anything - fruit, egg custard, or even savoury stuff. Elsewhere, it seems to be what we call Creme Caramel, and nothing else.
Batter should be left to rest for at least half an hour to allow the starch grains to get a proper soaking and expand - otherwise the pudding can come out flat or doughy. You’re doing it right.
Agree that the important point is the heat of the fat. Its a fine line between getting it the right temp (nuking hot) and completely evaporating it.
I always get the fat (dripping) piping hot in the oven and then take out, place over direct heat on the hob, and then as it bubbles in your face (hideous appearance before the fat hits is advisable), pour in the batter.
Seriously though, get it bubbling up before pouring.
Yorkshire pudding is like a popover. We have lots of other puddings that are nothing like that. Sponge pudding is different to suet pudding is different to bread-and-butter pudding is different to rice pudding… until you get all the way out to black pudding.
I think pudding originally meant something steamed or boiled in a cloth or skin, and then (as is often the case) in different times and places the word came to encompass a number of other things that were in one way or another similar. What’s interesting about the word pudding in Britain is that, instead of changing its meaning as most words do, it seems to have just kept on adding definitions. Possibly one of the hardest-working words in the language.
