I know you can buy mixes, but I’ve made them from scratch in muffin tins and they are so good.
The secret is since roast beef was served only at Sunday dinner, you had to eat the pudding before the meat…the trick being to fill up on the pudding so there would be more roast beef left over.
Yorkshire pudding is very much like a pudding if made right. It shouldn’t be dry, it should be moist, more firm than pudding, but not bread like. Popovers are smaller and made in muffin tins and usually end up much drier than Yorkshire. It’s a tricky dish to make without overcooking, a hot oven and pan are needed to get it to rise properly, but then wait too long and it turns into a bread.
♬ Girls and boys, come out to play,
The moon doth shine as bright as day;
Leave your supper, and leave your sleep,
And come with your playfellows into the street.
Come with a whoop, come with a call,
Come with a good will or not at all.
Up the ladder and down the wall,
A halfpenny roll will serve us all.
You find milk, and I’ll find flour,
And we’ll have a pudding in half an hour. ♬
This is the essential part. Hot cooking vessel. And don’t peek at them while they cook.
I like Jamie Oliver’s recipe for them. (The first time I came across that video, I did not at all recognize Jamie Oliver. I guess I just hadn’t seen him for a number of years since his Naked Chef days.)
Officially they should be evenly puffed up and crispy but i prefer mine to have a puffed up edge and a squishy bottom. It’s the same batter as in Toad in The Hole. There sausages are heated in oil before the batter is poured in and cooked.
I lost my British Cook credentials recently. I got the proportions of flour to liquid in the batter wrong and ended up with sausages in egg custard. I was so ashamed 
Since this has been revived, I’m going to pick a nit that’s nagging me
Aaargh. No, you pour the jus. Just jus.
In American English, “au jus” is pretty much idiomatic. You might not like it; it may not be linguistically “pure,” but language is language, and that’s the direction it turned here. You’ll even see and hear constructions like “with au jus gravy” which I’m sure will set your ears on fire.
Might as well complain about entering your PIN number at the ATM machine. It’s a fossilized usage.
I’m English and have eaten many, many Yorkshire puddings. Let me summarise my experience.
Yes, it’s an odd name (they are served with the main course, not as a dessert.)
They are shaped like a flat bottomed circular bowl, designed to hold e.g. gravy.
They are made of batter.
A traditional Sunday roast dinner always includes them; together with:
I have also eaten a main course of just huge (almost plate-sized) Yorkshire puddings filled with mince, vegetables and gravy. Yum!
Just for fun, here’s a picture of “au jus gravy” that is sold in supermarkets.
Just because it’s common, doesn’t mean it should be acceptable. Individuals can be taught better even if hoi polloi are idiots.
You’ll note, I didn’t say “the hoi polloi”, either. 
Yes, I noticed your wit before you had to explain it. Hoi polloi without the definite article in English grates on me and sounds completely unnatural.
I’ll contemplate this as I commute on the 5.
YORKSHIRE PUDDING
Let’s call Yorkshire pudding
A fortunate blunder;
It’s sort of popover
That tripped and popped under.
-Ogden Nash
I told my kids it was pronounced “ow juice”. I got one of those looks when the older one started taking French in Middle School.
Yum - sausages in egg custard.
I just called my local English restaurant and pub (in the US midwest) to ask if they ever had Yorkshire pudding on the menu. I was told they did not, but staff person did read off the list of all their dessert offerings. She seemed to think I wanted something sweet. When I told her Yorkshire pudding was savory, she just seemed confused.
They do offer a decent Scotch egg there, along with fair Fish & Chips and Shepherd’s pie. Also some curries, that are almost, yet not completely unlike actual Indian food. But they also offer poutine and steak Tartare, which I never considered traditional English food. <<sigh>>
I wants me some Yorkshire Pudding sooooo bad right now.
No, not a roll. The only thing I can think to compare it to is egg custard, but that’s not really accurate either.
I extracted the poor sausages and ate them with the veg. Definitely not my best meal.
