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.
The two basic types of British puddings are a suet crust pudding with a filling or a suet sponge pudding. Examples of a pudding with a crust are a steak and kidney pudding or a Sussex pond pudding and examples of the sponge pudding are spotted dick, Christmas pudding and college pudding.
Well, I wasn’t very daring this month and you won’t find any suet in this post. In case you’re wondering, suet is the hard but flaky fat found on the inside of a cow or sheep around the kidneys and that area of the body. Did I hear you say Ewwwwwww. No, that was probably me. I told you, I wasn’t very daring this month.
Luckily we were allowed to use substitutes for the suet in our British puddings and even better, we were allowed to make a savory or a sweet version. If you’ve visited my blog much you’ll know that, of course, I picked the sweet version.
I picked a rich, fudgey, lick-your-plate-clean, Very Chocolate Pudding from the very British Pudding Club website made with butter. They recommended serving it with a sauce and I thought since there was so much chocolate going on that a Creme Anglaise sauce would be perfect and it was.
I added the strawberry just for the picture, but after I had a bite of strawberry and a bite of Chocolate Pudding with Creme Anglaise sauce all at the same time, I decided it was a fabulous combination and diced up some strawberries to serve with the pudding.
This pudding reminded me of molten lava cakes that are so popular now, only without a liquid chocolate center. It had a very soft almost gooey texture in the middle – perhaps I should have steamed it longer, but it set up more after it cooled and everyone loved it. Did I mention I licked my plate clean.
Steamed British Chocolate Pudding
Ingredients
- ½ cup unsalted butter softened
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- ¼ cup cocoa
- 1 ¼ teaspoons baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs beaten
- ⅓ cup chocolate chips
Instructions
- Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Sift the flour and cocoa together and add to the creamed mixture with the egg, a little at a time, beating well between each addition. Finally, stir in half the chocolate chips. Place the remaining chocolate chips in a greased 1.5 quart pudding bowl before adding the mixture. Steam for 1 ½ hours. Turn out and serve with, inevitably, Chocolate Sauce. Custard or Extra Thick are also wonderful with this pudding.
- I followed the recipe for Creme Anglaise on Cafe Lynnylu, except I substituted vanilla bean paste.
- Visit the Daring Kitchen Recipe Achieve for the recipes and (tips on steaming) and the Daring Bakers Blogroll to see the wide variety of British Puddings other Daring Bakers created. Thanks Esther for helping take me out of my comfort zone and learning to bake with steam.
Lorraine @ Not Quite Nigella
Fantastic job mum and I like how you picked a recipe from the British Supper Club so you were definitely sticking with the theme! 😀 xxx
livestocreate
What did it for me was that beautiful Creme Anglaise! I'd never thought of steaming a chocolate pudding. My son-in-law (a fan of Nottingham) will love this!
lisaiscooking
Chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry sounds fantastic! The texture of the pudding sounds lovely too.
Renata
Looks delicious! I didn't go the suet way either but I still think it was a wonderful challenge! Your puddings look yummmyyyy
Lori
This looks so good. I really need to make one of these chocolate puddings!
shaz
Gosh, that is one seriously chocolatey pud! I too baled at the suet, but used lard instead (go figure). Great job Barbara.
shelley c.
I shouldn't be reading this first thing in the morning, because now I want that chocolate pudding for breakfast… It came out SO beautifully, and your cream on top just perfects it. YUM. Awesome job!!!
Lisa
This looks great! I LOVE the custard poured over the slice .. it just looks so tasty.
Jessica @ How Sweet
That looks amazing! Yum!
Bethie
That looks fantastic!
Audax
WOW that is one delicious and beautiful looking pudding I just love the custard yo made for it also well done on this challenge. Cheers from Audax in Sydney Australia. That pudding photo (the 2nd one) is perfect.
Grumpy and HoneyB
I'd probably lick my plate clean too! I would have been like you and ignored the suet….if you ask me, that stuff is for the birds. ;o) he he
Shabs..
Thats a yummilicoius recipe Barabara….I have seen James martin making a sponge pudding by steaming which was so moist….this one looks liek that…
Anncoo
Looks so yummy, makes me drooling.
Poires au Chocolat
The chocolate looks amazing! Great texture. I didn't use suet either, oh dear…
Meena
nicccce…i love your version of the pudding n the texture looks glorious…
Amanda
I have to say that I found suet to be "ewwww" as well! I used it, but didn't really want to eat what I had made. Still, it was a learning experience. Your pudding, on the other hand, looks delicious! The description of the soft centre and creme anglaise sauce is enough to prompt me to search the pantry for some chocolate…
Happy Cook
That is my kind of dessert with chcolate. Looks so so yumm.
Coleen's Recipes
My British mother would have been so excited about this bakers challenge; she would have certainly chosen the savory made with real suet, but I'm sure I would have favored the sweet one like you did. Looks lovely.
Memória
Oh, I wish I knew I could have done this. ¡Se ve fabuloso!