Famous Traditional British Puddings
Puddings are so special to Britons that there are even many Pudding Clubs in the United Kingdom. These organizations are devoted to preserving the most traditional of all the pudding recipes in the land.
A famous old pudding is the Apple and Mincemeat Pudding. This is a sponge-based pudding filled with apples and mincemeat that is made from self-rising flour and brandy. Everything is steamed in the oven until it gently rises. This is a dry pudding that looks like a bun when it is unmolded on the plate.
Another favorite sponge budding is simply called Holiday Pudding. It looks a bit like an upside down cake. It is breadcrumbs, raisin, candied peel, shelled walnuts, white whine corn flour and golden syrup mixed together. It is topped with pineapple rings and maraschino cherries when released upside down from the mold.
Jam and Coconut Sponge is another one of those English hybrid desserts that combines traditional flavors with those of the East Indies. This is a coconut sponge pudding that is crowned with tangy black currant jam when it is unmolded.
College Pudding is traditionally served at Oxford and Cambridge. This is an unmolded fluffy dry pudding without sauce that is made of suet, breadcrumbs, resins, currants, candied peel, milk sugar and flour.
Of course there is also the traditional British Christmas Pudding that consists of flour, salt suet, spice cinnamon peels, cherries, currants, resins, sultans, apples almonds and other ingredients. This pudding is sometimes served flambe in order to heighten the glamor of the occasion.
Oriental Ginger Pudding is also traditional. Ginger was brought over from the Middle East and the Britons made all kinds of desserts from it. This is a suet based pudding made out of preserved ginger, suet and brown sugar. Golden syrup is poured over the pudding to finish it.
The traditional Blackberry Exeter Pudding is popular in the South of England where the fruit is abundant. This pudding is suet and flour filled with chopped apple, honey, breadcrumbs and has course blackberries. It is a dry unmolded pudding without a sauce.
Some types of puddings that were made were called “ponds.” This is when an entire fruit is encased inside the pudding. A traditional one is the Sussex Pond. This is an entire large lemon that is encased in a pudding made from flour, butter and sugar. This idea comes from the days of Queen Victoria who frowned on wasting any part of the fruit.