Mention of Yorkshire Pudding on my yesterday's post brought forth one or two interesting comments. I wasn't born in Yorkshire but over The Humber Bridge in Lincolnshire (no bridge in my youth it was ferry from Barton on Humber to Hull). But it got me thinking about that good old favourite. I wonder how many 'tricks of the trade' our American bloggers know. I thought I would pass on a few tips. Maybe some of you can add to the pool because I have a feeling that a few tips might give some of you a few ideas. I do hope some of you don't think I am trying to teach my Grandmother to suck eggs.
So here goes with a few tips gleaned from my dear old Mum in the nineteen years I spent at home eating good wholesome food at her table - and for at least the first ten of those years cooked in a good old fashioned cast iron fire oven. ( Rice pud - just rice, sugar, milk and a grating of nutmeg- popped in the oven at bedtime as the fire was burning down and being let die out- was sublime for lunch the next day)
1. YPs were traditionally made in a large roasting tin, not in little individual 'pattie'tins.
2. The mixture was made early - before chapel - on Sunday morning and left to stand. On the return home, the roast joint ticking over nicely after its short, sharp searing earlier in the morning, the fire would be stoked up high and when the oven was really hot (no thermometer on these old ovens - just open the door and stick a knowing hand in between shelves) the mixture, after a quick stir, would be poured into a large roasting tin with a sizzling layer of beef dripping spurting up to catch your hand with a short sharp shock and left until it was crisp on the outside and hilly in the middle. Traditionally the joint would be placed on a slatted shelf so that the juices could then drop on to the pudding beneath but I never remember those days. But if the cook wanted her pudding to come out looking like the Mountains of Mourne the oven had to be HOT. (individual puds were never made in those days).
3. Good gravy essential.
4. What to do with left over mixture - or if you chose to make a new mixture - add sugar and sliced or cubed fruit - cubed or sliced cooking apple or - my favourite chunks of new rhubarb - and cooked in a hot oven. Then serve cut in pieces and dotted with blobs of good old fashioned farm butter and a sprinkling more sugar. Divine.
Off to toast a muffin.
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40 comments:
The secret to the good Yorkshire pudding is that not only has the oven to be hot, the fat has to be very very hot before you pour the batter into it.
And it doesn't matter where we live in Britain, we all eat Yorkshire puddings with whatever we like.
All seems odd now when Aunt Bessies are ready in 4 minutes and eaten with everything!
I've never had YP. I love a good tender prime rib roast with savory gravy so YP would likely be lovely and well enjoyed as well. Your mother must have been a really good cook. Unlike me, my Grandmother could cook and bake without recipes - sadly, I did not get those genes.
Most definitely Rachel.
Does anyone still serve the Yorkshire puddings first to take the edge off appetites so that less meat is eaten?
My son always loved cold Yorkshire pudding spread with butter and jam! Pollie.
Thank you for your tips! One of these days I will make YP. Roasts currently are about $5.99 and higher per pound. Saw a fancy prebound and rosemary on top, for $145 at grocers before Christmas!
I learned to make YP from my late husband, who was from Wath-upon-Dearne, and he in turned learned from his mother, who was born and raised in Thurnscoe. Like Rachel says, the fat (preferably lard) has to be piping hot when the mix is poured in. I use a rather battered muffin tin with 12 cups, and serve them with dark gravy based on red wine, roast vegetables and meat, preferably game goulash.
The fat, yes lard, Librarian, is taken from the tin the meat is roasting in.
We also had suet pudding with our roast dinner, made in the same white pudding cloth my mother had used for years. Any pudding left over I had for "afters" with jam, treacle or condensed milk on.
Well I must admit I have never seen or eaten Yorkshire pudding and had to Google 'images of', which is silly seeing I've visited England twice and had ample opportunity to sample such a traditional classic - a careless omission on my part, though I will never forget the wonderful gammon.
Our traditional English pubs here no doubt have it on their menu. I don't know how the whole thing has escaped me, as I would like to try it, but not confident to cook it properly.The visual tutorials are encouraging though. - Pam, S. Aust.
That sounds like my mom, cooking in a cast iron fireplace range in the Yorkshire dales. Yp was one big one, cut into large squares, her great gravy on it. She served it as a first course. This mainly took the edge off country appetites and made the meat go further! She had hard words about people making those "fiddly little" individual yps.
How interesting! Being from the other side of "the Pond", I've never had a YP but we still often cook in cast iron pans as our mothers and grandmothers did, at least here in the South!
Hugs!
I'm on my way to bed and you have made me feel quite peckish with those cooking tips for delicious results. Night-night.x
They look a bit like a popover to me. I've never eaten one or seen one made. I'm afraid the helpful hints won't help me as I wouldn't really know where to begin. Maybe one day I will try to follow a recipe...
When I lived in Sheffield
I was always told by older Yorkshire people
That pudding was a STARTER for a meal and served in one big container
Sometimes with veg but a,ways with thick gravy
Yes that was so. It was needed to fill up first as there would often be little meat to go round.
Our son in law introduced us to yorkshire puddings. It is fun to try new things. I had somehow got it in my head that it was actual pudding texture. But they were quite nice. Your gravy is much thinner than I make ours.
.Our rice pudding has eggs, but is otherwise the same.
I received a cookbook from my best friend when I married in 1964. *The American Woman's Cook Book *. It has a recipe for
Roast Beef with Yorkshire Pudding. There are specific directions for preparing and roasting the beef, then a recipe for the
Yorkshire Pudding. One cup flour, one cup milk, 1/2 t. salt, 2 eggs, and the drippings from the roast. It says to pour hot drippings into a hot shallow pan to the depth of one inch. Pour in your mixed batter quickly and bake at 400° for 1/2 hour. Then you may leave pudding on a rack under the roast and let the juices drip onto it.
I made this several times----here in TX with a Canadian husband!---- We thought it was very good. Seems like this tallies pretty
well with the way the English do it?
Yorkshire Pudding Forever!
Thanks. I make it both ways and they are both great. I use hot beef fat for mine. Milk and eggs are room temp and then mixed together with flour and salt to sit until it is time to bake them. I serve them as a side dish with the beef but will now serve them more often with other meats.
I've had YP several times, always prepared by my English sil, over for a visit. She made hers in one pan.
Now I want to see some one make this so I can have some !
I did make it once and I thought it very good but I am American !
Your mother must have been a very skilful cook Yorkshire Pudding was never a thing in our house when I was a child. Plenty of vegetables roasted around the meat were. And a couple of green vegetables, or in the height if summer green salads, were served. Special family meals were likely to have a baked upside-down or self-saucing pudding, with custard in winter, or a pavlova as a dessert. Did the UK do a version of Pavalova? It's just very well beaten egg whites, with sugar and a touch of vanilla, baked in a low oven until the outside has set, then covered in whipped cream and decorated with fruit - often strawberries. It is very easy to make if you have an electric beater, but pretty labour intensive in "the olden days".
It sounds as if you've had some lovely meals over Christmas. When the weather is horrid, a favourite meal is all the more appreciated.
One day I'm going to try to make a Yorkshire Pudding. I'll have to make it myself because no one around here has ever heard of them. They sound delicious.
Oh dear, I must be the only person in the world that does not like Yorkshire pudding! I only ever had what my English mother made, and thought it pretty tasteless. Yes, she used meat drippings and made it with very hot drippings, etc. The rest of the family liked it, but I never did. Maybe, though, if I had it in Yorkshire, it would taste better?
Librarian, you give me an idea! I am going to have game goulash on Sunday, with a lot of gravy, and I will make a big yorkshire pudding. Usually we have potato dumplings with goulash, but they are a lot of work, and I feel that I have spent enough time with cooking during the last days.
I had an Aunt who made her 'Yorkshire in exactly the same way. I still remember the flavour today. My mother's was good, but nowhere near as good as her sister's.
I've tried making Yorkshire puddings but they never taste as good as my Mother's... maybe the fat in the pan wasn't hot enough... or the oven wasn't hot enough??
Freut mich, dass ich helfen konnte, Hilde 😊
Through my late husband and his Yorkshire family I was introduced to Yorkshire Puddings and Trifle, both of which I had previously never heard of. My MIL made these every Christmas and many years ago I requested the recipe and began to make these myself. This year I baked the mini Yorkshire Puds and my daughter did the Trifle so although my Yorkshire MIL is long passed and my Durham husband even longer the memory of those past Christmasses is for now still carried on.
I have never made a YP, but when I was a child Mum used to make a big one and it was eaten as a dessert with Golden syrup on it...delicious. The corner bits were the best! I guess she didn't use beef dripping or it would have been too meaty tasting! Don't remember ever eating them with the main course in those days.
My Yorkshire father in law always had YP with onion gravy as a starter to his meal and then the meat and veg afterwards. It came from the days of filling hungry tummies to ration the expensive meat. Catriona
As an adult, I have even learned to make Yorkshire Puddings here in Australia. A nod to my ancestors who emigrated to the new colony of Queensland.
To our ladies in Germany (Mieke and Hilde), your game goulash sounds so interesting.
Now that is a Yorkshire pudding. I can't find any enthusiasm for those individual pieces of tasteless cardboard that folks haul home from the freezer section of the supermarket these days.
My mother made a good Yorkshire Pudding too. As everyone says, heat is the trick. It has to be smoking.
Yorkshire pudding has always been a favourite in our house.
When I lived a home with my mum, dad and 2 brothers money was tight so YP was served as starter with the good gravy made from the meat juices and the water that had cooked the vegetables (to keep the goodness) so that if there wasn't much main dinner to go around you were already part way to being full.
Another favourite way was to use 1lb of good butchers sausage meat to make small balls that are part cooked on the oven before pouring in YP mix to be cooked on high to make Toad in the Hole. I still make a version of this by cutting sausages in half to use in place of the balls of sausage meat, a firm favourite with my husband and 3 children.
And when me daughter was young and didn't like potatoes, especially mash it's a texture thing, I would make YP nearly every day as the carbohydrate part of her dinner, at least these days she will now eat the new type of potatoes.
Jane
My mother in law was a fabulous cook except for YP. I decided they would be the one thing I could cook better than her. I favour all the tips you offer and also just before ouring into the hot oil I pour in a tablespoon of boiling water and stir rapidly. No idea why it works but it does. John's comment reminded me that my great aunts served the yp first. i save a little of the mixture to thicken with gravy. Leftovers have Lyle's golden syru poured over.
As you can see the "p" key is sticking on my keyboard.
My Mum's would usually rise to such heights we struggled to get it out of the small oven without knocking the mountainous peaks down! Loved it fresh with the roast, and then again with a heavy drizzle of Tate & Lyles golden syrup for dessert! Wow! that was a lot of calories - but of course in those days we knew nothing about counting them! A nice brisk walk up the country lanes were all that was required to work them off!!!!
Mary x
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