- Joined
- Dec 4, 2011
This was not necessarily the most common way to serve peas, but it's something a little different from steaming green peas or making soup. This recipe is from the Kentucky Housewife, because she uses a pudding mold, while Eliza Leslie uses a trickier pudding bag.
Peas Pudding.
Boil them with a small leg of pork till very soft; then mash them fine, press them through a sieve, season the pulp with pepper and cream, and put it in a mould; draw the skin from the pork, toast it a little before the fire, dredging it lightly with flour, or finely grated bread, and serve it up. Turn the pudding carefully into another dish, and send with it the pork, and a boat of melted butter, to season it at table.
This could be made with green peas, but Eliza Leslie specifies "dried split pease," and I think that makes more sense, also based on traditional English peas pudding. The pork could be either salt or fresh, though the fact that the recipe adds pepper but no salt hints that it's salt pork. If the pork is very salt, you might want to parboil and change the water once before adding the peas.
"Very soft" is important, because you'll be making the peas into a paste. Drain them of excess water at each step, so they'll be very thick and dry enough to moisten with the cream.
The mold would be a tin pudding mold. You could substitute a buttered metal bowl with a cloth tied over the top. Usually, you set the mold in a pot of boiling water that doesn't come up high enough to get into the mould, and steam the pudding. The recipe doesn't specify this step, but it may be implied. There's also nothing to help thicken the peas, but other recipes stirred an egg or two into the pulp before the final steaming.
Dredge the pork before toasting it.
If you get down to the boat of melted butter, you may think you're home free, as anyone can melt butter. But in this context it's referring to a sauce called "melted butter" or "drawn butter," butter thickened with flour. This 1850 recipe from Mrs. Bliss seems as clear as any. By braid she means to intermix.
MELTED BUTTER.
Melted Butter, sometimes called Drawn Butter, is made as follows:—Braid two tea-spoonfuls of flour into a quarter of a pound of nice butter, stir this into four table-spoonfuls of boiling water, keep stirring until the butter is all melted; then let it boil up once, and it is fit for the tureen.
Peas Pudding.
Boil them with a small leg of pork till very soft; then mash them fine, press them through a sieve, season the pulp with pepper and cream, and put it in a mould; draw the skin from the pork, toast it a little before the fire, dredging it lightly with flour, or finely grated bread, and serve it up. Turn the pudding carefully into another dish, and send with it the pork, and a boat of melted butter, to season it at table.
This could be made with green peas, but Eliza Leslie specifies "dried split pease," and I think that makes more sense, also based on traditional English peas pudding. The pork could be either salt or fresh, though the fact that the recipe adds pepper but no salt hints that it's salt pork. If the pork is very salt, you might want to parboil and change the water once before adding the peas.
"Very soft" is important, because you'll be making the peas into a paste. Drain them of excess water at each step, so they'll be very thick and dry enough to moisten with the cream.
The mold would be a tin pudding mold. You could substitute a buttered metal bowl with a cloth tied over the top. Usually, you set the mold in a pot of boiling water that doesn't come up high enough to get into the mould, and steam the pudding. The recipe doesn't specify this step, but it may be implied. There's also nothing to help thicken the peas, but other recipes stirred an egg or two into the pulp before the final steaming.
Dredge the pork before toasting it.
If you get down to the boat of melted butter, you may think you're home free, as anyone can melt butter. But in this context it's referring to a sauce called "melted butter" or "drawn butter," butter thickened with flour. This 1850 recipe from Mrs. Bliss seems as clear as any. By braid she means to intermix.
MELTED BUTTER.
Melted Butter, sometimes called Drawn Butter, is made as follows:—Braid two tea-spoonfuls of flour into a quarter of a pound of nice butter, stir this into four table-spoonfuls of boiling water, keep stirring until the butter is all melted; then let it boil up once, and it is fit for the tureen.
Bringing the