A winter pudding – lemon delicious

After my last dessert post (which had friends happily bantering in the comments over recipe ownership) I am trying again – this time with a recipe so old fashioned and well established that anyone into dessert will probably have their own take on it. It’s Lemon Delicious pudding, which has been around for donkeys years. And there is a reason why we are still cooking it. It is – as the name suggest – delicious.

To me, pudding is a little like chocolate. I’m not really interested until it’s put in front of me and then I can’t stop eating it. I am still coming down off my chocolate binge that was Easter, so desserts are not really top of mind. So on the night we had it, I wasn’t thinking about dessert at all. My bloke had found a recipe and enlisted the assistance of our 5 year old (she beat the egg whites) before I even realised it was on the menu. Not that I was protesting of course. I actually thought I’d have the willpower to only have a taste….

In reality I could have devoured the whole thing – if it weren’t for my children asking for second and third helpings. It was so light and beautiful, but creamy tasting. Perfect end to a wintery dinner and massive special treat hit with the kids. Actually I think man grommets would like it too. Not a super lean dessert – so don’t go eating the whole thing on yer own now….

Apologies for the lack of after photo – we ate it before I had a chance to get the camera out. 25.07.11 update: new ‘after’ photo at the end of the post!

Lemon delicious – only an hour away from perfection. Waiting to be steamed under a watchful eye.

Recipe

Serves 4. Takes about 10 minutes to get ready, then an hour or so in the oven. You could also cook this in individual ramekins so then everyone gets the same amount which is important. This was adapted from a recipe found on Best Recipes. You could try different flours and see what sort of results you get – self-raising GF seemed to work very well.

Ingredients

3 eggs
1/2 cup white sugar
1 cup milk
1 tablespoon self-raising GF flour
1 tablespoon lemon zest (go more if you want it really lemony)
1/2 cup lemon juice
1 tablespoon extra sugar

What to do

Egg duty: firstly recruit a volunteer to beat the eggs. We did it the old school way with a whisk and a small hand, but you could use a hand held mixer. Especially the egg whites. Those suckers can take a while. So firstly separate the eggs. Get the egg yolks and mix them together with the sugar in a small bowl until light and creamy. Then add the milk, lemon juice and rind, and fold in the flour (sifted ideally – we didn’t though).

Then in a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until soft peaks form. Recruit more people to whisk if need be. Add the extra sugar and keep beating until that’s all dissolved. Fold this into the lemon mixture and pour into a greased casserole dish.

Steaming: get a shallow pan of cold water and stand the casserole dish in it. Bake it in a moderate oven for 50 – 60 minutes.

Servation: you could serve with more lemon zest and some sprinkled icing sugar. But we just had vanilla icecream and it was so good. I am now dessert hungry just writing about it.