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Yorkshire Pudding


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So I've recently acquired several of those Time-Life "Foods of the World" books, and I've been inspired by the British Isles book to make a traditional anglo-American dinner of roast beef with horseradish sauce and Yorkshire pudding.

I don't think I've ever actually tasted Yorkshire pudding. It looks incredibly simple. The recipe essentially requires you to whip up 1 cup flour, 2 eggs, 1 cup milk and half a teaspoon salt. Then you heat a couple tablespoons of drippings from the roast, pour the batter in, and bake for half an hour.

Is this a good recipe for Yorkshire pudding? Anyone have a favorite recipe that's significantly different?

"I don't mean to brag, I don't mean to boast;

but we like hot butter on our breakfast toast!"

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It's incredibly easy to make indifferent Yorkshire pudding, but good ones take a certain tour de main...

My sous chef can make them so pillowy, I swear the bastard hides baking powder up his sleeve.

One that never fails :

1 cup flour

1 cup 50:50 water and milk

1 cup eggs

salt, pepper, 1tsp mustard powder (important)

Sift the flour and mustard powder together.

Whisk the liquids together, incorporate the flour and mustard powder and seasonings. Let rest for 1/2 hour.

Get the roasting tin and drippings smokingly hot in a 250C oven, pour in the batter, cook for about 20 minutes.

Never open the oven door between putting the pudding in and taking it out at the end.

Happily, yorkies take about as much time to cook as your roast takes to rest. Nature's kind like that.

Allan Brown

"If you're a chef on a salary, there's usually a very good reason. Never, ever, work out your hourly rate."

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Thanks culinary bear! I'm going to try this one on Sunday, with *lamb* drippings!

I'm a canning clean freak because there's no sorry large enough to cover the, "Oops! I gave you botulism" regrets.

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Never open the oven door between putting the pudding in and taking it out at the end.

I love yorkies and never made them successfully until I learned this tip. DO NOT open the door until almost done. If you do they will not rise properly.

Life is short, eat dessert first

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One of my greatest culinary joys was arriving in York, buying way too many books from a book dealer I had been chatting online with and, taking him to lunch at a local pub, having the most AMAZING Yorkshire pudding IN York while the Grand National was running -- and I had a winning ticket...

I don't think a Yorkshire pudding ever tasted as good as that one did.

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So I've recently acquired several of those Time-Life "Foods of the World" books, and I've been inspired by the British Isles book to make a traditional anglo-American dinner of roast beef with horseradish sauce and Yorkshire pudding.

I don't think I've ever actually tasted Yorkshire pudding.  It looks incredibly simple.  The recipe essentially requires you to whip up 1 cup flour, 2 eggs, 1 cup milk and half a teaspoon salt.  Then you heat a couple tablespoons of drippings from the roast, pour the batter in, and bake for half an hour. 

Is this a good recipe for Yorkshire pudding?  Anyone have a favorite recipe that's significantly different?

I would DOUBLE whatever recipe you're using... we use 2 cups flour, 4 eggs, 2 cups milk, 1 teaspoon salt, 1/4 cup drippings in a 9 x 13" pan. The recipe says it serves 8, but it's more like 6 around our house! Make sure to let the batter rest before pouring it into the hot drippings, and don't open the oven to peek. Mustard sounds like it would be a delightful addition... I'll have to try that next time!

SuzySushi

"She sells shiso by the seashore."

My eGullet Foodblog: A Tropical Christmas in the Suburbs

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The mustard isn't there solely for flavouring - it acts as an emulsifier and gives more structure to the batter.

Allan Brown

"If you're a chef on a salary, there's usually a very good reason. Never, ever, work out your hourly rate."

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Reading your posts make me want to give Yorkshire Puddings another go. The only time I tasted one, I made out of a packet of YP mix from Tesco. Depending on the amount of liquid and eggs you add to it, you'll either get YP or pancakes, if I remember correctly. At least I made it in a YP tin :cool: It didn't excite me at all.

TPcal!

Food Pix (plus others)

Please take pictures of all the food you get to try (and if you can, the food at the next tables)............................Dejah

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Depth of batter is important; too thick and you get popovers, too thin and it doesn't puff. About an inch is ideal.

Making individual ones in muffin tines may be easier than one big one. In all cases make sure the fat (and plenty of it) is smoking hot when you pour in the batter,

Some fried or roast onion in the bottom is nice.

With sausages embedded it becomes toad in the hole.

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Thanks so much for all the replies. I'm curious about this idea of doubling the recipe. I was going to use a 9 x 13 pyrex pan. But the recipe I quoted above calls for a 10 x 15 pan-- won't 9 x 13 be too small if I double the recipe?

I think I will add a bit of dry mustard, thanks!

"I don't mean to brag, I don't mean to boast;

but we like hot butter on our breakfast toast!"

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Thanks so much for all the replies.  I'm curious about this idea of doubling the recipe.  I was going to use a 9 x 13 pyrex pan.  But the recipe I quoted above calls for a 10 x 15 pan-- won't 9 x 13 be too small if I double the recipe?

I think I will add a bit of dry mustard, thanks!

I don't know... I don't have a larger baking pan (roasting pan, yes, but that's the one the roast is in!), so I've never tried it any other way! :blink:

SuzySushi

"She sells shiso by the seashore."

My eGullet Foodblog: A Tropical Christmas in the Suburbs

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I don't know... I don't have a larger baking pan (roasting pan, yes, but that's the one the roast is in!), so I've never tried it any other way!  :blink:

Make the batter

Take the roast out of the pan. Let it stand in a warm place - it will be all the better for it. Wrap it in tinfoil ito keep it warm if you like.

Add extra fat if need be to the pan and get it smoking hot. I find this easier on the stovetop.

Pour in the batter and put into very hot oven. Half an hour later serve with the meat. Of course you'll have to make your gravy from a good demi-glace, since the yorkshire will have adsorbed the pan drippings, but you can't have everything...Gravy is essential to serve with yorkshire.

In olden and poorer times Yorkshire pud was served before the meat as an appetite killer; others serve it after with treacle or golden syrup...No gravy if its sweet.

Edited by jackal10 (log)
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Seth, I think that the Pyrex pan is out regardless of capacity. The pan, and the fat in it, really do need to be "smoking hot" for this to work. If you pour cold batter into a smoking-hot glass dish (even oven-proof glass like Pyrex), plan on sweeping up shrapnel for while. :shock:

Allan, I've never heard of using dried mustard in YP. I'm assuming that it's yellow mustard like Coleman's, right? Also, your colleague's recipe calls for a higher proportion of eggs than I'm familiar with. Thanks for posting the recipe!

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As a Yank who moved to England 3 years ago, I was pretty ignorant about yorkshire puddings. I had only read of them, and the concept of having a dessert with the main course baffled me. Soon after I arrived, I was taken out for a traditional roast lunch and finally tasted them. I was hooked. After asking a couple English acquaintances, I was told that a proper Yorkshire pudding was quite difficult to make and thus was scared off from even trying. That was, until I discovered

Delia Smith and a failsafe recipe for Yorkshire pudding. The key, according to her, to a properly airy, light pudding is a very hot tin (muffin, popover, or bread), and hot grease (whichever one you are using). You can find the recipe online on her website.

PS: If you like Yorkshire pudding, please try Toad in the Hole (can also find a recipe on Delia's website). It is simply sausages baked in the oven with yorkshire pudding batter....YUMMY!

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I don't know... I don't have a larger baking pan (roasting pan, yes, but that's the one the roast is in!), so I've never tried it any other way!  :blink:

Make the batter

Take the roast out of the pan. Let it stand in a warm place - it will be all the better for it. Wrap it in tinfoil ito keep it warm if you like.

Add extra fat if need be to the pan and get it smoking hot. I find this easier on the stovetop.

Pour in the batter and put into very hot oven. Half an hour later serve with the meat. Of course you'll have to make your gravy from a good demi-glace, since the yorkshire will have adsorbed the pan drippings, but you can't have everything...Gravy is essential to serve with yorkshire.

Will try it this way next time. No treacle, thank you! :rolleyes:

SuzySushi

"She sells shiso by the seashore."

My eGullet Foodblog: A Tropical Christmas in the Suburbs

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I did use the pyrex, although you're right, edsel, that might have been unwise. No cracks in the pan, but I don't think the pudding puffed enough. It climbed the sides and rose over the top of of the dish-- but only on the sides. It puffed in the middle too, but not as dramatically, and within a couple minutes sank back and seemed a little heavy.

Maybe my fat wasn't hot enough. People enjoyed it anyway.

"I don't mean to brag, I don't mean to boast;

but we like hot butter on our breakfast toast!"

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The mustard isn't there solely for flavouring - it acts as an emulsifier and gives more structure to the batter.

Hoo, Nelly! My Yorkie rose to six inches! (Smother impulse to go blue with this).

Thanks for the recipe! I didn't have quite enough lamb drippings to make a go of it, so I added some bacon drippings. My gawd. A permanent addition to Easter brunch!

I'm a canning clean freak because there's no sorry large enough to cover the, "Oops! I gave you botulism" regrets.

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Making individual ones in muffin tines may be easier than one big one. In all cases make sure the fat (and plenty of it) is smoking hot when you pour in the batter,

This is how Mum taught me to make them - made it very easy to divvy up (3 each) - and that's how I learned simple addition, multiplication, etc.! Interesting about the mustard powder - never heard that one. Mum always said the key was letting the batter sit - and hers were always light & fluffy.

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I did use the pyrex, although you're right, edsel, that might have been unwise.  No cracks in the pan, but I don't think the pudding puffed enough.  It climbed the sides and rose over the top of of the dish-- but only on the sides.  It puffed in the middle too, but not as dramatically, and within a couple minutes sank back and seemed a little heavy.

Maybe my fat wasn't hot enough.  People enjoyed it anyway.

That is what its meant to do. Leves a sort of basin for the gravy, onions, etc

If you wnt the centre o rise use a deeper batter (smaller dish) - but then its a popover.

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There are three immutable rules for Yorkshires:

1. Always rest the batter for at least an hour, all morning if possible.

2. Always use meat drippings.

3. Put the batter into the individual/large moulds on top of the stove, so that they sizzle and fry as they go in.

Result? Heaven :rolleyes:

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I did use the pyrex, although you're right, edsel, that might have been unwise.  No cracks in the pan, but I don't think the pudding puffed enough.  It climbed the sides and rose over the top of of the dish-- but only on the sides.  It puffed in the middle too, but not as dramatically, and within a couple minutes sank back and seemed a little heavy.

Maybe my fat wasn't hot enough.  People enjoyed it anyway.

That is what its meant to do. Leves a sort of basin for the gravy, onions, etc

If you wnt the centre o rise use a deeper batter (smaller dish) - but then its a popover.

Thanks, Jack! Then I guess it was perfect!

"I don't mean to brag, I don't mean to boast;

but we like hot butter on our breakfast toast!"

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I have read that the "classic " method is to pour the batter into the roasting pan at the end of the roast's cooking, leaving the roast above. The fats are all roast dripppings and as the pudding cooks, it gets dripped on a little more. I've never quite pulled this off, usually use a rack or mirepoix vegetables and can't seem to figure how the pudding could work on top of that stuff.

You shouldn't eat grouse and woodcock, venison, a quail and dove pate, abalone and oysters, caviar, calf sweetbreads, kidneys, liver, and ducks all during the same week with several cases of wine. That's a health tip.

Jim Harrison from "Off to the Side"

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a) remove meat and rack it was sitting on. Keep warm

b) Put pan on heat on top of stove so it smoking hot

c) Pour in batter (hear the sizzle)

d) Put in hot oven for half an hour

The yorkshire will pick up the pan juices, roast onions, mirepoix or whatever and be all the better for it. If you don't remove the meat rack it will get stuck in the yorkshire and make portioning difficult

Edited by jackal10 (log)
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