Yorkshire Pudding

[jayhay]

Beautiful Ann_T!

Next time I'll only double, not triple, my recipe. Filling them up to 3/4's full is obviously too much batter.

How long did you cook them?

[Marlene]

Using popover tins, I usually cook my about 30 minutes. They'll sound hollow when you tap on them.

[Jake]

I recently came into some popover/Yorkshire pans just like Marlene's as well. Hoping to try them out this week, and I may not even wait for the roast to go with them!

[Marlene]

I have a question. I have no trouble getting tall crispy yorkshire puddings in the oven. But they deflate really really fast. How do the restaurants keep those yorkies crisp and puffy from the kitchen to your table?

[alanamoana]

I have a question.  I have no trouble getting tall crispy yorkshire puddings in the oven.  But they deflate really really fast.  How do the restaurants keep those yorkies crisp and puffy from the kitchen to your table?

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at least with regard to popovers (cousins to yorkshire pudding), i've always baked them for at least 45 minutes (closer to an hour) in a 400F convection oven. from what i understand this is common.

similar to pate a choux, popover batter needs the time and temperature for the steam to allow for expansion and for the proteins to coagulate. then the extra time is for moisture evaporation. you want them to be drier than you think. people tend to underbake pate a choux and popovers.

i used to bake about 300 of them and we'd keep the oven going all night during service. the first ones pulled were fine and we'd warm them up if necessary but they never deflated.

edited to add: marlene, looking at the photo of your lovely roast and the accompanying yorkies, it definitely looks like the yorkies are underbaked. a little too light colored where there are cracks. but if you like them like that, why worry?! it's all about your meal

Edited April 16, 2007 by alanamoana (log)

[Marlene]

Hmmm you may be right. I'd prefer them a little crispier and I want them to hold up after I take them out. I think a little experimentation is called for this week.

[Corinna Dunne]

Certainly, drying them out a bit in the oven will keep them crisper and stop them deflating. But this does give a different result, and as alanamoana mentioned, it depends on taste.

Personally, I think that Yorkshire puddings fresh out of the oven are far superior to the more dried out option that never seems to soften properly, no matter how much gravy you pour over. Invariably, I make them using lard and keep the juices/dripping from the roast to make the gravy. Doing this will allow you more flexibility if you want to cook them in advance and hold them.

[Marlene]

I render my own beef fat, and that is what I usually use for yorkshires, so my drippings can be used for gravy. My preference is for them to be a bit crispier, so I'm going to try a few experiments this week, and in one of them try a little mustard powder.

[cfm]

ok folks. I've got a twelve pound prime rib in the oven.  Cast iron pan or individual muffin tins for the yorkies?  Help!

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On this topic, I can't fault the solution of a friend who says they can "never remember" which come out better. Make a tray of each, serve the best and hide the other. Cunning, huh?

Catherine

[Adam Balic]

Certainly, drying them out a bit in the oven will keep them crisper and stop them deflating.  But this does give a different result, and as alanamoana mentioned, it depends on taste.

Personally, I think that Yorkshire puddings fresh out of the oven are far superior to the more dried out option that never seems to soften properly, no matter how much gravy you pour over. Invariably, I make them using lard and keep the juices/dripping from the roast to make the gravy.  Doing this will allow you more flexibility if you want to cook them in advance and hold them.

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Funny how there are so many variations in preferance for such a simple dish. Some older accounts of the pudding say that "the local preparation of Yorkshire pudding seems to have been quite a speciality, and I have never seen a faithful representation elsewhere........[in Yorkshire] it was always thin and apt to be crisp if roasted too long. In London and elsewhere I have invariably found it very thick, resembling what we called in Yorkshire a batter pudding."

[Adam Balic]

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.

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This method works when "roasted" meant that the meat was cooked in front of a open heat source, rather then being baked in the oven as it generally means now. If you think about it, the conditions required for a successful pudding and roasted meat are not going to occur together in an oven at the same time.

A more detailed description of the method is shown on Ivan Day's excellent site (scroll down to "batter puddings").

Edited April 18, 2007 by Adam Balic (log)

[ned]

I offer the following:

Everyone who loves yorkshire pudding must love dutch babies.

[Hawthorne]

Bump this; it's nearly time to start thinking about Christmas dinner again!

Not that we'll be doing roast beef this year, due to the economy, but I did think it might be useful to add a couple of things.

Find a butcher who will sell you a roast which still owns it's own fat. That is, it hasn't been trimmed. You can't make YP (or roasted potatoes) without beef fat. And where I live, if you can't find a place who'll take a special order, even a very rich prime rib may not give up enough fat for accompaniments. Something needs to be done about this situation. I am capable of trimming my own meat, thankyou very much, and prefer to get my meat with the fat on.

When I take the roast out of the oven, I pour the fat off the pan very carefully; what I don't need for gravy and the YP I keep for frying potatoes and other such applications.

Someone upthread asked about seasoning on the roast - if you like the roast seasoned with whatever you put on it, your potatoes/YP/anything else you do with the fat will be fine.

I generally make mine in a cake tin, and cut it in wedges. However, when I make toad-in-the-hole I make that in a square pan - and I find it takes 10 or 15 minutes longer to cook. Whether that is due to the pan or the addition of the sausage I have no idea, but there you are ..

Otherwise, I concur with all the comments made above. In fact, I will now pay more attention to the stand time when I make it; I have a hunch that some of my less than stellar efforts may have been due to the batter not having stood long enough.

My grandfather always carefully put his YP on his saucer, sprinkled it with sugar and saved it for dessert. Even on Christmas, when there was plum pudding to be had, the old rogue!

Edited November 9, 2008 by Hawthorne (log)

[Dave Hatfield]

Being American I hesitate to speak upon this subject. I have, however, been married to a lass from county Durham for 20 years who is a dab hand at making Yorkshire.

She claims there are three essentials to making a really good Yorkshire.

1) a Very very hot oven. She cranks ours right up to over 220 C. (this also implies that your roast is out resting Before you bake your Yorkshire)

2) That your batter is at least one hour old. She prefers to make hers several hours ahead and keep it in the fridge until just before cooking.

3) Your fat must be smoking hot Before you pour the batter in. She puts her tin with the fat into the hot oven until the fat just begins to smoke. Then quickly out of the oven, pour the batter in & back into the oven.

Note that you don't have to use beef fat to make good Yorkshires. Duck fat does very well as we've found here in France. Roast lamb with Yorkshire pudding is almost, but not quite, as good as roast beef with Yorkshire pudding.

Either requires a really good gravy, but that's another story!

[bishwells]

scientists speak!

http://www.rsc.org/AboutUs/News/PressRelea...ctYorkshire.asp

Edited November 14, 2008 by bishwells (log)

[Adam Balic]

For those that are interested, food historian Ivan Day demonstrates how Yorkshire Puddings were originally made.

Batter puddings (scroll down).