Ricotta Jam Pudding

This is another in my collection of fabulous Things to Do With a Jar of Jam.    It's a creamy ricotta pudding, flavored and sweetened with a jar of whatever jam you like.   Then, then, topped off with spoonful of another jam.

And.   It's gluten free!

And!  Only three ingredients.

I know.

I know!



Ricotta Jam Pudding
www.rurification.com

• 30 oz or so ricotta cheese
• 4 eggs
• 12 oz jar of jam [1 1/2 cups] [I used Orange Marmalade.]

Preheat oven to 350.  Beat the eggs well, add cheese and jam.  Mix well.   Pour into greased 8 inch casserole dish.  Cover dish.   Bake about 60 minutes, until knife inserted in center comes out clean.

Serve warm with whipped cream, syrup or jam on top. I served it with Blueberry Lime Jam.

Oh. My. Gosh.    It was fabulous!

Notes:  You can fatten this up with a 1/2 cup of half and half or cream.  

The choice of jam to use is entirely up to you.   It would be good with any jam, even runny jam.  [Perhaps especially runny jam.]   Any.  Jam.   Really.  Don't stress out about it; just have fun. 

These jam recipes and 180 more are available in my ebook - A Simple Jar of Jam.   See sidebar for a link to a preview.

Sticky Toffee Pudding

If you are trying to lose weight, turn off your monitor now.   This recipe is full of calories. 

It's quite perfect for the holidays, in my opinion. 

I mean seriously, since you have to spend several hours in the same house with Crazy Aunt Sally for the holiday, then you deserve this dessert.   For breakfast! 

A friend of mine gave me this recipe last year and we made it for Christmas Eve dinner.   I made the batter earlier in the day and then we stuck them in the oven just before we sat down to dinner.   To say that we loved them would be a gross understatement.

They were To. Die. For.   The heavens opened, angels sang, all was right with the world.  We had them warm, with ice cream.   I could only manage a half of one.    Which meant there was more for later.  

More.  

Christmas night it started snowing and when it stopped, we had more than a foot of snow.  We dug ourselves out just in time for the power to go out.   We got our generator going [which took some fiddling] and settled in.  We were lucky - we were without power for only six hours.  To celebrate the return of electricity, we ate more sticky toffee pudding.   And then for breakfast the next day, just because we could, we finished it off.

See?   It's totally versatile!   You can eat it to celebrate anything!  In fact, you don't even need a reason to eat these.   You can have them whenever you want! 

I got the recipe from a friend, and she said it came from America's Test Kitchen.  The link will take you to the original recipe page, but you may have to sign up for a free trial in order to see it.   Here's basically what it is.

Individual Sticky Toffee Puddings, with Toffee Sauce

Cook's Illustrated, via www.rurification.com

Pudding Cakes

1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 1/4 cups whole dates, pitted, cut crosswise into 1/4-inch slices [The dry hard ones are easiest, but you can use fresher soft ones, too.]
3/4 cup warm water
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup packed brown sugar, light or dark
2 large eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
4 tablespoons unsalted butter (1/2 stick), melted

Toffee Sauce
8 tablespoons unsalted butter (1 stick)
1 cup packed brown sugar, light or dark
2/3 cup heavy cream
1 tablespoon rum or a couple of drops of rum flavoring
1/2 teaspoon juice from 1 lemon 

FOR THE PUDDING CAKES: Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour eight 4-ounce ramekins. Set prepared ramekins in large roasting pan.

Combine half of dates with water and baking soda in glass measuring cup (dates should be submerged beneath water) and soak for 5 minutes. Drain dates, reserving liquid, and transfer to medium bowl. Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt together in another medium bowl.

Process remaining dates and brown sugar in food processor until just blended, about five short pulses. Add reserved soaking liquid, eggs, and vanilla and process until smooth, about 5 seconds. With food processor running, pour melted butter through feed tube in steady stream. Transfer this mixture to bowl with softened dates.

Gently stir dry mixture into wet mixture until just combined and date pieces are evenly dispersed. Distribute batter evenly among prepared ramekins. 

Fill roasting pan with enough boiling water to come halfway up sides of ramekins, making sure not to splash water into ramekins.  I filled an empty wine bottle with water and poured it in that way.   Worked like a charm.   Cover pan tightly with aluminum foil, crimping edges to seal.  [I skipped that part entirely.]  Bake pudding cakes until puffed and small holes appear on surface, about 40 minutes. Immediately remove ramekins from water bath and cool on wire rack for 10 minutes.

FOR THE TOFFEE SAUCE: While the puddings are baking,  melt butter in medium saucepan over medium heat. Whisk in brown sugar until smooth. Continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until sugar is dissolved and mixture looks puffy, 3 to 4 minutes. [My sugar didn't dissolve until I put the cream in.]  Slowly pour in cream and rum, whisk just to combine, reduce heat, and simmer until sugar is dissolved and mixture is frothy, 10-15 minutes.   Remove from heat and stir in lemon juice.

To serve, invert each ramekin onto plate or shallow bowl, remove ramekin.  Divide toffee sauce evenly among cakes and serve immediately.   If you want to eat them later, then warm the pudding in the microwave for 30 seconds and it'll come right out of the ramekin.  

The recipe makes a lot.  You can use smaller ramekins and still have a generous dessert.  Or you could cut them in half and serve them cut side down on a plate.   They'd serve 16 or more people that way.

Bread Pudding

Comfort food.

Spoon food.

Food. Of. The. Gods.

Bread pudding is one of my very favorite things in the whole world.  Custard soaked bread flavored with warm spices....heavenly!


I like it for breakfast.    Warmed up.    We generally make it the night before because it bakes for a while.   In the morning, we can either pop the whole thing back in the oven for 20 minutes or just microzap individual servings  because some like it hot and some don't. 

The recipe we based ours on comes from Breakfast in Bed: 90 Recipes for Creative Indulgences, by Jesse Ziff Cool.    [No kidding about the name.]

We adjusted it, of course, to fit what we have around, and I always use less sugar and butter than her original recipe.   Here's the recipe as I make it.

Bread Pudding
www.rurification.com

• 2 - 2 1/2 quart baking dish, 9x9, etc. greased.
• Stale bread:  Slices, crumbles, whatever.  Doesn't matter what kind - white, wheat, cinnamon, whatever.   6 thick slices or about 1/3 - 1/2 of the dish full - less if you want a finished pudding with more custard and less bread. 
•  8 eggs or egg yolks or whites or a combination of what you might have on hand or left over from another dish.   A couple more or less isn't going to hurt things.
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp cardamom
• 3 1/2 cups milk.   Or cream.  Or half and half.  Or evaporated.  Or whatever.   Again - a bit more or less isn't going to hurt things. 

Preheat oven to 350.   Grease dish and put the bread in the bottom of the dish.   In a large bowl or mixer, mix everything else together.    Pour the egg mix over the bread in the baking dish.    Press the bread down so it soaks up the custard.    Put the pudding dish in a larger baking dish or pan and fill the large one with hot water so that it comes about half way up the pudding dish.    Bake it for 1 hour.     Serve warm or cool.   Store in refrigerator.

Solsberry Bog Puddings

While I was making those individual Sussex Pond Puddings, I thought I'd really put a Hoosier twist to it and make some with other fillings.    They were wonderful!





There's not enough goo in these to call them Pond Puddings, so I think we need to adjust the name.   We considered these names:

• Solsberry Wetland Puddings
• Solsberry Drought Puddings
• Solsberry Marsh Puddings
• Solsberry Bog Puddings
• Solsberry Puddle Puddings

I'm leaning toward Solsberry Bog Puddings.   These puddings are soft and boggy, not runny.  Plus, there's a real bog with a beaver pond next to it a mile or so west of us, so it fits where we live, too.   Vote for your favorite name in the comments!

Pastry [Enough for 3 individual puddings]

• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup fine bread crumbs
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup butter or shortening
• 1/3 cup milk + a Tablespoon or so

Combine the flour, bread crumbs and salt.  Cut in the butter or shortening until fine.   Add milk.  Stir together to form dough.   It will be soft.  

Divide dough into thirds.    Roll each into a round disk about 1/4 inch thick.   Cut out one quarter of the dough to save for the top.   Fit the rest of the dough into a cone shape and press it into the cup or ramekin.  Trim off excess dough and keep it for the top.   Fill the puddings.

Roll or press the remaining dough into circles for the tops of the puddings.   Seal, etc. as described here:  Sussex Pond Puddings - Hoosier Style 

Filling:
For our version of the puddings, all you have to do is choose a fruit, then choose a sweetener.   This is a great way to use up leftover bits of fruit and an even better way to use that jam you've been making all year.  This is definitely one of my favorite TTDWAJOJ.   [Things To Do With A Jar Of Jam].

For the fruit, we used bananas, lemons, peaches from a can, and apples.  You can use any kind of fruit, fresh or canned. 

For the sweet, we used brown sugar, maple syrup, apple-pear maple jam, strawberry rhubarb jam and orange marmalade.  You could also use honey, white sugar, turbinado sugar, agave, etc.   These were really good!   Here are the combinations we used.

Lemon and brown sugar.   This is very close to the traditional Sussex Pond Pudding recipe I told you about before. 1/2 lemon per ramekin.  Three tablespoons brown sugar.   Plus the butter.

Lemon and marmalade.  1/2 lemon per ramekin.   Two generous spoonfuls of marmalade that hadn't jelled right.  Plus the butter.  Loved this one!!  

Banana and brown sugar.   Like Bananas Foster without the booze.  One medium banana sliced per ramekin.  2 Tablespoons brown sugar.  Plus the butter.    To. Die. For.  

Peach and Strawberry-Rhubarb Jam.   I used sliced peaches out of a can to see if it would work.   Oh, it worked!  Let the juice drip off a bit before you put the peaches in the pastry.    You could also slice up a fresh peach, of course.  Two generous spoonfuls of jam.  Plus the butter. 

Apples and maple syrup.   About a quarter of a large apple cut up fit into a ramekin if you piled it in.  Since apples shrink a lot during cooking, I piled high.    Two tablespoons of maple syrup.   This was a huge favorite.

Apples and Apple-Pear Maple Jam.   About a quarter of a large apple cut up.  Two generous spoonfuls of jam.  Plus the butter.   Wonderful!

Don't be afraid to mix and match your fruit and jam.   Just because you're using peaches doesn't mean you need to use a peach jam.   Be bold.

Enjoy!