Butter thickly a basin which holds a pint and a half, and fill it nearly to the brim with good boiling apples pared, cored, and quartered; pour over them a batter made with four tablespoonsful of flour, two large or three small eggs, and half a pint of milk. Tie a buttered and floured cloth over the basin, which ought to be quite full, and boil the pudding for an hour and a quarter. Turn it into a hot dish when done, and strew sugar thickly over it: this, if added to the batter at first, renders it heavy. Morella cherries make a very superior pudding of this kind; and green gooseberries, damsons, and various other fruits, answer for it extremely well: the time of boiling it must be varied according to their quality and its size.
For a pint and a half mould or basin filled to the brim with apples or other fruit; flour, 4 tablespoonsful; eggs, 2 large or 3 small; milk, 1/2 pint: 1-1/4 hour.
Obs.—Apples cored, halved, and mixed with a good batter, make an excellent baked pudding, as do red currants, cherries, and plums of different sorts likewise.
KENTISH SUET PUDDING.
To a pound and a quarter of flour add half a pound of finely minced beef-suet,[[145]] half a teaspoonful of salt, and a quarter one of pepper; mix these into a smooth paste with one well-beaten egg, and a little cold milk or water; make it into the shape of a paste-roller, fold a floured cloth round it, tie the ends tightly, and boil it for two hours. In Kentish farmhouses, and at very plain family dinners, this pudding is usually sent to table with boiled beef, and is sometimes cooked with it also. It is very good sliced and broiled, or browned in a Dutch oven, after having become quite cold.
[145]. A very common fault with bad and careless cooks is, that of using for paste and puddings suet coarsely chopped, which is, to many eaters, distasteful to the last degree.
Flour, 1-1/2 lb.; suet, 1/2 lb.; salt 1/2 teaspoonful; half as much pepper; 1 egg; little milk or water: boiled 2 hours.
ANOTHER SUET PUDDING.
Make into a somewhat lithe but smooth paste, half a pound of fine stale bread-crumbs, three quarters of a pound of flour, from ten to twelve ounces of beef-suet chopped extremely small, a large half-teaspoonful of salt, and rather less of pepper, with two eggs and a little milk. Boil it for two hours and a quarter.