HASTY PUDDING.
But man, more fickle, the bold license claims,
In different realms, to give thee different names.
Thee, the soft nations round the warm Levant
Polanta call; the French, of course, Polante.
E’en in thy native regions, how I blush
To hear the Pennsylvanians call thee mush!
All spurious appellations, void of truth;
I’ve better known thee from my earliest youth:
Thy name is Hasty Pudding! Thus our sires
Were wont to greet thee from the fuming fires;
And while they argued in thy just defence,
With logic clear, they thus explained the sense:
“In haste the boiling caldron, o’er the blaze,
Receives and cooks the ready-powdered maize;
In haste ’tis served, and then in equal haste,
With cooling milk, we make the sweet repast.
No carving to be done, no knife to grate
The tender ear, and wound the stony plate;
But the smooth spoon, just fitted to the lip,
And taught with art the yielding mass to dip,
By frequent journeys to the bowl well stored,
Performs the hasty honors of the board.”
Such is thy name, significant and clear,—
A name, a sound, to every Yankee dear;
But most to me, whose heart and palate chaste
Preserve my pure, hereditary taste.
Barlow.
YORKSHIRE PUDDING.
The strong table groans
Beneath the smoking sirloin, stretch’d immense
From side to side; in which with desperate knife
They deep incisions make, and talk the while
Of England’s glory, ne’er to be defaced
While hence they borrow vigor; or amain
Into the pudding plunged at intervals,
If stomach keen can intervals allow,
Relating all the glories of the chase.
Thomson.
This pudding is especially an excellent accompaniment to a sirloin of beef. Six tablespoonfuls of flour, three eggs, a teaspoonful of salt, and a pint of milk, make a middling stiff batter; beat it up well; take care it is not lumpy. Put a dish under the meat; let the drippings drop into it, till it is quite hot and well greased; then pour in the batter. When the upper surface is browned and set, turn it, that both sides may be brown alike. A pudding an inch thick will take two hours. Serve it under the roast beef, that the juice of the beef may enter it. It is very fine.
SUET PUDDING.
Sir Balaam now, he lives like other folks;
He takes his chirping, and cracks his jokes.
Live like yourself, was soon my lady’s word;
And lo! suet pudding was seen upon the board.
Pope.
Suet, a quarter of a pound; flour, three tablespoonfuls; eggs two, and a little grated ginger; milk, half a pint. Mince the suet as fine as possible; roll it with the rolling-pin, so as to mix it well with the flour; beat up the eggs, mix them with the milk, and then mix them all together; wet your cloth well in boiling water, and boil it an hour and a quarter. Mrs. Glasse has it: “When you have made your water boil, then put your pudding into your pot.”