I have just spent the most wonderful week in northern Italy,
nestled at the foot of the mountains with the breathtaking sight of Lake Garda
stretching out before me. The weather was forecast to be terrible but our
saving grace we thought was the fantastic food we would have the pleasure of
experiencing; it didn’t disappoint and thankfully, neither did the weather.
The food was so simple, stripped back to let the flavours of
the bare essential ingredients speak for themselves and devoid of the
complicated herbal concoctions and lashings of garlic that seem to be added
when recreated in this country; just good pure wholesome food. Having visited Italy a few times previously
I was prepared for the famous gelato in all of its varieties and take advantage
of it I certainly did as my jeans knew all too well when they had to deal with
my body being squeezed back into them after a full week’s worth of food
indulgence.
The only thing that was lacking (if you could even call it
that with all the ice cream), was the pudding list. Yes, it’s true, the country is famous for the tiramisu…not my cup
of tea, or should I say coffee (as I don’t drink either) I was searching for
profiteroles, which I eventually found but other than a basic panna cotta,
there was not much else on offer. I
felt myself craving a good pud and on my return to England, I naturally started
planning my pudding list to work my way through.
There was, however the slight issue of the side effects that
my previously mentioned indulgence had created…the tight jeans…the “filling
out” of my stomach, thigh and probably bottom area…so the pud had to be a light
one, to give the air of being deceptively healthy…I had just the recipe.
Citrus pudding is a Delia Smith recipe, which Mum used to
make us when growing up, it is light and airy and a self saucing pudding, so I
have it in it’s purest form; nothing on the side. Now the recipe Mum shared with me slightly differs from Delia’s
so if you want to compare the two, just click here.
Feeds 4
Ingredients
The juice & rind of 1 lemon
4 oz caster sugar
1 oz self-raising flour
2 oz margarine
¼ pint milk
2 eggs, separated
Method
- Cream the margarine and sugar and meanwhile whisk the egg whites until the form firm peaks.
- To the margarine mixture, add the lemon rind, juice and egg yolks, followed by the flour.
- Fold in the egg whites (do it with a metal spoon – I think that is a Delia tip also). At this stage the mixture may look slightly curdled but don’t worry, it is fine.
- Now pour the mixture into an oven proof dish, but make sure you can put that dish inside a bigger one, this pudding is cooked in a water bath so to speak.
- Once your dish containing the mixture is sat inside the bigger dish, put them in a preheated oven at 150 degrees centigrade and then pour boiling water into the bigger dish so that it comes up the side of the smaller dish containing your pudding. You want the water level to rise up the side of the inner dish by between ¼ and ½ of an inch.
- The secret to this pudding is the higher the water comes up the side of the pudding dish, the more sauce you get.
- Cook the pudding for 35-40 minutes until the top is golden and just firm.
- Remove and serve warm, on it’s own or with cream.
A deceptively innocent dessert and devilishly moreish!
