Blueberry Batter Pudding 1839

Batter puddings are a lighter cake-type 'pudding'. The following recipe is by Sarah Josepha Buell Hale (1788-1879) best known for her poem "Mary had a little lamb" and promoting Thanksgiving.  Also general instructions from 1827.

BATTER PUDDING.  1839

Take six ounces of fine flour, a little salt, and three eggs; beat up well with a little milk, added by degrees till the batter is quite smooth; make it the thickness of cream; put into a buttered pie-dish, and bake three quarters of an hour; or in a buttered and floured basin, tied over tight with a cloth: boil one hour and a half, or two hours.

Any kind of ripe fruit that you like may be added to the batter,—only you must make the batter a little stiffer. Blueberries or finely chopped apple are most usually liked.

Hale, Sarah Josepha Buell.  The Good Housekeeper: Or, The Way to Live Well and to be Well While We Live ... Boston: 1839

General instructions for common flour pudding or batter pudding by a British lady - 

BATTER PUDDINGS.   1827

Of these, the constituent parts are milk, eggs, and flour: they may be variously enriched or flavoured, and hence derive different names: but the following general rules will apply to the whole race.

The eggs should be finer beaten; if yelks and whites are beaten separately, and afterwards mixed, it is all the better.

The eggs should be thoroughly mixed with the flour before any milk is added; then as much milk as will bring the batter to a proper stiffness, and the whole beaten till not a single lump remains. When a batter pudding is required to be particularly delicate, it may be strained through a sieve or coarse cloth, but if it be properly mixed and well beaten, this is not necessary. The basin in which a batter pudding is to be boiled, must be well buttered, and the batter must be just enough perfectly to fill it, otherwise it will be sure to be watery and broken.

If boiled in a cloth only, let the cloth be buttered or floured, and a little room allowed for the pudding to swell, Be very particular in seeing that the water boils first at the moment the pudding is put in, and that it be kept boiling the whole time.

The time required for boiling will be in proportion to the richness as well as the size of the pudding. A larger pudding with more eggs, will not take so long to boil as a smaller one with more flour and less eggs. If suet be added, a rather shorter time will suffice for boiling.

Batter pudding should be stirred to the very last moment before putting into the pot, otherwise the flour will settle, and the pudding appear of different substances. For the same reason, as well as to preserve it from sticking, the pudding should be shaken about in the pot for two or three minutes, which will secure the proper setting of the batter.

A pot in which a pudding is to be boiled, had better be placed on a trivet; if it be close to the flame, the pudding is apt to stick and burn; still it must not be so far off as to endanger its stopping boiling. A common pudding may be boiled in a pot with meat or even vegetables, if required; but for a light rich pudding, this should be carefully avoided, as a greasy appearance or unpleasant flavour is easily thus acquired.

As to proportions of the ingredients, to fill a half-pint basin with rich and light batter, five eggs may be allowed to three table spoonsful of flour, a grate of nutmeg, and as much milk as will exactly fill the basin. A pudding of this size and quality will require forty-five or fifty minutes boiling, and should on no account exceed an hour, or it becomes bad, let it be served as hot as possible, and eaten with wine sauce, or cold butter and sugar.

A very good batter pudding of the same size may be made with three eggs and three spoonfuls of flour, which may be either boiled or baked. If baked, the dish should not be quite full, as the batter, if well made, rises very hollow, and is liable to burn. In a baked batter pudding, a spoonful of suet shred fine, or an equal quantity of lard or dripping improves and renders it more wholesome.

The same pudding answers very well to bake under meat, in that case no other fat is required than the drippings of the meat; it may be made of any size, in the proportion of an egg to a spoonful of flour, and a quantity of milk equal to the eggs.

A Yorkshire pudding is much the same thing; only done under roast meat, not baked, and in a shallow square tin; when the under part is browned, it is turned over in the tin. To do this the more easily, there is a very good contrivance, that of a double tin, which shuts in like a box; let the pudding be half done in one part; when properly browned underneath, have ready the other part, greased and hot through; place it on as the lid of a box, and turn it over quickly, then remove the tin in which it has already been baked, and let the other part brown; two hours are allowed for baking. A very excellent family pudding may be made in the following manner: Prepare a batter as above; grease a deep dish; pour a little of the batter; then lay steaks of any kind, well seasoned; pour over the remainder of the batter, and bake it; for which purpose an hour and three-quarters or two hours will suffice.

The New London Cookery and Complete Domestic Guide. By a Lady.  1827