How to Prepare and Eat Yorkshire Pudding

Yorkshire Pudding is a traditional side dish most frequently associated with roast beef and other meat entrées. Vintage recipes for Yorkshire Pudding call for "drippings" or the excess fat from roasted meats. But in these days of health consciousness and enlightened eating, there is less meat on the menu and the very notion of "drippings" is, quite frankly, not particularly appetizing.

This is no reason to give up on Yorkshire Pudding. It is too good of a dish to just dismiss as merely a quaint historical culinary footnote. With a little adaptation, it can be updated to fit a modern menu. The basic ingredients of Yorkshire Pudding are among the most modest in your kitchen and preparation is remarkable easy. For those reasons alone, the dish is well worth remembering. Beyond that, it is downright delicious.

One of the initial ways to adapt Yorkshire Pudding is to shift its traditional role from entrée side dish to dessert offering. Actually, it was often served as a dessert in English country homes back in the day, so this shift is not completely revolutionary. The next step in adaptation has to do with the ingredients. Forget the "drippings." Instead, use butter.

Here is what is needed to make the Yorkshire Pudding itself. Toppings and extras will be discussed a little later.

1 cup milk
1 cup flour
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 eggs, slightly beaten
4 tablespoons butter

A hot oven is necessary, so preheat to 450 degrees. Mix together the dry ingredients of flour, salt and sugar. Before adding the wet ingredients, get the baking pans ready. Use two bread loaf pans measuring about 9 inches long by 4 inches wide by 3 inches deep. Put 2 tablespoons of butter into each loaf pan. Place these loaf pans into a hot oven so the butter melts, but does not burn. It is important not to let the butter scorch or burn. While heating the buttered pans, add the milk and vanilla extract to the dry ingredients. Mix this into a smooth paste. Then add the slightly beaten 2 eggs and beat with an electric mixer for 2 minutes.

Carefully pour the pudding batter into the hot pans. The level of the batter should be only about ½ inch deep. It needs plenty of room to puff and rise. Bake at 450 degrees for 25 minutes. It should appear puffy and golden brown when done.

Turn the pudding out of the pans and cut into dessert serving portion sizes. Now come the toppings and extras. Maple syrup makes a wonderful drizzle over this dessert served hot. Fresh berries or a fruit preserve are also perfect toppings. A pouring of heavy cream over the serving makes this authentic and irresistible.

There is an alternate method of baking Yorkshire Pudding. Instead of bread loaf pans, muffin tins can be used. This can be slightly easier than turning out a full loaf for slicing. The muffin tin method produces nice individual portions. However, it is somewhat trickier due to the rising of the batter. Cover the bottom of each muffin cup with melted butter. Fill each cup with a scant ½ inch of batter. Overfilling will cause the batter to spill over the tin and burn in the oven. It is a good idea to use a liner, such as a cookie sheet, underneath the muffin tins to catch any overspill. Bake at 425 degrees for about 20 minutes or until puffy and golden brown.

Eating habits are bound to change over time, but this doesn't mean we have to abandon delicious vintage dishes. A little adapting is all it takes.