How To Make Nursery Pudding

Nursery puddings are generally made from a concoction of fruit, stale sponge or soft white bread and some kind of custard or cream. There are dozens of variations to be found in really old cookery books; this recipe is nursery pudding in its simplest form, but it could also be made with fresh fruit and a proper home-made custard sauce. I’ve taken the easy route here and used a tin of mixed summer fruits in natural juice and blancmange made from the packet. (The instructions for making blancmange are on the box but I’ve included them here too.) Stewed apples in sweet, spicy syrup with vanilla blancmange or custard would be another good combination, as would sliced bananas sprinkled with brown sugar and nutmeg, with chocolate blancmange or custard. The amount of sponge cake used here – and this also applies to the Quick Queen of Puddings recipe – is the equivalent of a sponge made with 2 oz (50 g) each of butter, sugar and flour with one egg; i.e.

1. Step 1:

   Empty the contents of one sachet of pink blancmange into a large bowl with 2 spoonfuls of sugar and mix to a paste with a very little milk from 1 pint (600 ml).

2. Step 2:

   Bring the rest of the milk slowly to the boil until bubbles are forming on the surface then pour a little of the warm milk into the bowl with the blancmange paste and keep stirring as you pour the rest of the milk into the bowl.

3. Step 3:

   Pour the blancmange back into the pan and bring to the boil over a low heat, stirring all the time, and simmer for about one minute until the blancmange is thick, smooth and creamy, just like custard.

4. Step 4:

   Pour the blancmange back into the bowl and leave to cool by an open window for about 10 minutes, whisking with a fork from time to time. (The blancmange doesn’t have to cool completely; lukewarm is fine.)

5. Step 5:

   Meanwhile, cut the sponge cake into neat ¼ inch (5 mm) slices and cover the bottom of a medium-sized baking dish, a couple of inches (about 5 cm) deep, then spoon all the juice from the tin of fruit into the dish to soak the sponge.

6. Step 6:

   Cover the sponge with the fruit then pour on the slightly cooled blancmange and sprinkle the last dessertspoonful of sugar evenly across the surface to stop a skin forming. Refrigerate for an hour or two until the blancmange is set.