THE ORIGINAL ‘RECEIPT’

PUDDING AUX BLUETS. – Une pinte de farine, deux cuillérées de creme de tarte, deux grandes cuillérées de sucre battu avec deux oeufs; ajoutez à la farine une tasse de lait, une demi-tasse de beurre fondu, une petite cuillérée de soda dissout dans l’eau chaude, et une pinte de bluets; mettez le tout dans un plat et faites cuire dans le fourneau.

~La Revérénde Mère Caron. Directions Diverses. Montreal, 1883.

THE UPDATED RECIPE

• 2 c. blueberrries (preferably wild)
• 2 c. all-purpose flour
• 2 tsp. cream of tartar
• 2 Tb. granulated sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 c. milk
• 1/2 c. melted butter
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda, dissolved in
• 2 Tb. warm water

Clean and wash the blueberries.

Preheat oven to 350F.

Grease a 6-cup baking dish with butter.

Sift the flour and cream of tartar together in a mixing bowl.

Melt the butter in a saucepan over low heat.

In a mixing bowl, beat together the sugar and eggs with a wooden spoon.

Combine the milk with the melted butter; then add this to the beaten egg mixture, and stir all together.

Dissolve the baking soda in the warm water, and add it to the liquid mixture; stir to blend.

Quickly pour the liquid mixture into the sifted flour, and stir lightly to moisten all the flour.

Gently fold in the blueberries, until they are evenly distributed throughout the batter.

Put the batter into the buttered baking dish, and smooth the surface.

Bake the pudding in a preheated oven, at 350F for approximately one hour and fifteen minutes, until it is lightly browned.

Serve the Blueberry Pudding warm from the oven, with sauce. I recommend the Lemon Sauce – the tart citrus balances out the sweetness of the blueberries and it’s a match made in heaven!

Yield: 6 servings.

A note about puddings: In North America, we think of puddings as a creamy, cold dessert similar to a custard. However, traditional English puddings are more like a dense cake, are not overly sweet, and are a definite comfort food. Typically a sweet sauce is poured over the top to moisten it. When I first read over the recipe, I questioned why there was so little sugar in the ‘pudding’, but the sweetness of the sauce compensates and makes this dessert downright delicious!

…”the blueberries will be ripe for the feast of Ste. Anne.”

~Hemon, Louis. Maria Chapdelaine: A Tale of the Lake. Translated by W.H. Blake. St. John Country, 1913.

A note from Patricia: I love wild blueberries – they have a more intense sweet and tangy flavour than cultivated blueberries, and I love their smaller more adorable size. They are full of anti-oxidants, have anti-inflammatory properties, and are one of our native Canadian fruits. I suppose eating them in dessert form might cancel out some of those benefits, but I’m going to pretend it doesn’t. For this recipe, I used 1:1 gluten-free baking flour with good success, and I opted for frozen wild blueberries (thawed) as fresh isn’t quite in season yet (but sooooon!). The Lemon Sauce was sweet perfection, and would be lovely served hot or cold.