'A Rice Pudding'

Recipe from Hannah Glasse, Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy (1747).

Rice pudding was first used by the Romans as a medicine to settle upset stomaches.

Later in the medieval period, 'rice pottages' were a common recipe, made of boiled rice mixed with almond milk or cow's milk, sweetened, and sometimes coloured. Recipes for baked rice puddings, such as the one below, only began to appear in the early seventeenth century.

Fun Fact: Shakespeare included such a dish in A Winter's Tale. The Bard himself alludes to it's making at a celebratory feast in Scene III, lines 37-49.

Hannah Glasse, Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy (1747)

Ingredients

100g of Long Grain Rice

150ml of Milk

100g of Caster Sugar

1 tsp of Nutmeg

100g of Unsalted Butter

Optional: 50g Currants

Equipment:

Saucepan

Ceramic or glass ramakins

Wooden Spoon

Prep Time: 20 minutes Serves: 4 Ability: Easy

Cook Time: 30 minutes

Method

Preheat the oven to 190°c/Fan 180°c/Gas 5 and butter a ceramic or glass dish
In a large saucepan, add the rice to milk and let simmer
Stir in the sugar, nutmeg and butter to the milk mixture. It is at this point you have the option to also add currants if you wish. Mix well together and cook for 20 minutes until both the butter and sugar dissolves and rice becomes soft
Spoon mixture into the ramekins and bake in the oven for 10 minutes. Serve warm