After many years, I am finally able to source leeks at local stores at a reasonable price. (At one point they were $10 each….) To celebrate, I decided to make a nice leek pudding.
Wait, isn’t pudding sweet?
No, not necessarily. The word it ultimately derives from is a Latin word meaning “sausage”!
Ingredients for filling
- 3 medium sized leeks
- 8 ounces / 225 grams cheese*, shredded
- 2 medium potatoes
- 2 tbsp butter
- seasoning to taste
Clean and dice the leeks. Melt the butter in a pan large enough for them to spread out. Gently cook them in the butter, you want to wilt them and reduce the water a little, but not sautee or caramelise them.
Peel and small dice the potato. Add the cooked leeks and cheese and toss to combine. Season if you think you need it, depending on the cheese.
Ingredients for pastry
- 350 g / 12 oz flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 175 g / 6oz butter
- 1/2 tsp salt
- ice cold water as needed
Dice the butter and blitz it in your food processor to combine with the next 3 ingredients. Add ice cold water, a little at a time, to make it come together as a mass. You don’t want it sticky, just to come together. Decant onto plastic wrap and let rest in the fridge for 20 to 30 minutes.
After resting in the fridge, roll the dough out into a rough circle. Remove one quarter of the dough for the lid. Roll out the rest to make the liner for your pudding basin**. Fill generously, but not to the top, with the filling. Crimp the lid to the sides, cover the dough loosely with metal foil if your basin doesn’t have a lid, and steam*** for 2 hours. After 2 hours steaming, carefully remove the hot pudding basin and rest it on a trivet or cookie sheet for 10 minutes to cool slightly and set up before you try to turn it out onto a serving dish.
Makes 1 large pudding.
* cheese – which cheese? I used a nice cheddar, but use whichever cheese you prefer, allowing for allergies and preferences.
** well, what if I don’t have a pudding basin? Use a large glass or metal bowl, at least 2 pints / 1 quart capacity, preferably larger to allow a certain amount of expansion.
*** place a metal trivet, an upside down bowl, or crumpled up foil, in the bottom of a large pot. Put the pudding basin on top of the trivet and fill the pot to cover the bottom of the basin with water. Apply lid, turn on your stove to medium-high heat, and when it comes to a boil turn down to medium-low heat. You want a steady, slow stream of steam, not active boiling.