Bettina's Steamed Fig Pudding

1 c flour
1/2 tsp soda
1/2 tsp ginger
2/3 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/2 c molasses
1/2 c milk
1/2 c suet, chopped fine
1/3 c chopped figs
1/3 c stoned raisins
1/3 tsp lemon extract

Mix the flour, soda, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg and suet. Add the figs, raisins, molasses and milk. Stir well. Add the lemon extract. Fill a well buttered pudding mould two-thirds full. Steam an hour and a half, with the water boiling. Serve hot with foamy sauce.

Makes four portions.

Second February Menu

So after the success of the first Feb menu (on Feb 3), I made the next menu on Feb 6th from Chapter CX. The menu consists of:

Breaded Veal
Creamed Potatoes
Browned Sauce
Spinach with Hard Cooked Eggs
Bread & Butter Spiced Peaches
Fig Pudding
Foamy Sauce



The breaded veal was delicious. I was so happy that my butcher had veal and I didn't have to do a meat substitute again. So tasty.


The creamed potatoes were delicious as always. I have made these several times since that first menu in January, as they're so easy to make (and I'd cooked extra potatoes with the first menu so as to have the pre cooked potatoes needed for THIS meal).


The browned sauce was pretty straight forward and oh so tasty. As mentioned, I love gravy. Sadly, it's still in my fridge and that's a long time... I've not been as good at utilizing the full kitchen for menus and remembering to use up things this month.


And now we come to the trouble makers. Let's start with the Spinach with Hard Cooked Eggs. The book doesn't give a recipe for this. At all. And I looked. So to the internet I go! Turns out it's a pretty straight forward and common dish. Hard boil eggs, peel and slice in half lengthwise. Blanche spinach, mix with a cream sauce, settle the eggs into the spinach and top with buttered bread crumbs and bake. I made a little extra cream sauce for the potatoes and used it here. Easy peasy. But I wish the recipe had actually been given.


Spiced peaches are something I made years ago when I got 40 pounds of peaches for free. Mine are cooked a little more than Bettina's but that's fine by me.


And for our last bit of annoyance, the fig pudding. This is one of those recipes that was designed for the fireless. Well, Bettina's fireless had ceramic heated stones at the bottom. She also had a tin pudding mold. I used a mason jar and tried to heat up a iron weight. Suffice it to say, the pudding was not cooked. Or rather, the outer 1/2" of the entire thing was cooked. So then I popped it on the stove and tried to do the boil thing. It STILL was being recalcitrant at being cooked! But eventually it was heated into submission. But it was an annoying process to say the least.


The foamy sauce was underwhelming. Can you see it on the pudding in the picture below? Nope! But it added a lemony zing to the otherwise not impressive-tasting pudding.

Swiss Steak

1 lb of round steak two-thirds of an inch thick
5 Tbs flour
1 bay leaf
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper
1/2 c water
1 Tbs onion
2 cloves
1 Tbs bacon fat

Wipe the steak with a damp cloth, trim the edges to remove any gristle, and pound the flour into the meat, using a side of a heavy plate for the pounding. This breaks up the tendons of the meat. Place the bacon fat in a frying pan and when hot, add the meat. Brown thoroughly on each side.

Lower the flame. Add the bay leaf, salt, pepper, onion, clove and water. Cover with a lid and allow to cook slowly for one and a half hours. More water may be needed if the gravy boils down. Pour the gravy over the meat when serving. This recipe is good for the fireless.

Makes three portions

Baked Veal Steak

1 slice of veal steak (three-fourths of a pound, one-half inch thick)
3 Tbs flour
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp paprika
2 Tbs bacon fat
2 Tbs water

Wipe the veal and cut off any rind. Mix the flour, salt, and paprika. Roll the steak thoroughly in this mixture.

Place the bacon fat in the frying pan and when hot add the meat and brown thoroughly on both sides.

Placethe drippings and the meat in a small baking pan. Add in the water, cover, and place in the oven. Cook one hour. More water may be added if necessary.

This is a good recipe for the fireless.

Makes three portions.

Fireless Cooker: Success!

One of the things that Bettina goes on and on about is her fireless cooker. It's labor saving, it's money saving, it's gas saving. She waxed eloquent about it so much that I looked it up.

Turns out that a fireless cooker is a variation on an old fashioned passive cooker, specifically the haybale variety. You heat food to boiling, cover it tightly, and insulate the whole thing. This is best for foods which would normally be several hours at a low temperature to cook, e.g., beans, roasts, oatmeal.

So last night I made one. Although Bettina's was bought, and might have also had additional heating stones in a handsome piece of furniture, I made mine out of fabric scraps and my canning kettle.


I sewed two denim pant legs together and evened out the width to be roughly ten inches when stuffed (that being the height of my kettle). Using scrap fabric, I filled the pant legs, attempting to quilt panels as I went, with mixed results.



Turns out, my machine really hated this project and now needs as tuneup. (This is piggybacking my last project of a heavy wool coat, so it's had hard usage.) I then made a little pillow out of pockets to put in the center , directly underneath the pot, along with a few pieces of scrap cardboard to act as a heat shield. I then set up my cooker!


I curled the pant legs around the inside of the kettle, put the pocket pillow in the middle and the cardboard on top.


I then started oatmeal boiling in the asparagus kettle. When it was good and boiling, I put it in the fireless, put a pillow on top, and tied the lid on tightly. And so, more than 12 hours later, we had warm and cooked oatmeal for breakfast! I consider this project a success and am looking forward to repeating it.

Notes about the oatmeal: it clumped together outrageously, make sure to have a little extra water, or boiling water ready in the morning.