One of our favourite things to enjoy in our home with our usual Sunday Dinner is this Yorkshire Pudding recipe. Yorkshire puddings are a very British thing and are an essential part of any British roast dinner. They are the perfect side dish.
Yorkshire Puddings are very similar to popovers. They are crisp baked puddings, roughly the size of muffins, created from beating together eggs, flour and milk with a bit of salt. These get baked in a hot oven in either muffin or dedicated Yorkshire pudding tins.
The heat of the oven makes them puff up, crisp and golden brown. A good Yorkshire Pudding will have a lovely indentation in the middle which is perfect for cradling and cupping your gravy! This is an appetizing treat you can do for yourself and your family. With its ingredients easily accessible to you, you can definitely make this perfectly.
They are really quite simple to make and, when done well, they become everyone’s favourite part of the meal. Properly done, they should be light, crisp and golden brown. A very tempting display. Doing it is not a problem because I have prepared a step-by-step list of procedures to guide you in the process. Make sure to have everything set up.
The Yorkshire pudding recipe I am sharing with you today comes from my late Father in Law. He was a cook in the Canadian Army for many years. As you can imagine, they are exceptionally good! I consider this to be a pretty fail-proof recipe.
What You Need To Make Yorkshire Pudding
Simple ingredients done well.
INGREDIENTS |
2 large free range eggs, at room temperature |
1 tsp salt |
a little oil or dripping |
1 cup flour |
1 1/3 cups milk, at room temperature |
Hints And Tips
If you follow my hints and tips you can be assured of success!
1. Read the recipe through thoroughly several times prior to beginning. This will help to familiarise you with any equipment, ingredients, or techniques you may need to employ when making this tasty dish.
2. Assemble everything you will need prior to beginning. This will help to prevent you from leaving out anything integral to the recipe.
3. Make sure all of your ingredients are at room temperature. This is essential and is especially important to the finished result. You will get lighter and taller puddings.
4. Sift your flour and salt together. I usually do this from about 6 to 8 inches above the bowl. This helps to aerate the flour and gives you more lift.
5. Make sure your eggs and milk are well beaten together.
6. When adding the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, make a well in the centre of the dry and pour the wet into the well. Begin, using a whisk, whisking in the flour to the wet ingredients a little at a time, whisking gradually until all of the dry have been incorporated. This helps to ensure a lump-free batter.
7. Leave the batter to sit for one hour, undisturbed, and covered. This helps to develop the gluten in the flour and gives you nice light puddings.
8. You want to begin with a really hot oven. The excessive heat causes the puddings to rise immediately when you put them into the oven.
9. You can use beef drippings to oil your pans, but a good cooking oil also works. About 1 tsp per muffin cup works really well. Put the oil-filled pan into the oven as you are heating the oven up so that the fat heats up really well. You want it almost smoking. (If your oil is not hot and you don’t use enough, your puddings will stick, which will greatly hamper the rise.)
10. Transfer the batter to a pouring cup for ease in pouring it into the hot muffin cups without creating too much of a mess.
11. Work quickly, filling each hot oiled cup about 2/3 full while the oil is still really hot. You may notice that it starts to cook and puff up immediately. This is as it should do.
12. Don’t open the oven door while they are baking. This will lower the oven temperature and affect your rise.
13. Decrease the oven temperature by 10 degrees after every five minutes of baking. The initial really high temperature sears the bottoms and keeps them crisp. The lowering of temperature in this way helps to keep them crisp and keeps them cooking without burning.
14. You can bake these ahead. Do remove them from a pan to a wire rack so they don’t get soggy bottoms. Reheat by placing them onto a baking tray and popping them into a hot oven for about five minutes.
How To Make Yorkshire Pudding
This Yorkshire pudding recipe has to be one of the simplest things to make. Don’t let the fear of making them intimidate you. They are really extremely easy to make.
Do make sure all your ingredients are at room temperature before beginning.
Beat your eggs together in a large measuring jug until light. Whisk in the milk.
Sift the flour into a bowl along with the salt. Make a well in the middle and add the wet ingredients all at once, pouring them into the well, and then whisk them in, slowly incorporating the dry mixture from the sides until you have a smooth batter.
Now, this is the important bit. COVER IT AND LET IT SIT ON THE SIDEBOARD FOR ONE HOUR.
Preheat your oven to 450*F. Place a small amount of oil or dripping into each cup of a 12-cup muffin tin. Place the tin into the hot oven to heat up until the fat is hot and sizzling.
Remove from the oven and quickly divide the batter amongst each muffin cup, filling them about 2/3 full.
Return to the oven and bake for 20 minutes, until well risen, browned and crispy, reducing the oven temperature by 10 degrees every five minutes. Serve hot with plenty of gravy!
Serving Suggestions For Yorkshire Pudding
Yorkshire Pudding is an essential part of any British Roast Dinner. It is an incredibly versatile food and, depending on the size you choose to make them, they can actually be served in a variety of ways. Made small as I have shown you today, they can be served on the plate as one of the sides for a roast dinner, cradling some of that delicious gravy.
You can bake them in much larger dishes, such as small pie plates, and they will be large enough to actually serve as a plate for your dinner. You will see them served this way in some of the Pubs in the UK, where they will cradle all of the components of the roast dinner.
If you pour the pudding into a heated and oiled 9 by 13 inch pan and lay out cooked sausages over top where the dish becomes Toad in the Hole.
Leftovers are great torn up and fried with the leftover vegetables and meat to make a bubble and squeak.
You can also eat them warm and crisp with honey and jam instead of English scones.
Last Crumbs
A tall, crisp, and light Yorkshire Pudding recipe is a real thing of beauty. They are not hard to make at all, or overly complicated. They just take time and a little bit of effort. Trust me when I say they are worth all of it.
Why not surprise your family soon by making them this wonderful side dish for your next roast dinner! If you follow my instructions to the “T” I can guarantee you are all in for a real taste treat!
PrintYorkshire Pudding Recipe
I wonder who it was that discovered that with just a little flour, milk, and eggs you could create something that is so crispy, light and delicious! Sunday lunch just would not be Sunday lunch without a couple of these on the plate. These turn out perfect every time if you follow the directions to a "T." Not hard to do really as they are very simple.
- Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
- Yield: Makes 12 1x
Ingredients
- 2 large free range eggs, at room temperature
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 1/3 cups milk, at room temperature
- 1 cup flour
- a little oil or dripping
Instructions
- Make sure all your ingredients are at room temperature before beginning.
- Beat your eggs together in a large measuring jug until light.
- Whisk in the milk.
- Sift the flour into a bowl along with the salt.
- Make a well in the middle and add the wet ingredients all at once, pouring them into the well, and then whisk them in, slowly incorporating the dry mixture from the sides until you have a smooth batter.
- Now, this is the important bit . . . COVER IT AND LET IT SIT ON THE SIDEBOARD FOR ONE HOUR.
- Preheat your oven to 450*F.
- Place a small amount of oil or dripping into each cup of a 12-cup muffin tin. Place the tin into the hot oven to heat up until the fat is hot and sizzling.
- Remove from the oven and quickly divide the batter amongst each muffin cup, filling them about 2/3 full.
- Return to the oven and bake for 20 minutes, until well risen, browned and crispy, reducing the oven temperature by 10 degrees every five minutes.
- Serve hot with plenty of gravy!
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Additional Time: 1 hours
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
Nutrition
- Calories: 103
Marie Rayner is a retired Chef, freelance writer, recipe developer, food blogger, and Cookbook author. She makes her home in Chester, UK, where she lives with her husband, Todd, and their much beloved English Cocker, Mitzie. Her motto is “Life is far too short to eat bad food,” and her goal is to share delicious and easy recipes which anyone can enjoy and cook in the comfort of their own home.