Mush, or Hasty-pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Make the mush
Pour 1 quart of boiling water into a saucepan and place it on the fire.
In a bowl, mix 1 cup of Indian meal with enough cold water to make a smooth paste.
Stir the meal mixture into the boiling water, adding 1 teaspoon of salt.
Continue stirring constantly for 20 to 30 minutes until it thickens to a soft, stirring consistency.
Serve or mold
Serve with milk, cream, butter, or syrup.
For cold mush, pour into shallow pans wet with cold water and let set to mold.
Fry
To fry, heat butter in a pan until it sizzles, then add the molded mush and fry until golden.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Indian meal
- Forms the thick body of the mush as its starch swells and thickens in the boiling water.
- Butter
- Adds richness and, when frying, promotes golden browning on the molded mush.
The step that matters
Stirring the meal into the boiling water. If the paste is added without constant stirring, the starch clumps and cooks unevenly. Smooth mixing first and steady stirring afterward keep the mush lump-free and evenly thickened.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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