The Unofficial Harry Potter Cookbook - Dinah Bucholz [78]
¼ teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
Preheat the oven to 300°F and grease a 2-quart baking dish. Combine the rice, milk, sugar, and salt in a large saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Remove the pan from the heat and add the butter, vanilla, and nutmeg. Stir to combine. Pour the mixture into the baking dish and bake for 1 hour, stirring every 20 minutes or so. Bake another 30 to 45 minutes until spotty golden brown. Serve warm or at room temperature with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream or jam.
Serves 4 to 6
Spotted Dick
Hermione refuses to eat after discovering that enslaved house-elves cooked her food. Ron has no such qualms and naughtily tries to tempt her with spotted dick (see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Chapter 12).
This is one dish that makes a lot of Harry Potter fans wonder what in the world is that? It's an old-fashioned Victorianera suet pudding (suet being the hard fat that encases beef kidneys). The story of its name is not very exciting: It's called “spotted” because it's spotted with raisins and “dick” because that's a Victorian word that means “pudding.” Don't worry about where to find suet: This recipe uses butter, which makes a fine substitute.
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups fresh bread crumbs (see note)
1 cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
¼ teaspoon ground cloves
2 sticks cold butter, cut into pieces
½ cup dark raisins
½ cup golden raisins
1 cup dried currants or cranberries
¾ cup whole milk
Fill a large pot with water and place a rack or overturned shallow bowl in the pot. Bring to a simmer. Grease a 2-quart heatproof bowl with a tight-fitting lid and set it aside.
Whisk together the flour, bread crumbs, sugar, baking powder, salt, and spices in a large mixing bowl. Rub in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse meal with some larger pieces of butter remaining. Toss in the raisins and currants or cranberries. Pour in the milk and fold it in until the mixture is uniformly moistened. Turn out the mixture into the prepared dish and press the top down with a spatula.
Cover the dish with the lid, making sure it is tightly sealed. Place it in the pot; the water should come halfway up the sides of the dish. Steam for 3 hours. Add water to replenish as necessary. Remove the pudding, remove the lid, and invert it onto a plate. Serve warm with warm custard.
Serves 8
To make fresh bread crumbs, process 6 to 8 slices fresh bread in a food processor or blender. There is no need to remove the crusts.
No-Bake Chocolate-Bottom Pumpkin Tart
Harry, Ron, and Hermione can hardly wait for the pumpkin tart to be cleared away so they can rush over to Hagrid and congratulate him on his new position as Care of Magical Creatures teacher. Now that his name has finally been cleared, thanks to our dauntless trio, Hagrid is a qualified wizard and can fulfill his lifelong dream to teach (see Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Chapter 5).
Most people associate pumpkin with pie, but the tart is a close relative. The only difference is that tarts are shallower than pies with straight rather than flared sides and use a richer dough than standard pie crusts.
Tart Dough
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons granulated sugar
¾ stick (6 tablespoons) cold butter or margarine, cut into pieces
1 large egg yolk
2 tablespoons heavy cream
1 teaspoon vanilla
Chocolate Bottom
½ cup heavy cream
4 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped
Pumpkin Filling
1½ cups canned pumpkin, not pumpkin pie filling
½ cup granulated sugar
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground allspice
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
½ cup heavy cream
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1½ ounces bittersweet chocolate, melted, for drizzling, optional
To make the dough, place the flour, salt, and sugar in the bowl of a food processor and