Macaroni Pudding can be described as a take on rice pudding.
It is a a custardy pudding with cooked macaroni as the base, instead of rice, tapioca, etc.
Basic ingredients, besides macaroni, are milk, butter, and a bit of nutmeg for flavour. Some recipes add egg, sugar, and sultanas.
You bake the mixture in a buttered dish; the pudding cooks up creamy, with crispy brown edges.
It is now considered somewhat of an “older” dish.
Cooking Tips
6 oz / 1 ½ cups uncooked macaroni
1 pint / 2 cups milk
2 eggs
2 tablespoon butter
handful of raisins
nutmeg
zest from ½ lemon
Cook the macaroni until soft, then drain. While it is draining, in the cooking pot mix the milk and egg, with some grated nutmeg to taste, then add the butter, raisins and lemon zest and put the macaroni back in, bring to a simmer and let simmer 15 minutes. Transfer to a buttered 2 quart casserole dish and bake at 350 F / 150 C for about half an hour or until firm and golden on top.
History Notes
Macaroni Pudding dates from a time when macaroni came in long, straight lengths instead of cut elbow shapes, that you’d then break up.
It appears in cookbooks starting from the very early 1800s.
Victorian versions always called for eggs. Eggless versions emerged during the rationing of the Second World War.
Literature & Lore
Macaroni Pudding
Simmer an ounce or two of the pipe sort, in a pint of milk, and a bit of lemon and cinnamon, till tender; put it into a dish, with milk, two or three eggs, but only one white, sugar, nutmeg, a spoonful of peach-water, and half a glass of raisin wine. Bake with a paste round the edges. A layer of orange marmalade or raspberry jam in a macaroni pudding, for change, is a great improvement; in which case omit the almond water, or ratafia, which you would otherwise flavour it with .” — Maria Eliza Ketelby Rundell. A new system of domestic cookery: formed upon principles of economy and adapted to the use of private families. London: Jacob Johnson. 1807. Page 226.
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Mrs Beetons Sweet Macaroni Pudding
1301. INGREDIENTS – 2-½ oz. of macaroni, 2 pints of milk, the rind of ½ lemon, 3 eggs, sugar and grated nutmeg to taste, 2 tablespoonfuls of brandy.
Mode – Put the macaroni, with a pint of the milk, into a saucepan with the lemon-peel, and let it simmer gently until the macaroni is tender; then put it into a pie-dish without the peel; mix the other pint of milk with the eggs; stir these well together, adding the sugar and brandy, and pour the mixture over the macaroni. Grate a little nutmeg over the top, and bake in a moderate oven for ½ hour. To make this pudding look nice, a paste should be laid round the edges of the dish, and, for variety, a layer of preserve or marmalade may be placed on the macaroni: in this case omit the brandy.
Time – ¾ hour to simmer the macaroni; ½ hour to bake the pudding.
Average cost, 11d.
Sufficient for 5 or 6 persons.
Seasonable at any time.