VANILLA-BOURBON PUDDING CAKE Recipe

How to make it

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• 1. Adjust oven rack to center position and heat oven to 325 degrees. Lightly butter pan or baking molds of choice. Lay folded dish towel in bottom of roasting pan and set molds or pan inside. Bring several quarts of water to boil for water bath.
• 2. Meanwhile, in mixing bowl mash 2 tablespoons butter together with sugar and salt with back of wooden spoon until crumbly. Beat in yolks, then flour, mixing until smooth. Slowly beat in vanilla extract and bourbon, then stir in milk. Beat egg whites to stiff, moist peaks. Gently whisk whites into batter just until no large lumps remain.
• 3. Immediately ladle (don’t pour) batter into pan, custard cups, or ramekins. Set baking pan on oven rack. Pour enough boiling wter into roasting pan to come halfway up sides of baking pan or molds. Bake until pudding cake center is set and springs back when gently touched, about 25 minutes. Remove roasting pan from oven and let pan or molds continue to stand in water bath for 10 minutes. Pudding cakes can be served warm, at room temperature, or even chilled.
• Pudding Cake Hints:
• 1. Be sure to whisk the egg whites into the batter instead of folding them in. Since the batter is about the consistency of milk, folding would flatten the fluffy whites. 2. Rather than pouring the batter, ladle it; otherwise the first cups get all the froth and the later cups get all the batter. 3. Set the roasting pan on an oven rack and pour boiling water into the pan until it comes halfway up the sides of the molds. This water bath keeps the temperature low enough to prevent the eggs from curdling.