Mango Pudding

When I was in kindergarten, my teacher used to videotape everything going on in the class. When the year was over, she put together this montage for the parents. Considering how much of a backstage person I am now, I was surprised to see that I always tried to be the center of attention. Always doing something to show off to the camera or just standing there smiling. There was one particular scene with us sitting there eating juice and cookies and music was playing around in the background. I was pretty easy to spot. I’m the little kid staring at the cookie in her hand and dancing. Mostly some head bobbing and swaying. Now that I’m an adult, I realize that I still do that; Just not so excessive. Whenever I eat something good, I always hum to myself and sway a little. This happens completely involuntary. I guess I watch myself when I’m in public. (At least I think I do. Oh geez.)

Today I made a mango pudding. It came out so good. I would have taken pictures of the mango pudding, but it didn’t quite make it to being photographed. To feed the masses, mostly made up of my family, I made a vanilla pudding, which is the base for the mango. I was able to snag a picture of that. I miss my dishes at home. I had to dig to find something okay to put the pudding in.

Vanilla pudding

1 cup milk or heavy cream

¼ cup white sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

3 egg yolks

4 tbs flour

1 tbs butter

1. Pour milk into a saucepan and place over medium heat. You are trying to just heat up the milk right now, so watch your saucepan.

2. In a mixing bowl, add egg yolks and sugar. Combine with a whisk. Add flour and vanilla extract and whisk once again.

3. Once the milk has heated up, pour about ¼ cup worth into bowl of egg mixture and whisk. This is called tempering the eggs. This ensures you won’t end up with scrambled eggs.

4. Add the egg mixture into the saucepan and turn up the heat. Make sure you keep whisking. Once the mixture starts boiling, give it about 8 seconds while whisking.

5. Remove from heat and whisk in butter. If your pudding was cooked for too long and it looks clumpy and almost separated, just add some cold milk and whisk together. The mixture should come together just fine.

6. Pour into a separate bowl and chill.

7. For the mango pudding: Just add in ½ cup or more, depending on taste, mango puree or mango compote after whisking in the butter.