Snow + Vanilla Pudding (Soup)

In case you haven’t heard, it’s snowed a lot in the Northeast. This week was particularly brutal, with snow on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday … can you tell I’m a little annoyed?

Snow in Maryland was the best. It was fresh, white, pristine and smelled so clean. It capped the firs in our front yard and made everything look like an idyllic English countryside. I loved to sit in the living room in front of a fire, sipping hot chocolate while watching the snow fall, filled with excitement about the pending “Montgomery County Public Schools: Closed” I’d see the next morning.

But in New York, snow is a nuisance. It covers sidewalks and makes them difficult to navigate, ruins leather boots, delays subways and creates lakes of icy slush that are impossible to traverse without a boat.  It turns gray (or worse, yellow) within hours and lingers on streets for weeks, stubbornly refusing to melt. Still, as I realized on Tuesday (let’s not talk about the lag time in my posting … ), there is nothing prettier than falling snow. Walking through Riverside Park filled me with an almost eerie sense of calm, as there were maybe two other people there. It was a great opportunity to clear my head, and almost has me anxiously awaiting the next storm.

And then I made vanilla pudding. After falling head over heels for the milk chocolate pudding I used in my Christmas trifle, I became obsessed with making a vanilla version. My first attempt was a little … off. The recipe, from Mark Bittman (who sadly left his Minimalist column this week, leaving me without delicious recipes to drool over on Wednesday mornings), seemed as simple as my beloved chocolate version, and best of all, called for no tempering of eggs. But somehow, it never set. So here I present you the best vanilla pudding soup I have ever tried, a luxurious faux-creme anglaise that would be perfect spooned over  anything (I humbly suggest this Ginger Pumpkin Tart or even this Apple Yogurt Cake). Perhaps an additional tablespoon of cornstarch would convert it to pudding, but I’m out of whole milk and well … it’s snowing outside.

Vanilla Pudding
Recipe from the New York Times

– 2-1/2 cups whole milk or half-and-half

– 2/3 cup sugar*

– pinch of salt

– 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

– 3 tablespoons cornstarch

*This was really sweet, so I might cut back to a 1/2 cup of sugar next time.

1) Heat 2 cups of the milk with the sugar and salt in a medium saucepan on medium-low until it begins to steam.

2) Combine the cornstarch and remaining milk in a bowl (or the measuring cup) until there are no lumps. Add the cornstarch mixture and cook until the mixture starts to thicken and just reaches a boil, about 5 minutes.  Reduce the heat to low and cook, stirring frequently, for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla extract.

3) Pour the mixture into a bowl and cover with plastic wrap pressed directly on the pudding (if you don’t like pudding skins). Refrigerate until chilled.

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Note: The next pudding I’m eyeing is banana, so if you’ve got a great recipe for it please send it my way!