Independence Month!
One of the best Jamaican desserts has to be sweet potato pudding. When made correctly, its a warm sweet treat with a custard consistency on top, a firm center with crispy caramelized edges. As a child we would sneak in the pudding and break off the edges. For this month’s series of recipes I wanted to include a dessert twist. And what better twist can there be than to sandwich grape-nut ice-cream between some sweet potato pudding.
Pudding and ice-cream go hand in hand. So it’s no surprise that this greedy girl would try her hand at an ice-cream sandwich using my favorite pudding and my favorite ice-cream, both homemade.When cold, potato pudding is firm, and when warmed it gets very soft. Normally at restaurants, when potato pudding and ice-cream are served, you get the warm pudding with the cold ice-cream. It’s very yummy; however it’s generally a one texture dessert. Soft ice cream and soft pudding, not to mention the warm pudding melts your ice-cream very fast. I always wondered why not just make an ice-cream sandwich with it. Potato pudding is also great when cold.
I love my mother’s version because it is 95 percent sweet potato and no
fillers. Most recipes use up to 2 cups of flour as a binder, but all we use here are a few table
spoons of cornmeal. The coconut milk, sugar, spices all help the flavor of the
potato to stand out. The pudding semi frozen is firm, with the creamy ice-cream
in the center, and using grape-nut ice cream adds another layer of texture to
the dessert. The process is a bit time consuming, because this is two desserts
combined into one, but worth every second. I hope you try it out.
Makes 16 sandwiches
Sweet potato pudding
5 large Sweet potatoes (grated)
2 cans Coconut milk
1 cup Evaporated milk
2 cup water
1 cup Rum soaked raisins
4 table spoons Cornmeal
1.5 cup Sugar (more to taste)
3 tsp Vanilla
1 tbs Nutmeg
1 tbs Cinnamon
½ tsp salt
Your favorite ice-cream
I used my home made grape-nut ice-cream click here for recipe
You will also need two floured baking pans and some parchment paper
Instructions
- Heat oven to 350
- Peel and grate all the potatoes and place in a large bowl aka a ‘pudding pan’ as we say in Jamaica
- To the potatoes, add cornmeal, cinnamon, and nutmeg
- In a separate bowl mix the coconut milk, evaporated milk, water, sugar, salt and vanilla
- Blend together a cup of rum soaked raisins and add to the milk mixture.
- Reserve some of this milk mixture (about 1.5 cups) for the top of the pudding
- Stir in the remaining milk mixture with the potatoes. This should be a fairly watery consistency
- Pour the mix into two flour lined baking pans, and pour the reserved milk mixture on top
- Bake for 1 to 1.5 hours. A knife inserted will come out clean and the pudding will be firm.
- Turn the pudding out onto a cooling rack and allow to completely cool
- Once cooled cut the pudding in half and remove the edges, side and bottom leaving the top. (These are very yummy and should be eaten not discarded)
- Slice a piece of parchment paper slightly bigger than the pudding with the corners cut and place back into the baking pan
- Layer ice-cream on top, followed with the top of the pudding, cover with parchment and allow to set in the freezer for 30 to 40 minutes
- Once the entire thing is set, slice into individual servings, and enjoy
Remember this is pudding not cake, you don't want to freeze these for too long the pudding will get very hard. But lets just say you have left overs and you store them in the freezer, all is not lost. Let it thaw for 2-3 minutes before serving and it will be just fine.
Xoxo Greedygirl