Yorkshire puddings

THE PAN AND OIL YOU MAKE YORKSHIRE PUDDINGS IN NEEDS TO BE SMOKING HOT BEFORE YOU POUR IN THE BATTER

BARNEY SAYS I’m as guilty of this as anyone else. The most popular recipe I’ve ever written is for Yorkshire puddings and, yes, it states that the oil in the pan should be smoking hot. First off, there isn’t anything wrong with doing this, it gets good results but can also be dangerous. We’ve all been there, it’s the last part of the roast, you’re already spinning roasting trays, boiling veg and jugs of gravy, and now you’ve got to heat oil in a muffin tray! Well I’m here to tell you, it ain’t so. You can get brilliant individual Yorkshire puddings without having to heat fat until it’s smoking hot. As long as you use a thin metal pan, or tray, from cold, with cold oil but still going into a hot oven, you will get perfect puddings. Why does every recipe call for smoking hot fat? Traditionally much heavier tins were used that would have taken a good 20 mins to heat up, and done from cold would have left you with a soggy pancake. Modern tins are much thinner and take a matter of minutes to heat up, so essentially after a few minutes, the oil and the batter in the cold pan comes up to the required temperature.