Puddings and Desserts

The Women's Institute has a reputation for traditional home cooking that is second to none in the UK. The Best Kept Secrets is a series of cookbooks written by women who know all about cooking, homes and families from personal experience. They learnt to cook from their mothers and grandmothers, from family friends and from each other. They don't have to re-discover the British tradition of cooking because they never lost touch with it in the first place. Few people can resist a dessert, particularly if it's home-made. Puddings and desserts get a special response from friends and family - call it the 'ooh!' factor. They needn't take long. Many of the recipes in Puddings and Desserts make use of good-quality convenience ingredients, such as ready-made custard, pastry, tarts and meringues. Recipes that are speedy can be just as good as those that take a long time. Many recipes here can be prepared in advance and frozen. For those of us who have fond childhood memories of fruit crumbles with lashings of hot custard, there are plenty of comforting, traditional puddings like Blackberry and Apple Crumble and Gooseberry and Elderflower Cobbler.
There are more sophisticated desserts too, like cheesecakes, syllabubs and mousses, and for lovers of chocolate there's a whole chapter devoted to the subject with White Chocolate Terrine with Summer Fruit Coulis and Double Chocolate and Banana Sponge. Sweet courses need not always be naughty and there's a chapter on desserts that are healthy but delicious; other recipes can be easily adapted to a healthier eating plan by using lower-fat ingredients.