Popovers

Popovers

The first Popover I ever ate was at Anthony’s Pier  4 restaurant.

Anthony’s Pier 4

Once I had one of these piping hot pastries I was hooked. I’d go to lunch at Anthony’s any time I could get an invitation. Served piping hot from the oven theses tender puffed pastries are heaven. Sadly Anthony’s closed in 2013 so if I want to indulge I have no choice but to learn to make them myself!

What are These Tasty Treats

A popover is a light American pastry made from an egg batter similar to that of Yorkshire pudding, typically baked in muffin tins or dedicated popover pans, which have straight-walled sides rather than angled. Now I suppose you’ll ask me what a Yorkshire Pudding is. I can tell you it is not a pudding.

A Yorkshire Pudding is an English side dish that is made from a simple 4 ingredient batter and cooked in hot beef drippings (or oil) in the oven until puffed and crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. It’s basically the English equivalent of a dinner roll in North America. Extremely similar to a popover

Where there’s smoke …

The first thing I did was order 2 popover pans from Amazon.

The 2nd thing was to research Popover recipes. They are all pretty similar and simple. Basically eggs, milk and flour. 

The thing that gave me issues was that you need to put a pat of butter in the pan and then put the pan in a 400 degree oven. Butter has a low smoking point and I set off the smoke alarms every time. The popovers tasted great but the noise level was unacceptable.  Maybe you can only make popovers in a commercial oven?  Sadly I decided to retire my Popover pans.

A New Recipe

Then one day I stumbled over a new Popover Recipe. It even came with a video. The main difference is that you add the butter to the popover pan after they are hot so the butter melts but doesn’t sit in a hot oven so no smoke.

Ingredients

• 3 eggs (room temperature)
• 1 Cup Milk ( room temperature)
• 3 Tbsps. Oil ( Canola oil recommended)
• 1 Cup all purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees
2. While preparing batter  spray popover pan with non-stick cooking spray and place in oven to heat.
3. Whisk eggs, milk and oil together. Sift flour and add to egg mixture. Add Salt and beat mixture until smooth and free of any lumps.
4. Remove Popover pan from oven and place a small bit of butter in each popover cup. 
5. Pour batter 3/4 of the way full in to each Popover Cup. 
6. Place filled pan into the 400 degree oven and bake for 30 minutes
7. Reduce heat to 325 degrees and bake for additional 5-15 minutes (Keep an eye on your popovers)
8. Popovers are done when they are a nice, golden brown.
9. Serve hot with butter or jam or whatever you desire

Success!

I’m happy to report my Popovers were a complete success. I think I’ll be making them often now. 

Popovers- photo by Deb Neumann