Sussex Pond Pudding

[Subduction Zone]

Yes I know the brand - it's the same as the beef suet. I'll have to look into how they make it. But anyway, good to know it is not hydrogenated. Something else I've learnt out of this whole exercise.....

85% fats 15% flour:

Sainsbury's online Grocery Shopping and Fresh Food Delivery

 

[exchemist]

85% fats 15% flour:

Sainsbury's online Grocery Shopping and Fresh Food Delivery

That does not explain how they get a high melting point fat of vegetable origin without hydrogenating it.

Normally, vegetable fats contain fatty acids that are partly unsaturated (with C=C double bonds in), which tends to give them a low melting point. Hydrogenating the double bonds "saturates" them, making them more like animal fatty acids. However, some isomerisation of double bonds from cis to trans occurs at the same time, so if the hydrogenation does not go to 100% completion you can introduce the dreaded "trans fats" which are now thought to be a health hazard.

Looking into this, it seems that vegetable suet almost certainly contains fractionated palm oil. The fatty acids in palm oil are almost 50% palmitic acid, which is already fully saturated. (Much of the rest of natural palm oil is triglycerides of oleic acid which will have a lower MP.) My guess is they separate out the palmitic acid portion and use that.

 

[exchemist]

You could but frankly I've read dodgy things about hydrogenated veggie fats. I think you are better off with beef suet, from the health point of view.

Actually, a lot of the suet comes out into the water during cooking, which is why suet pastry is always spongy, i.e. full of holes. So it's not really fatty to eat at all.

I've read up about this: seems the key thing with suet pastry is the fat has a high melting point, so the pastry is already starting to set when the fat melts. Hence it runs out, leaving a porous, flexible structure behind. When you use butter, as in normal pastry, it melts in at the start, making a far greasier final pastry, but which goes crisp. So maybe suet is not as bad for you as it seems.

Addendum: this morning I weighed the fat that was left behind in the water used to steam the pudding. It had set overnight so I was able to decant off the water and weight the residue. Out of 67g suet originally added, 55g had come out. So only 12g of fat was actually absorbed as "shortening" in the pastry.

So in fact this type of pastry has a lot less fat in it that a regular pastry, made with butter or equivalent low melting point fat. I feel a lot better about making these puddings now!