If, like me, you grew up as a working class lad in Somerset, the highlight of a day spent in the fields and/or down the mine was coming home to a delicious cooked dinner. And what's the best part of dinner? Pudding! And what's the best pudding? Bread and butter pudding, obviously, but a close second is Angel Delight.
Angel Delight is a fascinating thing: a packet of powder that you whisk with milk and then leave to set. What manner of sorcery is this?! It is light and fluffy, unlike most British puddings that take 3-5 business days to digest because they're made from stale leftovers (see: bread and butter pudding, above). It is especially interesting in the USA as it conforms to the specific American definition of "pudding" - as opposed to the generic "dessert" - and is also unavailable, possibly because it's considered dangerous, like Kinder Surprise eggs, not safe, like guns.
So how does one acquire pudding contraband this side of the Atlantic? Well, you need an international supplier, which I have. In a stroke of genius, it's my mum! No one expects 70-yr-olds to be mixed up in this stuff. So when a box of Christmas goodies arrived last week, I opened it to find not one but all four currently available flavours! Which meant there was only one thing to do. Yes, create the fabled, perhaps even mythical, four-layer Angel Delight.
But what order to place them in? Banana is the strongest flavour and can tend to bleed into the others, especially chocolate. Butterscotch - the best flavour, don't argue - is strong enough to withstand banana's assault, but its beige colour next to the yellow does not make for the best aesthetic composition. Strawberry's pink layer is certainly the most striking, but sadly is the least sophisticated on the palate. Also we were only sent the sugar-free version! I'll have words with my dealer.
In the end, from bottom-to-top we went for banana-butterscotch-strawberry-chocolate. Much milk was sacrificed in this culinary feat, and Pete was allowed to lick the mixing bowl on three occasions; he's too young to appreciate butterscotch.
The result? With the addition of some squirty cream I'll let the pictures speak for the themselves, as I sit back to consume whipped nirvana and await the Michelin inspector with my first star...or the culinary police...or US Customs and Border Protection.
