Raspberry Blancmange Recipe

Sometimes things don’t go according to plan, that was certainly the case when I gave blancmange a go. Blancmange has always been one of my favourite deserts, it always reminds me of being little. I can’t remember where I had it, but I have a vague childhood memory of eating blancmange and literally thinking it was the best thing ever. A few years ago while feeling nostalgic I picked up a kit to make one from the supermarket. I don’t know what particularly was wrong with it, but it was literally disgusting and up until last week I had been put off trying it again for life!

While looking for vintage recipes I came across quite a few blancmange recipes, but I was really put off by the idea of using cornflour as is traditionally used as I don’t think it tastes very nice. I them came across this recipe which I adapted to make my own raspberry version. This uses ground almonds to thicken out the mix and it’s absolutely delicious.

As you’ll see from my pictures I made a big mistake on my first attempt, but the actual recipe is perfection so don’t be put off!

Ingredients:

300ml milk (I actually used skimmed as that’s what I had in the fridge at the time)

600g raspberries (I used frozen ones from Tesco as they are much cheaper)

100g caster sugar

50g ground almonds

5 gelatine leaves

300ml double cream

whipped cream to decorate (if you want to!)

Method:

1. Blend your raspberries in a food processor and then push through a sieve to form a smooth puree.

2. Bring your milk to the boil and add your sugar and ground almonds. Let it simmer for 5 minutes before removing from the heat.

3. Soak the gelatine leaves in cold water for 5 minutes. Before squeezing out the excess water and dissolving them into the warm milk mixture.

4. Add the cream and raspberry puree to the mixture and stir until completely mixed.

5. Pour into your moulds and leave to set over night.

6. Turn out onto a plate and serve with cream.

At the turning out stage I made a horrible mistake. To loosen the blancmange from the mould you need to dip it into hot water for a few seconds. Then turn it onto a plate. I got distracted and left it in the hot water too long and ended up melting it! So my first attempt in my pretty glass jelly mould was a disaster! Luckily I had made two more, in my heart-shaped bowls from tiger, so I saved the situation by using one of these. And at least it looks great for valentines! We ate the melted one anyway and it tasted delicious, but it definitely wasn’t so good for blog photos! I probably would have made the whole thing again, but sometimes too much blancmange can be a bad thing!

The heart shaped ones came out perfectly as I only popped them in the warm water for a few seconds and they all tasted absolutely amazing however they looked!