White Pudding, Irish
NOT "black pudding without the blood" - that lazy definition hides the answer. Blood does two jobs (binding and moisture) and both must be re-filled: here by fat, a higher cereal load, egg, and - the Irish difference - a substantial proportion of pork and pork liver. Irish black pudding is a blood-and-oatmeal sausage; Irish white pudding is a PORK-and-oatmeal sausage. Start here if you have never made either: no blood to source, no casings needed, no nitrite arithmetic.
NOT “black pudding without the blood” - that lazy definition hides the answer. Blood does two jobs (binding and moisture) and both must be re-filled: here by fat, a higher cereal load, egg, and - the Irish difference - a substantial proportion of pork and pork liver. Irish black pudding is a blood-and-oatmeal sausage; Irish white pudding is a PORK-and-oatmeal sausage. Start here if you have never made either: no blood to source, no casings needed, no nitrite arithmetic.
Ingredients
- 450 g pork shoulder, ground coarse - the Irish difference
- 100 g pork liver (about 7%)
- 250 g pork back fat, diced 6 mm - dice, don’t grind
- 350 g pinhead (steel-cut) oatmeal, dry - soak overnight in milk
- 400 ml whole milk, for soaking
- 120 g onion, finely diced, sweated and COOLED
- 24 g fine sea salt (about 1.5%)
- 4 g white pepper
- 2 g ground mace
- 0.5 g ground cloves - restraint, cloves take over fast
- 1 egg, as binder
Directions
Key ingredients
- Soak the oats in the milk overnight, refrigerated.
- Keep the pork, liver and fat at or below 2 C / 35 F throughout. Cold is not optional - warm fat smears instead of cutting.
- Grind the pork coarse; grind or finely mince the liver. Dice the back fat by hand at 6 mm - do not grind it. You want visible fat, not a smear.
- Combine everything with the drained oats and the egg. Mix thoroughly.
- Either (a) stuff into 32-36 mm hog casings and poach at 80 C / 176 F to an internal 72 C / 160 F, about 30-40 minutes…
- …or (b) use the loaf-pan method: greased and parchment-lined loaf pan, set in a roasting tray with hot water halfway up, 160 C / 325 F, to 72 C / 160 F internal. Never let the water bath boil.
- Chill overnight. It must be cold and set before it will slice.
- Slice about 1 cm and fry to serve, 2-3 minutes a side, until crusted.
Notes
On the liver
No source gives a canonical Irish liver percentage - the 7% here is my judgement, not a documented figure. Liver browns the mix, so keep it low if you want a pale pudding; 7% will already push it fawn-grey. The “white” was always relative.
Scottish vs Irish - the trap
Marianski’s recipe titled “White Pudding with Oatmeal” is beef suet + oatmeal + onion with NO PORK. That is a SCOTTISH mealie pudding, despite the generic title. Scottish white pudding (essentially a cased skirlie) typically contains no pork meat. The pork and liver are what make it Irish. A trusted source’s title nearly led me to publish a Scottish pudding as Irish.
Boudin blanc is a false friend
Boudin blanc is NOT the French white pudding. It is an emulsified cream-and-egg white-meat sausage from 17th-century northern France - fine and delicate. White pudding is coarse and oaty. They share a colour and a name-shape, nothing else.
The medieval survivor
White pudding likely descends from medieval sweetened blancmange-type recipes - early versions carried offal, cream, eggs, breadcrumbs, and historically dates, currants and saffron. By the mid-18th century recipes dropped the liver and the sweet flavourings. It is a sibling of mincemeat and Christmas pudding that walked the other way. The Irish version kept the liver the Scottish version dropped.
Honesty label
Synthesized from sourced anchors (Marianski’s cook parameters and salt loading, with pork and liver added per the Irish definition). Not a transcription of a tested house recipe.
You really cannot buy this one
Nothing on a mainstream American shelf resembles Irish white pudding. Black pudding at least has poor cousins (morcilla, boudin noir). White pudding has essentially nothing. This is the one you must make.