Vanilla blancmange with Saffron syrup

Following on from my recent post about winning a new cook book, I made at the weekend the Vanilla blancmange with Saffron syrup, from A Passion for Puddings by Phil Vickery.

Not the most attractive of pictures! I wanted to make, as per the recipe, in single servings but I was outnumbered by the boys who wanted one big pudding, cue mums old tupperware jelly mould! To serve it wasn't so practical...

The blancmange was really lovely and creamy, if a little sweet, and the sauce looked oddly like irn-bru (!), its nice, slightly unusual and I thought I had a sweet tooth...but this was too sugary for me! Will probably make the blancmange again but not with the syrup! The recipe calls for saffron threads but I used a sachet of Zafferano, a gift bought back from Italy, this is also possibly why mine looked distinctly like the irn-bru as it turned out to be ground, rather than stamens!

Here's the recipe if anyone fancies a sugar high for the rest of the week!

Blancmange:

1 tin condensed milk (397g)

284ml whipping cream (I had to use Elmlea double as thats all they had!), lightly whipped

4 gelatine leaves

1 vanilla pod

300ml water

Syrup:

1 lemon, juiced

large pinch saffron stems

225ml cold water

200g caster sugar

1) Place the condensed milk and water into a saucepan, scrape the vanilla pod and add the seeds to the mix and bring to the boil, meanwhile cover the gelatine leaves in cold water

2) Once it has come to the boil, remove from heat and cool down, when cold enough place in fridge for 45 minutes

3) Gently whip the cream, I put mine in the Kenwood chef for about 3 mins with the whisk attachment, fold into the chilled mixture, pour into 8 or 1 moulds and chill until set, book says 1 hour but I left over night

4) To prepare the syrup (which is to be served fresh) place all the syrup ingredients, excluding lemon juice into a saucepan, bring to boil and reduce by about 1/3, keeping on a steady boil, cool slightly (I placed pan in cold water bowl) and add the lemon juice, when at a lukewarm temperature its ready to gently pour over the upturned puddings