isithalal.food · Recipes

Jam roly-poly with vegetable suet

A rolled British jam pudding steamed in the oven, made with vegetable suet in place of beef suet, a vanilla pod rather than extract, and served with custard.

British · Dessert · Easy · 1 roly-poly, 6 slices · 80 min

Each method follows published technique for the dish, and every Halal substitution is checked against the ingredient pages we cite. Photographs come from our ingredient library rather than the finished dish.

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Why Halal checks matter here

Jam roly-poly is made with shredded suet, and the beef suet sold in UK shops is beef fat with no Halal mark; swapping the vanilla pod for vanilla extract would add alcohol.

Halal-critical ingredients

• Shredded suet: Beef suet is beef fat. The Atora and Aldi beef suet pack records show no Halal mark, so it is Halal only from Halal-slaughtered cattle. Use vegetable suet, which is palm and sunflower oil, or beef suet from a Halal butcher. See Suet.
• Vanilla: The recipe uses the seeds from a vanilla pod. Vanilla extract is made with alcohol, and scholars differ on it. Keep the pod, or use an alcohol-free vanilla. See Vanilla extract.

Ingredients

Pudding

• 50 g (3½ tbsp) salted butter, cold and cut into chunks, plus extra for greasing
• 250 g (2 cups) self-raising flour, plus extra for rolling
• 1 (1) vanilla pod, seeds scraped out
• 50 g (1¾ oz) shredded vegetable suet (or beef suet from a Halal butcher)
• 150 ml (⅔ cup) milk, plus a drop more if needed
• 100 g (4 oz) raspberry or plum jam, or a mixture

To serve

• to serve (to serve) custard

Method

1. Set up the oven. Put a deep roasting tin on the bottom shelf of the oven with another shelf directly above it. Pull the tin out on its shelf, fill it two-thirds with boiling water from the kettle and slide it carefully back in. Heat the oven to 180°C (160°C fan, gas 4). Tear off a sheet of foil and a sheet of greaseproof paper, each about 30 × 40 cm, lay the paper on the foil and butter it.
2. Make the dough. Pulse the butter, flour and vanilla seeds in a food processor until the butter disappears, then tip into a bowl. Stir in the suet, pour in the milk and work it together with a cutlery knife into a sticky dough, adding a drop more milk if your flour needs it.
3. Fill and roll. Tip the dough onto a floured surface, pat it smooth and roll it out to a square of about 25 × 25 cm. Spread the jam all over, leaving a gap along one edge, then roll up from the opposite edge. Pinch the jam-free edge into the dough where it meets, and pinch the ends roughly.
4. Wrap and bake. Lift the roll onto the buttered paper, join-side down, bring the paper and foil loosely up around it and scrunch the edges and ends to seal. It puffs as it cooks, so don't wrap it tightly. Set the parcel directly on the shelf above the tin of water and cook for 1 hour.
5. Rest and serve. Leave the pudding for 5 minutes before unwrapping, then open the foil and paper carefully and cut thick slices. Serve with custard.

Allergens

gluten (flour, and the flour in shredded suet), milk (butter, milk)

How this recipe was researched

Method adapted from BBC Good Food's 'Jam roly-poly' (butter, self-raising flour and vanilla seeds pulsed together, shredded suet and milk stirred in, rolled to a 25 cm square, spread with jam, rolled up, wrapped loosely in buttered greaseproof paper and foil, and baked for 1 hour on a rack over a tin of boiling water at 180°C). The recipe says only 'shredded suet'; we specified vegetable suet, or beef suet from a Halal butcher, and kept its vanilla pod. Timings follow the published technique rather than a kitchen test.

Photograph from our ingredient library: a box of vegetable suet, not the finished dish.