This cherry suet pudding is a real winter warmer. I’ve probably made and eaten more of these sweet microwave dumplings and sponges than you’ve had hot dinners! The trouble with a steamed pudding in a microwave is it’s just too darned easy and I love to whip up a cherry suet sponge pudding and get on with the serious business of eating it!. Making a sponge cake in a microwave oven is so easy, I’ve a variety of different flavours and recipes I’ve used over the decades, since I made my first treacle sponge in a holiday caravan over 30 years ago! Microwave steamed sponge puddings can be made fast and with few ingredients, this cherry suet pudding’s a staple in my house.
Now, when I look round the supermarkets, I see the TINY pots for sale at £1 for 1-2 TINY puddings and I think “I can make 10x that amount for 1/3rd of the cost at home!” – and quickly rush home to make one. Below is a cherry suet pudding I made in the microwave last week:
I’ve noticed a lot of people calling these mug cakes online in recent years, then presenting a photo of something that’s, well, a bit of a mess as a mug’s not large enough for a full-sized portion.
My ‘secret’ isn’t trying to squeeze all that goodness into a mug, but using a 1 pint Pyrex jug to do the cooking instead. 
This gives me a VERY generous serves one portion and the steamed pudding’s got space to rise. If you don’t know how to make dumplings then you’re in for a treat as it’s so easy:
Ingredients:
- 2 tablespoons Suet dumpling mix – a simple 2:1 ratio of self-raising flour and suet. Recipe: Suet mix
- Jam – I used black cherry jam this time. Any jam will do, so grab your best jam!
- Custard – I used a packet of instant custard.
Make Sponge Cake in a Microwave Oven:
- I intended to spoon out one tablespoon of jam into the bottom of the Pyrex jug, but it was so close to the end of the jar I added more jam than I usually do.
- I added water slowly to the 2 tablespoons of suet dumpling mix (to be honest, 2 tablespoons was a little big piggy, but I felt I deserved a big pudding that day). The water/mix are then combined slowly, until they combine (no dry bits left).
- Spoon the suet dumpling onto the jam in the Pyrex jug.
- Cover the Pyrex jug (this helps the whole steaming part as the steam is retained in the jug.
- I then microwaved it at full power (800 watt microwave oven) for 3 minutes, while watching it through the window until I thought it looked “good enough to eat”
Serve, I served mine with instant custard.
It’s that simple. The other benefit of using a Pyrex jug for this is you’ve a nice handle to grip so you can turn the jug upside down and tip the pudding into a bowl. If you’re against washing up you can eat your pudding from the Pyrex jug, if nobody’s looking.
Want to Make Suet Free Dumplings?
You can also make cherry pudding without suet – yes, one without suet: Dumplings Without Suet
Microwave steamed sponge puddings are the future of comfort eating 🙂