School Days Tuesday: The Snack Pack
Billy Madison: I guess that Snack Pack is pretty good huh? [the little kid smiles and nods] Billy Madison: Wanna trade me the rest of it for this banana? [the little kid smiles and shakes his head] Billy Madison: You know how how hard I could beat you? From Internet Movie Database. In any serious discussion of school lunch food, you cannot forget to mention the packed lunch. Anyone who brown-bagged it remembers peeking into the lunch sack before breakfast had even digested, just to see what would be waiting for lunch. As soon as you sat down at the cafeteria tables, the trading and comparing began. The kids stuck with celery sticks were on their own, forever cast off into the cafeteria abyss. Those with better food could safely mingle and compare trophies--the chips, fried potato sticks, and any kind of sugar product. Clearly, what your parents packed you for lunch revealed how much they liked you or how cool they were. But there is one item that above all else proves that you are loved by the coolest parents in the school, and that of course is the chocolate pudding cup. The biggest decision of the entire day is whether to eat it first or last. Immediate gratification or having the delicious pudding taste in your mouth for the rest of the day? Oh, the big decisions seven-year-olds have to make. While many of my friends have left the bulletin boards, lockers, and lunch boxes behind, as a teacher I still employ my lunch packing skills daily. And yes, I too still look forward to the days in which I pick in and see the chocolate pudding waiting for noon. When Cooking Light featured pudding in its August issue, I quickly jumped at the chance to make a dessert that did not require turning on the oven and also would last for days. Immediately, I thought of home-made Snack Packs in my lunch sack. I should have known, though, that this pudding would be too tasty to last that long. Chocolate Pudding 
2 1/2 cups fat-free milk 1/3 cup sugar 3 tablespoons cornstarch 1/4 teaspoon salt 2 large egg yolks 2 teaspoons butter 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 5 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped Adapted from Cooking Light . Begin by boiling 2 cups of the milk in a saucepan. Perhaps a more efficient pudding-maker can complete the subsequent steps in less time, but I think I left the pudding on the stove for too long. My milk was perilously close to scalded. 
Typical to many dishes of the sort, you combine the wet and dry ingredients separately. Therefore, in one bowl combine sugar, cornstarch, and salt. In another bowl, whisk together the 2 egg yolks and remaining 1/2 cup of milk. 
Then combine the wet and dry mixtures and stir well. 
The next step is tempering. To avoid the raw egg from becoming cooked like a breakfast dish, pour a small amount of the hot milk into the egg yolk mixture. Stir together, and then add the contents of the mixing bowl to the saucepan. If you have questions, check out this lovely post at Cuisine at Home . 
Bring this to a boil, and then reduce the heat. Simmer for one minute while stirring constantly. I believe the STIRRING CONSTANTLY instruction is probably the most important in the entire process. Cornstarch causes lumpiness, which can only be counter-balanced by stirring. I learned this lesson the hard way, although the Paupered Chefs evidently enjoyed the pudding enough to ask for seconds, I was disappointed by the tiny lumps disrupting the texture of the pudding. 
The final steps seal the delicious deal: after removing the pan from heat, stir in the chocolate, vanilla, and butter. Now the creation resembles a dessert, as opposed to an ambiguous semi-liquid white concoction. The quality of the rich chocolate flavor sets this pudding apart from the packaged variety. Even if a bit lumpy, the chocolate flavor affirms that homemade pudding is certainly worth the effort. As any kid will tell you, pudding is best when cold. At this point, I learned a second trick. Remember that skin on the surface of chocolate pudding on the dinner table? To prevent the skin from forming, press down plastic wrap directly onto the pudding before cooling. After it cools, you should have a lovely bowl of the perfect dessert for a lunchbox, dinner table, or screening of Billy Madison.
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