If there is a single dessert that conjures up childhood to me, it is chocolate pudding: served in a tall glass sundae dish, topped with homemade whipped cream and a cherry, with “skin,” please.

As with all favorite childhood foods, there was a definite strategy to eating chocolate pudding. The cherry was saved for the end. The first few bites were just pudding; you’d break a crater in the surface and eat around the whipped cream. Then, a dab of whipped cream was piggybacked on each