Feeling Festive
Last Sunday (the 22nd) was the last Sunday before advent, or ‘Stir-up Sunday’ as it has become known. This year I took it upon myself to preserve this tradition of pre-Christmas baking, and make my own Christmas pudding. As we don’t actually have a tradition of pre-Christmas baking, I borrowed a recipe from the December issue of Delicious Magazine, bought originally to keep my company on a recent coach journey to London.
The idea of making your own Christmas pudding may sound daunting (and perhaps even pointless considering the huge range of puddings available in the supermarkets), but in fact it’s rather simple, requiring nothing more than assembling a lot of ingredients, then stirring them all together. The long cooking time can be a tad bothersome, requiring as it does an entire free afternoon/evening, but you will be rewarded with a magical Christmassy smell that pervades the kitchen every time you lift the lid. And with the weather so gloomy, who needs an excuse to stay in and watch a pot boil?
Below are some photos of the pudding steaming away. More photos of the results to follow, when my willpower cracks and I start eating the first pudding!
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Christmas pudding
Source: Delicious magazine, December 2009
Makes 2 1.2 litre puddings (each serves approx. 8)
Dry ingredients:
300g fresh white breadcrumbs
100g self-raising flour
1 tsp mixed spice
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 whole nutmeg, very finely grated
350g raisins
100g mixed peel
50g flaked almonds
250g suet
225g demerara sugar
225g sultanas
225g currants
2 carrots, peeled and finely grated
2 cooking apples, peeled and finely grated
Wet ingredients:
Zest and juice of 1 orange
Zest and juice of 1 lemon
1 small wine glass (125ml?) brandy
2 tbsp black treacle
4 eggs
(N.B. Inexplicably, Tesco had no currants when I went to buy the ingredients, so I used 550g of mixed dried fruit (raisins, sultanas, currants and mixed peel), a 150g bag of mixed ‘fancy’ raisins, and 100g of dried figs, diced. I feel it is ok to play around with the dried fruit, just make sure the total quantity stays around 800g)
Put the breadcrumbs in the biggest bowl you can find (bigger than you imagine, I now know this from experience). Sift the flour into the bowl with the spices. Then add all the remaining dry ingredients, up to and including the apple.
Combine all the wet ingredients in a jug and pour into the dry ingredients. Mix together thoroughly. Cover with a damp cloth and leave overnight (this is important to allow the dried fruit to plump up).
Divide the mixture between 2 1.2 litre pudding basins. Personally I used plastic basins with lids, to avoid all the tying with string and paper faff. However, a useful video of how to do this can be found here.
Steam the puddings for 6 hours, or in pans with simmering water that reaches two thirds of the way up the sides. Remove and allow to cool.
The puddings will keep, covered, until Christmas day. Steam for 1-2 hours before serving.
