Recipes from Around the *World*
Deconstructing Christmas Pudding: Secrets Of A Seasonal Staple
This article was adapted from National Geographic Traveller (UK).
If you needed an emblem for a typically British Christmas, the plum pudding would probably be it. Love it or hate it, this currant-freckled sphere — better known as Christmas pudding, and often adorned with holly — is an instantly recognisable festive icon.
The British have a sentimental attachment to this dessert. A dark, sticky mass of dried fruit, suet, breadcrumbs and spices, it's a proper rib sticker; Christmas just wouldn't seem right without its solid, reassuring presence on the table.
Perhaps one of the reasons the dish remains so popular — despite many professing not to like it — is the fact we have such a longstanding relationship with it. Plum pudding can trace its origins back to at least the Middle Ages, when it had a less sturdy consistency. There's a recipe in The Forme of Cury (believed to date from the late 14th century, it's the oldest known English language cookery book) for something called 'fygey'. This thick, porridge-like mixture contains ground almonds, wine, figs, raisins, ginger and honey, and while the end result looks fairly unappetising to the modern eye, it does actually taste like Christmas pudding.
Elizabeth David, the doyenne of post-war food writing (who, incidentally, believed plum pudding to be 'a pretty awful concoction') suggested it may hark back as far as ancient Greece. In Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen, she writes that a French historian called Bourdeau 'says that it is precisely described by Atheneus in a report of the wedding feast of Caranus, an Argive prince'.
Dried-fruit porridges continued to be eaten at all manner of celebrations, including Christmas, and were enjoyed by historical figures, including the 17th-century diarist Samuel Pepys. This dish was given the catch-all name 'plum pudding', despite containing a variety of dried fruits, from prunes to currants.
Perhaps one of the reasons the dish remains so popular is the fact we have such a longstanding relationship with it: plum pudding can trace its origins back to at least the Middle Ages.
In the ensuing decades, the porridgey version eventually yielded to the more solid incarnation we recognise today, with recipes for plum pudding starting to appear in cookery books in the early 18th century. Although animal intestines and stomachs had been used to encase puddings (like haggis) for some time, it was a cloth that revolutionised the way puddings were cooked. The pudding mixture was piled onto a damp piece of buttered and floured fabric (so it wouldn't stick), which was then gathered up and tied with string to create a nice, plump sphere before boiling.
As for how this dish became inextricably linked with the festive season, Charles Dickens certainly bears some responsibility. He cemented the plum pudding in the popular imagination as the ultimate Christmas treat with his evocative description in A Christmas Carol, in which Mrs Cratchit presents her brood with a pudding 'like a speckled cannon ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern of ignited brandy'.
In 1845, just two years after the publication of A Christmas Carol, cookery writer Eliza Acton offered up four plum pudding recipes in Modern Cookery for Private Families, two of which are referred to as 'Christmas puddings'. The book even includes a recipe for 'vegetable plum pudding' ('cheap and good') that contains mashed potato and carrots. A version of this frugal dessert even appeared during the Second World War, popularised by the Ministry of Food.
What Dickens doesn't tell his readers is how much effort went into producing a Victorian plum pudding. The raisins had to be stoned: a fiddly, sticky job. The suet (the raw, hard fat surrounding cow or sheep kidneys) had to be shredded. Bread had to be grated — for crumbs — as did the sugar, which came in solid cones. All this, of course, had to be done by hand: many a 19th-century finger will have been rasped raw grating a nutmeg for the mix.
Perhaps one of the reasons the dish remains so popular is the fact we have such a longstanding relationship with it: plum pudding can trace its origins back to at least the Middle Ages.
Photograph by Hannah Hughes styled by Amy Stephenson
Despite the cumbersome nature of the work required to make a pudding, it seems to have become a festive-season ritual. Traditionally, it began on the fifth Sunday before Christmas. On this day, a short prayer was read out from the Book of Common Prayer, which begins 'Stir up, we beseech thee'. Parishioners would take this as their cue to go home and make their Christmas puddings and cakes and, as a result, it became known as Stir-up Sunday.
Like so many traditions based in folklore, there were — and for some cooks there continue to be — certain dos and don'ts. A wooden spoon had to be used to mix the pudding, as a reminder of the manger the baby Jesus lay in. The mixture had to be stirred in an anti-clockwise direction — from east to west — to honour the journey of the Wise Men; it was said that health and happiness were guaranteed if you did this correctly, and that disaster loomed if you stirred the wrong way. While stirring, you were also meant to make a wish, naturally keeping the details to yourself for fear it wouldn't be granted.
Various 'fortune-telling' trinkets could also be secreted in the mix. Rings or thimbles meant marriage or spinsterhood, respectively, while a coin signified imminent riches.
As for ingredients, there are few hard and fast rules for the modern pudding. Dried fruit is a must, but along with the currants and raisins, you could follow Nigella Lawson's lead and include sherry-drenched prunes. Jamie Oliver, meanwhile, promises 'dynamic flavours' in his version, based on his grandmother's recipe, which contains dates, apricots and crystallised ginger. Suet is generally considered essential, adding moisture to the pudding, although today it's possible to buy vegetarian alternatives. Mixed spice, meanwhile, is commonly used these days, or you could create your own blend, as suggested by Raymond Blanc, who himself prefers a combination of ginger, clove, star anise and cinnamon. Alcohol such as beer or brandy — the latter favoured by King Edward VII — seems to be a given, except in the most frugal puddings.
The beauty of a Christmas pudding is that it keeps so well, with some cooks making theirs months or even years in advance of the festive season. The Spread Eagle Hotel in Midhurst, West Sussex has decades-old Christmas puddings suspended from the ceiling of its restaurant, and while these may be more for decoration than consumption, it's speculated that even the oldest might be edible once revived with a little brandy.
You can count on steaming a pudding in a 600ml basin for at least five to six hours. The lengthy cooking time is essential in order to achieve the intensity and depth of flavour.
Photograph by Hannah Hughes styled by Amy Stephenson
For the most part, the individual ingredients required to make a Christmas pudding can be found ready-prepared in most supermarkets (aside from fresh breadcrumbs, for which you may need to use a food processor). There's no need to use a pudding cloth either, as it's far easier to steam the dish in a pudding bowl. One thing that hasn't changed, however, is the time Christmas pudding takes to cook, which might be why many people are reluctant to make them at home. You can count on steaming a pudding in a 600ml basin for at least five to six hours. The lengthy cooking time is essential in order to achieve the intensity and depth of flavour. That said, the pudding can be steamed in stages — say, in two three-hour stints — and, once cooked, it should be stored in a cool, dark place, ready for reheating on the big day.
Once the Christmas pudding is on a plate, tradition dictates it should be flambéed. Where exactly this custom comes from is uncertain — some suggest the flames represent the passion of Christ, while others link it to the winter solstice's fire-based traditions. Whatever its origins, there are few more spectacular ways to end a meal than by setting light to dessert, whether you choose to use a drop of vodka or Mrs Cratchit's generous serving of brandy.
A historic timeline of Christmas pudding1390 Fygey, a dried-fruit porridge, said to be a plum pudding forerunner, appears in cookery book The Forme of Cury
1662 Diarist Samuel Pepys writes of having 'a mess of brave plum-porridge and a roasted pullet for dinner' on Christmas Day
1723 The Duke of Bolton's cook, John Nott, includes a plum pudding recipe in The Cook's and Confectioner's Dictionary
1843 Queen Victoria has plum pudding as part of her Christmas dinner — a royal tradition that continued throughout her reign
1927 George V urges the UK to make Christmas puddings using ingredients from the Empire
1940s The Ministry of Food provides a rationing recipe for plum pudding bulked out with potato and carrots. It claimed you couldn't taste the veg
2010 Waitrose launches Heston Blumenthal's Hidden Orange Christmas Pudding — a modern twist on the classic
A dark, sticky mass of dried fruit, suet, breadcrumbs and spices, plum pudding us a proper rib sticker.
Photograph by Hannah Hughes styled by Amy Stephenso
Christmas pudding recipeThis family recipe for plum pudding dates from 1871. It was passed to my grandmother by her great aunt Eliza, who worked in service before her marriage. The original pudding was much larger and took 15 hours to cook. This is a scaled-down version.
Takes: 15 mins plus at least 1 hr marinating and 5 hrs steamingServes: 4-6
Ingredients 75g currants 75g raisins or sultanas 100g pitted prunes, quartered 25g chopped mixed peel 10g blanched almonds, cut into slivers 1½ tbsp brandy, plus 4 tbsp for flambéeing (optional) 1½ tbsp dark rum butter, for greasing 50g plain flour 50g 'fresh' white breadcrumbs (from a stale loaf is fine, but don't use dried) 50g dark brown sugar 45g vegetable or beef suet 1 tsp mixed spice 1 egg 2-4 tbsp milk
To serve 50g brown sugar, 50ml brandy and 50g butter, for the pudding sauce (optional) brandy butter (optional)
You'll need 600ml glass or ceramic pudding basin foil and greaseproof paper, to make the lid string, to secure the lid 1 large saucepan, with a steamer basket
Method1. Put the dried fruit (including the mixed peel) and the almonds in a large bowl. Stir in the brandy and rum. Leave to marinate for at least 1 hr, or overnight if possible.2. Grease your pudding basin well with butter. To make the lid, cut a circle of greaseproof paper and foil significantly larger than the top of your pudding basin, then fold a pleat in the middle of each circle (this will allow the pudding to expand when cooking without causing the lid to pop off)3. Stir the flour, breadcrumbs, sugar, suet, mixed spice and a pinch of salt into the dried fruit mix.4. Beat the egg and 2 tbsp of the milk together. Pour into the dried fruit mixture and stir until thoroughly combined — it should take on a dropping consistency. Add more milk if you think the mixture is too stiff.5. Spoon the mixture into the prepared basin. Place the greaseproof lid on top of the basin, then add the foil lid, ensuring the pleats are roughly aligned. Secure with string (most pudding basins have a lip at the top, which makes this easier to do than it sounds). Place the pudding in a steamer basket set over a pan of simmering water. Cook for 6-8 hrs, ensuring the water is regularly topped up to stop the pan from boiling dry (this can be done in two or three stages if necessary). Allow to cool, then refrigerate until required or store in a cool place.6. If you want to make a sauce for the pudding, melt the brown sugar, brandy and butter together in a saucepan set over a medium heat. To reheat your pudding, steam it again for 1 hr. If you want to flambé it as well, gently heat the brandy in a small saucepan. Once hot but not boiling, remove from the heat and carefully ignite with a lit match. Pour the flaming liquid over the pudding before swiftly presenting it to your guests.7. Serve with the brandy butter or pudding sauce, if you like.
Published in Issue 14 (winter 2021) of National Geographic Traveller Food (UK)
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Allie's Christmas Pudding Chronicles: Flambéing And Serving
Christmas has a habit of sneaking up on me. Despite preparing for this moment for five weeks, I still feel like it arrived fast. It's the final chapter in my six-part series—Allie's Christmas Pudding Chronicles—and ready or not, it's time to flambé a figgy pudding.
I started this exploration in November, on Stir-up Sunday, fascinated with the festive tradition of a Christmas pudding. If you're just joining the party, Christmas pudding is a spiced cake-like dessert, composed primarily of dried fruit, bread crumbs, sugar, and fat. It's commonly made in the UK and various countries including New Zealand, Canada, and Australia. As a person born and raised in the US where dried fruit-laden cakes are often mistrusted and the term "pudding" is reserved for custards, I was looking forward to properly trying out this unfamiliar Christmas treat.
It certainly didn't disappoint. Every step was an adventure, from soaking the fruit, steaming it, weekly brandy "feedings," brandy butter (hard sauce), and now, serving it as a ball of flames. There's a lot to go over in this post. Before you can even think about flambéing, we have to reheat the pudding. Let's get to it.
Re-steam the puddingJust when you thought steaming a dessert for five hours seemed strangely thorough, back into the sauna we go. On the Sunday after Thanksgiving, also called Stir-up Sunday, I mixed the batter, poured it into a heat-safe glass bowl, wrapped it in a highly detailed fashion with foil, parchment, and kitchen string, and steamed the pudding in a pot for five hours. Well, I had to steam it again, but this time for two hours instead of five.
If you've been joining me with your own pudding, a few hours before you plan on serving the pudding, rewrap the bowl and do the same. (Check this post for pictures on how to wrap the bowl and set up the steamer.) The idea of steaming it again is simply to thoroughly reheat the pud without losing moisture. Since the pudding has been "curing" for five weeks, it's only natural for it to dry out slightly, even if it's been well covered and bedaubed with brandy on a weekly basis.
While I have read that you can unmold the pudding, wrap it in foil and pop it in the oven to heat for an hour at 300ºF, or alternatively cover it in vented plastic wrap and microwave it for 15 minutes, these options can further dry out the pudding, or worse. (If you've ever forgotten a soft roll in the microwave you know what I mean—mummified.) The steamer creates a humid environment with gentle heat. The way I see it, you put all this work in already, why risk ruining it?
As I've mentioned in the earlier parts of this series, I'm using Nigella Lawson's recipe as a guide. Some folks say one hour of steaming is sufficient, and Lawson's instructions say three hours. While the Christmas pudding is dense, my pudding bowl is more wide than deep, so I steamed it for about 90 minutes.
Unmold the pudOnce the pudding is thoroughly reheated, lift it out of the steamer and let it cool on a wire rack. It should be cool enough to handle but still warm; this took about 20 minutes for me. Put an overturned plate on top of the bowl, and flip both of them so the pudding falls down onto the plate. Remove the bowl and there you have it. Does it look like a mottled big brown blob? Yes. But I know what it really is. A softly steaming spiced pudding speckled with plump fruits and exhaling tablespoons of alcohol.
A few small sections of my pud stuck to the bowl, but it wasn't catastrophic. I used a rubber spatula to scrape the bits off and stuck them back onto the cake where they belonged. If your cake doesn't easily dislodge, flip it back right-side up and run a knife around the edge. Sneak a knife or fork down the side toward the bottom. It's possible the cake is suctioned to the bowl, and making an indentation for air to break the vacuum will help it come out. Peel off the parchment circle on the bottom and top it with a bit of fake holly or some sugared cranberries for presentation.
What do you think so far? Flambé and serveCredit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann
Traditionally, you flambé a Christmas pudding, but of course you could skip this part and simply slice in. That being said, don't skip it. It's so fun. There are a couple ways to safely ignite alcohol, and you can read here for some flambé tips if it's new to you. I usually heat and light alcohol on the stovetop, but I tried a more low-key method I read about using a candle to flame the pud tableside, so I did what any proud professional does and watched a YouTube video.
There are two steps to lighting alcohol on fire: heat the alcohol to emit more fumes, and light the fumes. Normally with food, you can warm the alcohol in a pan on the stove and then use a lighter or the gas burner to light it. In this case, you set up your station at the dinner table (or the coffee table because that's apartment life sometimes). Light a candle and put the plated pudding next to it. To flambé, use a high proof alcohol. Somewhere between 80 and 90 proof is ideal, so vodka, rum, or brandy will likely be fine. I used the same Neversink Spirits Orchard Brandy that I've been using this whole time to "feed" Li'l Pud.
Bring a metal ladle over to the table, too. Pour the alcohol into it; you only need about 2 or 3 ounces. Hover the ladle over the lit candle and move it around so the alcohol can warm up. I did this for about 20 seconds or so. Then tilt the ladle toward the flame and try to ignite the fumes. It looks pretty easy in the video, however I couldn't get the flame just right without pouring brandy into my candle. So I needed to bring a lighter over for assistance. I warmed the brandy again over the candle and finally lit the edge of the ladle with the lighter. The blue flames flourished and I poured the ignited brandy onto the Christmas pudding. It's the closest I'll get to feeling like a wizard.
The flames extinguish themselves in a matter of seconds but it's thrilling to witness for that short time. Serve it with the brandy butter you made last week (it only takes a minute to make), and tuck in. I can say with confidence: fruitcake haters can go kick rocks. This is damn good pud. The dried fruit stayed moist, even from soaking so long ago, and the combination I used was sweet but also delivered a nice bit of tangy flavor. The weird greasy smell the beef tallow had (suet didn't work out) was completely undetectable. Only warming spices and the deep, treacly flavors of molasses and fruit were present. Oh, and the brandy. That weekly anointing absolutely penetrated through the entire pudding, and it makes quite a statement. The texture was light, spongey, and incredibly moist.
I can see why making a Christmas pudding is something to look forward to every year. It's like an edible way to keep track of the entire holiday season, and I may very well start my own tradition with it. Though I think I'll cut the recipe in half and make a mini pudding next year—this one will take me a while to get through, but at least I know it'll keep for weeks. Have a merry Christmas. I hope you enjoyed my Christmas Pudding Chronicles. I certainly did.
How The Christmas Pudding, With Ingredients Taken From The Colonies, Became An Iconic British Food
As an American living in Britain in the 1990s, my first exposure to Christmas pudding was something of a shock. I had expected figs or plums, as in the "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" carol, but there were none. Neither did it resemble the cold custard-style dessert that Americans typically call pudding.
Instead, I was greeted with a boiled mass of suet – a raw, hard animal fat this is often replaced with a vegetarian alternative – as well as flour and dried fruits that is often soaked in alcohol and set alight.
It's in no danger of breaking into my top ten favorite Christmas foods. But as a historian of Great Britain and its empire, I can appreciate the Christmas pudding for its rich global history. After all, it is a legacy of the British Empire with ingredients from around the globe it once dominated and continues to be enjoyed in places it once ruled.
Christmas pudding takes its shapeChristmas pudding is a relatively recent concoction of two older, at least medieval, dishes. The first was a runny porridge known as "plum pottage" in which any mixture of meats, dried fruits and spices might appear – edibles that could be preserved until the winter celebration.
Until the 18th century, "plum" was synonymous with raisins, currants and other dried fruits. "Figgy pudding," immortalized in the "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" carol, appeared in the written record by the 14th century. A mixture of sweet and savory ingredients, and not necessarily containing figs, it was bagged with flour and suet and cooked by steaming. The result was a firmer, rounded hot mass.
During the 18th century, the two crossed to become the more familiar plum pudding – a steamed pudding packed with the ingredients of the rapidly growing British Empire of rule and trade. The key was less a new form of cookery than the availability of once-luxury ingredients, including French brandy, raisins from the Mediterranean, and citrus from the Caribbean.
Few things had become more affordable than cane sugar which, owing to the labors of millions of enslaved Africans, could be found in the poorest and remotest of British households by mid-century. Cheap sugar, combined with wider availability of other sweet ingredients like citrus and dried fruits, made plum pudding an iconically British celebratory treat, albeit not yet exclusively associated with Christmas.
Such was its popularity that English satirist James Gillray made it the centerpiece of one of his famous cartoons, depicting Napoleon Bonaparte and the British prime minister carving the world in pudding form.
A satirical cartoon by James Gillray, showing British Prime Minister William Pitt and the French leader Napoleon Bonaparte carving up the world between them. Called 'The Plumb Pudding in Danger,' it was published on Feb. 26, 1805. Rischgitz/Hulton Archive via Getty Images Linked with ChristmasIn line with other modern Christmas celebrations, the Victorians took the plum pudding and redefined it for the holiday season, making it the "Christmas pudding."
In his 1843 internationally celebrated "A Christmas Carol," Charles Dickens venerated the dish as the idealized center of any family's Christmas feast: "Mrs Cratchit entered – flushed, but smiling proudly – with the pudding, like a speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quarter of ignited brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top."
Three years later, Queen Victoria's chef published her favored recipe, making Christmas pudding, like the Christmas tree, the aspiration of families across Britain.
Christmas pudding owed much of its lasting appeal to its socioeconomic accessibility. Victoria's recipe, which became a classic, included candied citrus peel, nutmeg, cinnamon, lemons, cloves, brandy and a small mountain of raisins and currants – all affordable treats for the middle class. Those with less means could either opt for lesser amounts or substitutions, such as brandy for ale.
Eliza Acton, a leading cookbook author of the day who helped to rebrand plum pudding as Christmas pudding, offered a particularly frugal recipe that relied on potatoes and carrots.
White colonists' desires to replicate British culture meant that versions of Christmas pudding soon appeared across the empire. Even European diggers in Austrialia's goldfields included it in their celebrations by mid-century.
The high alcohol content gave the puddings a shelf life of a year or more, allowing them to be sent even to the empire's frontiers during Victoria's reign, including to British soldiers serving in Afghanistan. Christmas celebrations for British soldiers fighting in the Crimea in 1855 included the Christmas pudding – a welcome respite from the cold winter.
Empire pudding The royal recipe for the Christmas pudding. BiblioArchives / LibraryArchives via Flickr, CC BYIn the 1920s, the British Women's Patriotic League heavily promoted it – calling it "Empire Pudding" in a global marketing campaign. They praised it as emblem of the empire that should be made from the ingredients of Britain's colonies and possessions: dried fruits from Australia and South Africa, cinnamon from Ceylon, spices from India and Jamaican rum in place of French brandy.
Press coverage of London's 1926 Empire Day celebrations featured the empire's representatives pouring the ingredients into a ceremonial mixing bowl and collectively stirring it.
The following year, the Empire Marketing Board received King George V's permission to promote the royal recipe, which had all the appropriate empire-sourced ingredients.
Such promotional recipes and the mass production of puddings from iconic grocery stores like Sainsbury's in the 1920s combined to place Christmas puddings on the tables of a myriad of peoples who resided across an empire on which the sun never set.
After the empireDecolonization did not diminish the appeal of the Christmas pudding. Passengers transiting through London's airports can find them in abundance this time of year. Their shape and density have baffled airport security scanners for some time, leading to requests to carry them as hand luggage.
In former white settler colonies, like Canada, the tradition endured, although in Australia, where Christmas falls in summer, trifle and pavlova are at least equally common. In parts of India, where it is sometimes known as "pudim," it remains a traditional favorite, "steeped in tradition," according to the leading English national daily newspaper, the "Hindustan Times."
Reflecting modern palates and trends, Jamie Oliver, the celebrated British chef and author, has gluten-free and more modern options this year. His "classic" recipe, however, would not have been out of place on Queen Victoria's table.
Like so many adaptations around the former empire, it includes some American ingredients: pecans and cranberries as well as bourbon substituted for brandy – an Anglo-American concoction – much like my own family. And I will embrace this one.
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