For us, this weekend was stir-up Sunday or, in our case, stir-up Saturday and Sunday - the weekend when we make our Christmas cake and puddings. This year, after a bumper crop on my sister’s tree, we’re also making quince jelly.
We always make the cake and puddings around six weeks before Christmas; some people make a pudding one year to eat the next, but I don’t think there’s any need for that.
We have two recipes which work really well. The Christmas pudding comes from a Delia Smith cookbook and the cake is a Nigella recipe, which she claims comes from her grandmother (yeah Nigella!).
It’s a two-man job, mainly for the tying, it’s always a bit stressful and it’s also very companionable - gets you into the Christmas spirit. And talking of Christmas spirit, that started a good few weeks ago when Margaret made sloe gin and blackberry (bramble) brandy. Two jars of that have been steeping in the cupboard for a month or so, taken out every week for a shake.
It’s nice to make a few different drinks for Christmas and Limoncello has been a favourite since we had some home-made Limoncello at James and Claudia’s wedding. We’ve never quite been able to get our recipe to the standard of that and on Saturday we found out why. We were at Pauline and Chris’ for a bonfire party and Claudia’s family were all there - Tony Pieri (dad), Leena (mother) and Claudia’s two sisters - Laura and Daniella, with their husbands. I don’t know how the subject got onto Limoncello, but it did and Tony gave us his take on it. He started off by telling us it was all down to the lemons and how you’ve never tasted a lemon until you’ve had one picked fresh from the tree. I’m sure he’s right, but the real secret ingredient is the alcohol. Apparently, in Italian supermarkets, you can buy a spirit which is 90 per cent alcohol and which they use for making fortified drinks. You can’t get it in the UK which is a shame, but could you imagine what would happen if you could. The British just couldn’t be trusted with that kind of liquor - every wino and half the Scottish nation would be comatose!
Apologies for the Scottish stereotyping - it’s a cheap shot - but you get the point. This strong liquor is the key to making good Limoncello - the sort that won’t freeze in the freezer. Tony dilutes the alcohol quite a lot, so his final drink is just over 30 per cent alcohol, but even using the strongest vodka we can find, ours would probably end up 10 per cent lower than that.
Anyway, I have digressed. Back to cakes and pudding. It’s always a two-day job as you have to steep the fruit and other ingredients overnight. With the pudding, everything gets put together and stirred up with rum, stout and barley wine. We make it in an old pottery hand-basin from my dad’s - the same one that my mum used to make the Christmas cake when I was a child. Before people had bathrooms, they would wash with a large bowl and jug of hot water and this bowl, white with a blue pattern, is one of those that survived. Most were thrown away or used for garden ornaments. It sits on the old wind-up gramophone in the hall all year, but every Christmas it’s pressed into service for the pudding and cake.
The pudding mix stands in the bowl, covered with a cloth, overnight and by next day, the fruit has swollen to twice the size. It then gets spooned into three bowls and each one needs steaming for eight hours. If we had a steamer with bigger compartments, we could perhaps get it all done at once, but the pudding does rise quite a lot during cooking and would push our steamer’s compartments apart. So making the puddings starts at noon on Saturday and finishes at 9pm on Monday (by the time the last one is done). Pudding making is a two-man job because of the tying of greaseproof paper and cloth over the top of the pudding - it’s one of those jobs where you really need three hands.
The dried fruit for the cake is steeped in brandy overnight. We have a big Tupperware container for this, so we can shake it every hour or so to make sure the brandy coats every currant, sultana and raisin. Mixing is hard work. Margaret does most of the vigorous stirring, while I drop ingredients into the bowl.
The cake tin has to be lined with greaseproof paper and we also have to tie brown paper around the outside to protect the cake from burning. Cooking takes three hours at 150 deg C and we’ve been having some concerns about the thermostat in the bottom oven not working correctly. I bought an oven thermometer from Ostlers in Whittlesey a couple of weeks ago and it’s shown that the oven is running cooler than its setting. On Saturday, I experimented with settings. If you set the oven to 150 deg, it never gets higher than 130, but if you set it to 180, it gets up to 160 and turning it down will allow it to maintain an even temperature of 140 at a 150 setting. We’re putting quite a bit of trust in the accuracy of a £5 oven thermometer (made in China, of course). Any way, we had the oven at 150 when the cake went in and we cooked it for three hours and 10 minutes at a steady 140. It seems fine. Last year, we thought it was a bit claggy inside (still very nice) and the joke was that Margaret had fed it too much brandy. It may have been that we never got the oven quite hot enough.
Once the cake is out, we brush the top with brandy and then wrap it up in foil while still hot. I think this helps keep it moist. It stays hot for hours afterwards. Margaret will drip brandy into it over the next few weeks and then it will be iced a week or so before Christmas. The puddings need to be steamed for another two hours before they are served. The Bramble Brandy and Sloe Gin will need to be filtered before bottling and that’s a job for the week before Christmas.
I’m playing no part in the making of the quince jelly (which is lovely with a hard cheese, such as Cheddar). My sister has a quince tree in her garden and it’s done really well this year. Quince is similar to pear, but has a very fragrant scent to the fruit. My sister has made quince jelly and eats it on toast like marmalade. It will be nice to have some ready for Christmas to go with the Cheddar and Stilton.
Quince jelly update: successful batch made on Monday. It's set very firm and has good taste (delicate pear flavour and very fragrant). Another batch is being made today in a loaf tin, so we can wrap in clingfilm and slice off as required (like they do in the shops).
We always make the cake and puddings around six weeks before Christmas; some people make a pudding one year to eat the next, but I don’t think there’s any need for that.
We have two recipes which work really well. The Christmas pudding comes from a Delia Smith cookbook and the cake is a Nigella recipe, which she claims comes from her grandmother (yeah Nigella!).
It’s a two-man job, mainly for the tying, it’s always a bit stressful and it’s also very companionable - gets you into the Christmas spirit. And talking of Christmas spirit, that started a good few weeks ago when Margaret made sloe gin and blackberry (bramble) brandy. Two jars of that have been steeping in the cupboard for a month or so, taken out every week for a shake.
It’s nice to make a few different drinks for Christmas and Limoncello has been a favourite since we had some home-made Limoncello at James and Claudia’s wedding. We’ve never quite been able to get our recipe to the standard of that and on Saturday we found out why. We were at Pauline and Chris’ for a bonfire party and Claudia’s family were all there - Tony Pieri (dad), Leena (mother) and Claudia’s two sisters - Laura and Daniella, with their husbands. I don’t know how the subject got onto Limoncello, but it did and Tony gave us his take on it. He started off by telling us it was all down to the lemons and how you’ve never tasted a lemon until you’ve had one picked fresh from the tree. I’m sure he’s right, but the real secret ingredient is the alcohol. Apparently, in Italian supermarkets, you can buy a spirit which is 90 per cent alcohol and which they use for making fortified drinks. You can’t get it in the UK which is a shame, but could you imagine what would happen if you could. The British just couldn’t be trusted with that kind of liquor - every wino and half the Scottish nation would be comatose!
Apologies for the Scottish stereotyping - it’s a cheap shot - but you get the point. This strong liquor is the key to making good Limoncello - the sort that won’t freeze in the freezer. Tony dilutes the alcohol quite a lot, so his final drink is just over 30 per cent alcohol, but even using the strongest vodka we can find, ours would probably end up 10 per cent lower than that.
Anyway, I have digressed. Back to cakes and pudding. It’s always a two-day job as you have to steep the fruit and other ingredients overnight. With the pudding, everything gets put together and stirred up with rum, stout and barley wine. We make it in an old pottery hand-basin from my dad’s - the same one that my mum used to make the Christmas cake when I was a child. Before people had bathrooms, they would wash with a large bowl and jug of hot water and this bowl, white with a blue pattern, is one of those that survived. Most were thrown away or used for garden ornaments. It sits on the old wind-up gramophone in the hall all year, but every Christmas it’s pressed into service for the pudding and cake.
The pudding mix stands in the bowl, covered with a cloth, overnight and by next day, the fruit has swollen to twice the size. It then gets spooned into three bowls and each one needs steaming for eight hours. If we had a steamer with bigger compartments, we could perhaps get it all done at once, but the pudding does rise quite a lot during cooking and would push our steamer’s compartments apart. So making the puddings starts at noon on Saturday and finishes at 9pm on Monday (by the time the last one is done). Pudding making is a two-man job because of the tying of greaseproof paper and cloth over the top of the pudding - it’s one of those jobs where you really need three hands.
The dried fruit for the cake is steeped in brandy overnight. We have a big Tupperware container for this, so we can shake it every hour or so to make sure the brandy coats every currant, sultana and raisin. Mixing is hard work. Margaret does most of the vigorous stirring, while I drop ingredients into the bowl.
The cake tin has to be lined with greaseproof paper and we also have to tie brown paper around the outside to protect the cake from burning. Cooking takes three hours at 150 deg C and we’ve been having some concerns about the thermostat in the bottom oven not working correctly. I bought an oven thermometer from Ostlers in Whittlesey a couple of weeks ago and it’s shown that the oven is running cooler than its setting. On Saturday, I experimented with settings. If you set the oven to 150 deg, it never gets higher than 130, but if you set it to 180, it gets up to 160 and turning it down will allow it to maintain an even temperature of 140 at a 150 setting. We’re putting quite a bit of trust in the accuracy of a £5 oven thermometer (made in China, of course). Any way, we had the oven at 150 when the cake went in and we cooked it for three hours and 10 minutes at a steady 140. It seems fine. Last year, we thought it was a bit claggy inside (still very nice) and the joke was that Margaret had fed it too much brandy. It may have been that we never got the oven quite hot enough.
Once the cake is out, we brush the top with brandy and then wrap it up in foil while still hot. I think this helps keep it moist. It stays hot for hours afterwards. Margaret will drip brandy into it over the next few weeks and then it will be iced a week or so before Christmas. The puddings need to be steamed for another two hours before they are served. The Bramble Brandy and Sloe Gin will need to be filtered before bottling and that’s a job for the week before Christmas.
I’m playing no part in the making of the quince jelly (which is lovely with a hard cheese, such as Cheddar). My sister has a quince tree in her garden and it’s done really well this year. Quince is similar to pear, but has a very fragrant scent to the fruit. My sister has made quince jelly and eats it on toast like marmalade. It will be nice to have some ready for Christmas to go with the Cheddar and Stilton.
Quince jelly update: successful batch made on Monday. It's set very firm and has good taste (delicate pear flavour and very fragrant). Another batch is being made today in a loaf tin, so we can wrap in clingfilm and slice off as required (like they do in the shops).
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