An English Tradition
As a child, I eagerly looked forward to all holidays—Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentine's Day, Washington's Birthday—and I adorned my playhouse accordingly. Bats swooped through string cobwebs, shamrocks graced the windows, a flag waved from its holder, and colored paper turkeys sat proudly on my card table in season. These days, though, I reserve that decorating energy for the Christmas/Solstice holiday. And at our house, that celebration has a distinctly English feel, not only because of my English husband but because of the heritage of my Canadian-English forbears and my own fascination with Britain.
Probably the most truly "English" of our holiday celebrations, aside from Christmas crackers, involves creating and enjoying the traditional flaming plum pudding. A co-worker was aghast a few months ago when I described how I make the pudding, put it in the lidded mold, steam it for about seven hours, and then store it for months, taking it out every so often to pour brandy and/or rum over it. I have to admit, until I married Justin, I too thought this was weird. How could you keep something for months like this? But in truth the constant re-application of alcohol both flavours and preserves the dense, fruity "pudding", which most resembles a round heavy fruitcake with a hole through the middle. A second steaming on the day of eating, for two or three hours, gives it the final cooking. You can supposedly also bake or "steam" these in the oven, but steaming in a pot on the stovetop frees up the oven for the goose, turkey, roast beef, or baked vegetarian offerings.
Although it can be eaten at a 1 p.m. dinner, this kind of flaming pudding is most spectacular in the dark hours of the night. When the second steaming has gone on for an hour or two during and after dinner, and the company now feels it could wedge in "just a little something", you slip into the kitchen and tip it out of its mold onto a plate. Top it with a washed sprig of holly (for Christmas Eve/Christmas Day only, I've been told; no holly for New Year's or other days or you'll have bad luck), and heat about a quarter cup of brandy in a little saucepan. When the brandy is hot but not boiling, you pour it over the pudding and quickly light it with a match. Don't worry! You won't be burned by the gorgeous blue flames, even if you get them on your hands or arms.
Once you've lit the brandy and the flames are going, walk swiftly into the darkened room where the awed and appreciative company waits for the pudding. Speed is of the essence, because the flames soon die down, leaving only the wonderful dark pudding and a slightly charred sprig of holly behind.
I'm not at liberty to divulge Justin's family recipe for Christmas Pudding, which dates back to the 1700s, but I'll pass on a few web sites with decent-looking recipes. A search on Epicurious brings up Superb English Plum Pudding, which is much like what I actually make. Mrs. Mackie's recipe looks interesting, and Victoriana.com has some Victorian recipes from Godey's Lady's Book. You'll notice that many of these recipes call for suet. That's what I use, since for us this is a once-a-year treat. But in Nancy Silverton's Desserts (New York, Harper & Row, 1986) you can find a recipe for Christmas Pudding that uses butter. Her secret? "Melt the butter and vanilla bean over high heat...until the bubbles subside and the butter is dark brown and smoking, and gives off a nutty aroma."
We eat brandy butter on our Christmas Pudding, but others like hard sauce. Brandy butter is easy - you start with butter, cream in powdered sugar, and add brandy bit by bit til the taste and texture are as you like them. Ever-helpful Epicurious has a recipe for brandy butter to accompany a Caribbean Christmas Pudding. The leftovers are good cold or wrapped in foil and re-steamed briefly.
There's a good short article about the history of steamed puddings, with photos of some pudding molds, at Hearth to Hearth in the January 2002 issue of the Journal of Antiques and Collectibles. Modern day pudding molds look very similar to the molds pictured in the article, and are usually available at the more up-scale kitchen stores or more cheaply at the True Value hardware store on Willamette in Eugene.