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Who does not like pudding? I know I love pudding!

Christmas Pudding is one of my favorite desserts but I can only have it once a year, 🙁

Christmas Pudding is not your everyday pudding.

Christmas Pudding, traditionally, is to be eaten on December 25th, Christmas Day.

It originally started in Medieval England. Yep, that long ago. Christmas Pudding is also called, Plum Pudding. Guess what ? It has no plums!

Plum Pudding is composed of many dried fruits and held together by eggs and suet. What the heck is suet? It is beef or mutton fat. The pudding is sometimes moistened with molasses or treacle (a pale syrup known as golden syrup). What gives this pudding a distinct flavor is the cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cloves and other spices. What put this pudding over the top is the alcohol that helps keep the pudding aging for months, sometimes at least a year.

Look at this delicious dessert.

If only it can be eaten more than once per year.

I like to think of it as a special birthday cake. A cake for one special person. Who without his birth Christmas would not even be a word, or a celebration at all.

It is fitting that Christmas pudding be served once per year, and only on December 25th.

See since we give each other gifts for someone else’s birth, on December 25th, then it is only appropriate that we savor a special treat to remind us of a special birth in the time of history.

Here is a recipe for Christmas Pudding/Plum Pudding. Not an easy recipe. but it is only once a year!

1 pound seedless raisins
1 pound sultana raisins
1/2 pound currants
1 cup thinly sliced citron
1 cup chopped candied peel
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon mace
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 pound finely chopped suet – powdery fine
1 1/4 cups cognac

Pudding

1 1/4 pounds (approximately) fresh bread crumbs
1 cup scalded milk
1 cup sherry or port
12 eggs, well beaten
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
Cognac

preparation

Blend the fruits, citron, peel, spices and suet and place in a bowl or jar. Add 1/4 cup cognac, cover tightly and refrigerate for 4 days, adding 1/4 cup cognac each day.

Soak the bread crumbs in milk and sherry or port. Combine the well-beaten eggs and sugar. Blend with the fruit mixture. Add salt and mix thoroughly. Put the pudding in buttered bowls or tins, filling them about 2/3 full. Cover with foil and tie it firmly. Steam for 6-7 hours. Uncover and place in a 250°F. oven for 30 minutes. Add a dash of cognac to each pudding, cover with foil and keep in a cool place.

To use, steam again for 2-3 hours and unmold. Sprinkle with sugar; add heated cognac. Ignite and bring to the table. Serve with hard sauce or cognac sauce.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

recipe, Time of the Season, work

Sopapilla And The Christmas Office Party

December 23, 2013December 11, 2013

As promised, here is the quick and easy recipe for the delicious Sopapilla Kathy made and brought to the office Christmas Party this year.

Sopapilla (Cheesecake Bars)

2 – 8 oz. cans Pillsbury Refrigerated Crescent Dinner Rolls
2 – 8 oz pkg cream cheese (softened)
1 1/2 C sugar
1 tp Vanilla
1/2 C butter – melted
1 TB ground cinnamon
Honey

Unroll 1 can dough. Place in bottom of ungreased 13×9-inch (3-quart) glass baking dish. Stretch to cover bottom of dish, firmly pressing perforations to seal.

In medium bowl, beat cream cheese and 1 cup of the sugar with electric mixer on medium speed until smooth. Beat in vanilla. Spread over dough in baking dish.

Unroll second can of dough. Carefully place on top of cream cheese layer. Pinch seams together.

Pour melted butter evenly over top. Mix remaining 1/2 cup sugar with the cinnamon, and sprinkle evenly over butter.

Bake about 30 minutes or until center is set. Drizzle with honey. Cool slightly, about 20 minutes. Refrigerate for easy cutting. Cover and refrigerate any remaining bars.

Every year we have a “Dirty Santa” gift exchange for Christmas. $50.00 limit and we pick numbers. First person picks a gift from the gift table and opens it, the next person has the option of “stealing” that gift or going to the gift table. If your gift is “stolen”, you must go to the gift table and get a new one. There is a lot of stealing and laughing and most of all good cheer.

Merry Christmas!

arts/craft, Family, Time of the Season

Hand Traced Christmas Fun – Frosty, Santa, Rudolph & Clarissa

December 20, 2013December 11, 2013

It all starts with some construction paper, pencil and tracing of a hand. Then let your imagination go. The last time I babysat, the kids made Rudolph, well, Natalie made Clarissa (Rudolphs’ friend, she has a red bow) and Santa. Liam wanted to draw free style, so he made Frosty The Snowman.

So get out the crayons and have some Merry Fun!!

Family

Christmas School Brunch

December 19, 2013December 19, 2013

Last Saturday morning my daughter in law called me and asked me to come with her to Sophie’s Christmas school brunch. See my son was suppose to go but canceled out at the last minute,. He said he had too much to do at home. So I got to go and see Sophie’s school and all the kids that go to it.

The school had set up tables with all kinds of crafts that the children can do.

Sophie and Christian love arts and craft. Don’t tell them but for Christmas this year I ordered them Kiwi Crates. See, my grand daughter keeps reminding me that I promised her more Kiwi Crate.

I tell you they have memories like elephants when they want to remember.

It was a lot of fun to watch the grand kids try to make a Snowman, a Santa , and a of course a Christmas Angel.

They also had two elves helping them put their crafts together. Mommy and Me.

My daughter-in-law also got to enjoy the day with her friend, whose son goes to the same school as Sophie.

All was going fine until we got on line to see Santa. It was then that Christian decided he had had enough of being still. So Santa could wait while Christian ran in and out of the boys room.

Why he wanted to run in and out of the boys room is still a mystery to us.

Then it happened!

We got Christian to sit still on Santa’s lap. The one thing really good about Santa is he surely gets the boys and girls to behave themselves. Well at least while they are sitting on his Santa lap.