A currant affair Plum pudding recipe indulges in old-fashioned passion for dried fruit By: Eva Wasney Posted: 6:00 AM CST Monday, Dec. 12, 2022

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 12/12/2022 (1244 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

For the first several decades of the Free Press’s existence, holiday recipes were decked with all manner of dried fruits and booze. If it wasn’t fruitcake, it was plum pudding.

Up until last week, my only reference point for the latter was seeing “steamed puds” mentioned in old-timey Christmas movies and stories. I had neither eaten nor made the stuff and was excited to give it a try.

Then I read the ingredients.

This iteration from 1893 promised to be “the genuine old English article,” billed as “a mixture strange of suet, currants, sweets.” Strange indeed.

Suet, as I would come to learn, is raw, hard fat found near the loin and kidneys of cows and other livestock. It’s essentially lard that hasn’t been rendered.

Suet, as I would also come to learn, is somewhat difficult to find and hard to look at. After calling around to a few local butcher shops I found some in stock at Miller’s Meats. The package of pale, frozen fat looked like brain tissue and chopping it into smaller bits didn’t exactly give me a warm, festive feeling.

The only thing keeping me going at this point was curiosity and the emphatic, flowery praise of plum pudding from the unnamed recipe writer.

“There may be a Christmas without holly and mistletoe, there may be a Christmas without stocking or tree, there are, alas, Christmases without presents, but there could not be a Christmas without its dinner, and of this the glory is the plum pudding,” reads the entry, which precedes a story about the popularity of miniature tabletop fir trees that season.

I pressed on, adding the suet to a mixture of breadcrumbs, dried fruits and citrus. Despite the name, the recipe includes zero plums, although plums may have been shorthand for dried fruits in general at one time (thanks, Google). At this point, things were at least smelling festive.

Before leaving the batter to sit overnight, I doused the whole thing in a half-dozen shots of brandy. The original recipe calls for three gills of brandy, an unfamiliar unit of measurement that (again, thanks Google) translates to roughly 375 ml (12 ounces) of liqueur. The accompanying recipe is a halved version; feel free to scale up if you’d like plenty of pud to share.

In 1893, it seems making plum pudding was family affair carried out on Christmas Eve so the cake could be steamed and ready for dinner the next day: “Tradition tells us that to have the true holiday flavour each one in the family, from the grand sire to his last descendant, must give at least one stir of the spoon during its concoction,” notes the recipe.

“There could not be a Christmas without its dinner, and of this the glory is the plum pudding.”

There are purpose-built ceramic pudding basins available online, but I wasn’t ready for that kind of commitment. Instead, I steamed the cake in an ovenproof glass bowl set atop a metal trivet in a large stockpot. It worked great; though I’d recommend consulting YouTube for some strategies to seal the vessel and make a handle out of kitchen twine.

I’d also recommend flipping the cake from its mould before it cools completely (I had to re-steam to get it out of the bowl).

The resulting pudding exceeded my admittedly low expectations. It’s dense and warm and sweet, with little trace of the off-putting suet. I forced some upon my colleague Jen Zoratti and here’s our taste test:

 

eva.wasney@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @evawasney

 

Plum Pudding, 1893

1/2 cup (125 ml) raisins
1/2 cup (125 ml) sultanas
2 cups (500 ml) currants
1/2 lb (227 g) beef suet, chopped fine
1/4 cup (60 ml) powdered sugar
1/4 cup (60 ml) flour
2 cups (500 ml) bread crumbs
1/2 whole nutmeg, grated
1/4 cup (60 ml) candied citron
Peel of 1/2 a lemon, chopped fine
12 blanched almonds, chopped
4 eggs, beaten
6 oz (180 ml) brandy
2 oz (60 ml) milk
Brandy Sauce
1/4 cup (60 ml) butter
1/2 cup (125 ml) plain flour
2 cups (500 ml) milk
4 tbsp (60 ml) brandy or dark rum
2/3 cup (165 ml) caster sugar

Combine raisins, sultanas, currants and beef suet in a large bowl. Stir in powdered sugar, flour and grated nutmeg. Add citron, fresh lemon peel and almonds. Pour eggs and brandy over mixture and stir well. Refrigerate overnight.

The next day, stir in milk prior to steaming. Transfer mixture to a generously buttered pudding basin or heatproof bowl.

Cut a round of parchment paper and foil slightly larger than the mouth of the bowl. Butter the paper and place on top of the pudding. Cover tightly with foil and secure with kitchen twine. Add a loop of twine overtop of the vessel to create a handle.

Place a steamer basket, rack or overturned plate in the base of a large stock pot and fill the bottom with water. Bring to a boil and place the pudding inside the pot. Steam covered on medium-low heat for three hours, refilling water regularly. Pudding is done when a toothpick comes out clean.

Remove from the steam and let cool slightly before turning flipping onto a serving plate.

To make brandy sauce, melt butter in a small saucepan and stir in flour. Cook for two minutes and stir in the milk. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly, and simmer gently for 10 minutes.

Stir in the brandy or rum and the sugar and serve with pudding.

Recipe has been edited for clarity. Brandy sauce originally published by BBC.