Christmas puddings are often dried out on hooks for weeks prior to serving in order to enhance the flavour. This pudding has been prepared with a traditional cloth rather than a basin.

Christmas pudding is the dessert traditionally served on Christmas day, although still available and popular throughout the year in Britain. It has its origins in England, and is sometimes known as plum pudding, though this can also refer to other kinds of boiled pudding involving a lot of dried fruit. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (1728x2304, 3468 KB) Summary A Christmas pudding hanging on a hook to dry, photographed by DONeil. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (1728x2304, 3468 KB) Summary A Christmas pudding hanging on a hook to dry, photographed by DONeil. ... Christmas is an annual holiday that marks the birth of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. ... Motto: (French for God and my right) Anthem: God Save the King/Queen Capital London (de facto) Largest city London Official language(s) English (de facto) Unification    - by Athelstan AD 927  Area    - Total 130,395 km² (1st in UK)   50,346 sq mi  Population    - 2006 est. ...

Basics

Many households have their own recipe for Christmas pudding, often handed down the family. Essentially it brings together what traditionally were expensive or luxurious ingredients - notably the sweet spices that are so important in developing its distinctive rich aroma.

Christmas pudding is a steamed pudding, heavy with dried fruit and nuts, and usually made with suet. It is very dark in appearance - effectively black - as a result of the dark sugars and black treacle in most recipes. The mixture can be moistened with the juice of citrus fruits, brandy and other alcohol (some recipes call for dark beers such as mild, stout or porter). In Peru, some families use Pisco. Pudding can be prepared with a large variety of toppings such as fresh fruit and whipped cream Christmas pudding Dessert pudding In the British Isles, and some Commonwealth countries, pudding is the common name for dessert. ... Dried fruit is fruit that has been dried, either naturally or through use of a machine, such as a dehydrator. ... Hazelnuts from the Common Hazel Chestnut Walnuts A nut can be both a seed and a fruit. ... Suet is raw beef or mutton fat, especially that found around the loins and kidneys. ... Brandy pot stills at the Van Ryn Brandy Cellar near Stellenbosch, South Africa. ... A glass of beer and different beer bottles. ... Mild Ale is one of the oldest styles of beer from England, and originally meant a young or immature ale. ... A pint of stout Stout is a dark beer made using roasted malts or roast barley. ... Żywiec Porter Porter is a style of beer in the ale family which has a dark colour. ... Some bottles of Peruvian Pisco Some bottles of Chilean Pisco Pisco (from Quechua: pisqu, little bird) is a liquor distilled from grapes (a brandy) made in wine-producing regions of Peru. ...

Traditionally, Christmas puddings were boiled in a pudding cloth, and they are often represented as round, but at least since the beginning of the twentieth century they have usually been prepared in basins. (19th century - 20th century - 21st century - more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s The 20th century lasted from 1901 to 2000 in the Gregorian calendar (often from (1900 to 1999 in common usage). ...

To serve, the pudding is reheated by steaming once more, and dressed with warm brandy which is set alight. A sprig of holly tops the pudding off.

The wish and other traditions

Traditionally, every member of the household stirs the pudding, while making a wish. Puddings are often flamed with brandy before serving This Christmas pudding is decorated with skimmia rather than holly.

Traditionally puddings were made on or immediately after the Sunday "next before Advent", i.e. four to five weeks before Christmas. The Collect for that Sunday in the Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England, as it was used from the sixteenth century (and still is in traditional churches), reads: Image File history File linksMetadata Stirring_christmas_pudding. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Stirring_christmas_pudding. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (2048x1536, 721 KB) Summary Christmas pudding being flamed with brandy. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (2048x1536, 721 KB) Summary Christmas pudding being flamed with brandy. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Christmas_pudding. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Christmas_pudding. ... Species See text Skimmia is a genus of four species of evergreen shrubs and small trees in the Rue family, Rutaceae, all native to warm temperate regions of Asia. ... Species Ilex ambigua - Sand Holly Ilex amelanchier - Swamp Holly Ilex aquifolium - European Holly Ilex bioritsensis Ilex buergeri Ilex canariensis - Small-leaved Holly Ilex cassine - Dahoon Holly Ilex centrochinensis Ilex ciliospinosa Ilex colchica Ilex collina Ilex corallina Ilex coriacea Ilex cornuta - Chinese Holly Ilex crenata - Japanese Holly Ilex cyrtura Ilex decidua... Advent (from the Latin Adventus, implicitly coupled with Redemptoris, the coming of the Saviour) is a holy season of the Christian church, the period of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of the Nativity of Christ, also known as the season of Christmas. ... In Christian liturgy, a collect is both a liturgical action and a short, general prayer. ... For the novel by Joan Didion, see A Book of Common Prayer. ... The Church of England is the officially established Christian church[1] in England, and acts as the mother and senior branch of the worldwide Anglican Communion, as well as a founding member of the Porvoo Communion. ...

"Stir up, we beseech thee, O Lord, the wills of thy faithful people; that they, plenteously bringing forth the fruit of good works, may by thee be plenteously rewarded; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen"

The day became known as "Stir-up Sunday". Traditionally everyone in the household, or at least every child, gave the mixture a stir, and made a wish while doing so. Stir-up Sunday is an informal term in the Anglican Church for the last Sunday before the season of Advent. ...

It was common practice to include small silver coins in the pudding mixture, which could be kept by the person whose serving included them. The usual choice was a silver 3d piece, or a sixpence. The coin was believed to bring wealth in the coming year. However this practice fell away once real silver coins were not available, as it was believed that alloy coins would taint the pudding. The practice has largely stopped for reasons of safety and liability. The threepence, pronounced thruppence, was a denomination of currency, used by various jurisdictions in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, until decimalisation of the pound sterling and Irish pound. ... The scilling or scylling (which possibly comes from the Teutonic root skil meaning to divide) was used in Anglo-Saxon times as money of account, even though no coins of that denomination existed. ... General Name, Symbol, Number silver, Ag, 47 Chemical series transition metals Group, Period, Block 11, 5, d Appearance lustrous white metal Atomic mass 107. ...

Other tokens are also known to have been included, such as a tiny wishbone (to bring good luck), a silver thimble (for thrift), or an anchor (to symbolise safe harbour).

Once turned out of its basin, the Christmas pudding is traditionally decorated with a spray of holly, and it may be doused in brandy, flamed (or 'fired'), and brought to the table ceremoniously - where it may be greeted with a round of applause. In some houses the lights are turned out as the pudding is brought in amid a halo of purple brandy flames (this is related to the Christmas tradition of snap-dragons). It can be eaten with hard sauce, brandy butter, rum butter, cream, lemon cream, or custard and is often sprinkled with caster sugar (the fall of the sugar on triangular slices resembling the fall of snow on a pitched roof, or snowy mountain tops). Brandy pot stills at the Van Ryn Brandy Cellar near Stellenbosch, South Africa. ... Fanciful image of a dragon playing Snap-dragon, from Robert Chambers Book of Days (1879) Snap-dragon (also known as Flap-dragon, Snapdragon, or Flapdragon) was an English parlour game popular from about the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries. ... Hard sauce is a cold dessert sauce made by creaming or beating butter and sugar with rum, brandy, whiskey, vanilla or other flavoring. ... Brandy Butter is a sweet, rich sauce, usually consumed with traditional desserts during the Christmas and New Year period in the UK. Description Brandy Butter is a blend of soft dark brown sugar, unsalted butter and brandy. ... Butter is commonly sold in sticks (pictured) or blocks, and frequently served with the use of a butter knife. ... Cream is a dairy product that is composed of the higher-fat layer skimmed from the top of raw milk before homogenization. ... Custard is a range of preparations based on milk and eggs, thickened with heat. ... This article deals with sugar as food and as an important, widely traded commodity; the word also has other uses; see Sugar (disambiguation) A sugar is a form of carbohydrate; the most commonly used sugar is a white crystalline solid, sucrose; used to alter the flavor and properties (mouthfeel, perservation...

After Christmas

Christmas puddings have very good keeping properties and many families keep one back from Christmas to be eaten at another celebration later in the year, often at Easter. Some take the practice so far as to make each year's pudding the previous Christmas. Others claim that this impairs the flavour, but admit that a well-made pudding will keep at least adequately for a year. This article is about the Christian festival. ...

Christmas puddings can be bought ready made and cooked, but unless they come from a luxury shop these are likely to be a poor substitute for a home-cooked pudding. Nowadays, many people find the Christmas pudding too rich and heavy.

See also

• List of Christmas dishes
• Mincemeat, another common Christmas food incorporating suet
• Recipe from Sussex can be found at the Wikimedia Cookbook.
• Plum Pudding Model
• Touch Pieces More details of coins being added

This page is a list of Christmas dishes as eaten around the world. ... Mincemeat was originally a conglomeration of bits of meat, dried fruit and spices, created as an alternative to smoking or drying for preservation. ... Suet is raw beef or mutton fat, especially that found around the loins and kidneys. ... Sussex is a historic county in South East England corresponding roughly in area to the ancient Kingdom of Sussex. ... A schematic representation of the plum pudding model of the atom. ... A number of coins and medalets have attracted superstitious beliefs, such as those with holes in them or those with particular designs. ...

References