Of Christmas Puddings and Apple Pie

Making Christmas Pudding is my project every year. As much as I am part of Katy's Kitchen and help the business in many ways, the making of the Christmas Pudding is one aspect of the business that is absolutely mine.

I wrote about it last year and here I am again, talking about Christmas Pudding.

This time it was a melancholy experience and I didn't enjoy it one bit. We lost K's dad just a couple of weeks ago, in fact it is exactly two weeks today.

He was one of my biggest fans as far as my cooking went. He's the Dad I didn't have and he filled up many holes in my heart. He was so proud of me and whatever I churned out of my kitchen - always looking forward to what I would make next, happily asking me to make this or that again, and steadfastly refusing to eat chocolate mousse anywhere else because "no one makes it like Rhea".

My mom in law had many cook books and once in a way I would borrow one and try out something new. One day I made an apple pie - something that's very mundane to people in the west but for us it is something exotic and different - or at least it was when I tried it roughly 10 years ago. I don't know how good it really was but Daddy said it was the best he'd ever had - even better than the ones he'd had on his innumerable travels abroad.

Once I took over the making of the yearly Christmas puddings he would eagerly wait for his pudding. We'd wait till New Year's Day and the whole family would gather to celebrate Katy's birthday and the New Year with the pudding. It would be duly steamed for an hour and then brought to the table with the flambéed Brandy burning on it steadily, making it look spectacular. He always maintained that the pudding tasted just as good as when Katy was in charge. This time I didn't make one for the family.

Is it any wonder that I have a new hole in my heart? Now I have two Dads to miss...

25 December 2013
Marathon Bloggers

Katy Dalal's Christmas Pudding with Brandy Butter

Photo credit - Aaron Santos

Katy Dalal, my mom in law, started a catering business from home many years ago. As she tried out new dishes and cuisines her popularity grew as did her skills and knowledge in the kitchen. One of her biggest successes has been the Christmas Pudding with Brandy Butter.

I started helping her with the making after K and I were married and I always found it to be one the most fun things to do with her. I like to believe it also made her happy to see me pitching in.

Piles of raisins, black currants, dried prunes and a host of other, then unfamiliar, ingredients would be cleaned  and then put in a huge plastic barrel. Then endless bottles of rum and brandy would be poured in, and K would also fling in the leftovers from random opened bottles of wine and other suitable liquor that was handy. In a week the alcohol would have to be topped up as the shrivelled fruit would be plump with the booze and would have risen way above the alcohol in the barrel. The barrel would be sealed up and forgotten till a week before Christmas.

Large quantities of juicy red winter carrots have to be grated. Along with this a mountain of apples are grated.

Fresh bread crumbs, white flour, demerara sugar, molasses, candied ginger, ground almonds, butter, freshly powdered nutmeg, cinnamon and cardamom, and eggs are all mixed in a huge vat. The soaking fruit is drained and then added to the mix.

The tins are buttered and lined with butter paper. Then the pudding mix is filled in, topped with a circlet of butter paper and then sealed either with a lid or with aluminium foil. The larger pudding moulds come with a lid, the smaller ones don't.

Steam the puddings for 4 hours and they are ready to be despatched. We recommend that the puddings be steamed once again for an hour before serving.

The brandy butter is a delicious accompaniment to this pudding. Blend regular salted butter with powdered sugar and a generous dash of brandy. Chill the butter till it is nice and hard.

Ma in Law would serve the pudding with a dash of drama. She would light half a cup of brandy and pour it over the pudding. We would put off the lights of course!

I have taken over the mantle of Christmas Pudding maker now. And I look forward to Christmas every year when we do a special Christmas menu and these traditional Christmas Puddings.

Photo credit - Ketan Pandit

Marathon Bloggers Day 13