Christmas!!!!!!!!!!!

Can you feel my excitement already? November's nearly over. It's December tomorrow and that means one thing and one thing only. Christmas. And more importantly it means I don't have to stop pretending I'm not excited about it any more. (that's two things isn't it?) I've been getting overly and prematurely excited for weeks (the lists are made, the puddings done, obviously, and the craft gifts being dealt with!) but I've had to keep it under wraps for fear of getting things thrown at me. But now it's open season. And what better way to celebrate than with a Christmas blogpost. Puddings to be precise. I actually made mine about two weeks ago. They're maturing away nicely in the press. I didn't want to inflict the Christmas theme on anyone before now so I held off on the blog-post. I know how appreciative you'll all be for this!

I've spent years trying to recreate my Granny's perfect plum pudding. The recipe for which got lost somewhere along the way in the great move of 2000. A lot of good stuff got lost in that move. And seeing as she's no longer around I can't very well go asking her for it. So year after year I toil away trying to recreate it and it's never very successful. This year I fear will be no different. I used a recipe from the Irish Times which you can find here. It's got all the stuff you'd expect. However, it's missing one vital ingredient. It hasn't got any suet. I only remembered after I'd made it that Granny's definitely had suet. I know this because I remember how ten year old me was particularly grossed out by the concept and practicalities of cooking with suet. I loved being grossed out by things as a ten year old and so remember this vividly.

Anyway, here's a few photos of the process. I made one big and a few mini puddings. I also made a few mini christmas cakes. No one in my family really goes for the cake at christmas and there's always tons left over so this year I just made a small offering. They too are maturing away in the press. I'm very excited about these as I think I may have found Granny's christmas cake recipe. Although I couldn't swear to it. What's more I'm really excited about decorating them. I've bought far too many cake decorations for them already and it's turning into a bit of a habit. I think I may have a problem.

The mincemeat gets made tomorrow.

I need to get out more.

from this...

...to this...

...via a slightly less attractive this...

etc...

...you get the idea...

and....ready to be steamed

the finished product (not quite actually, it'll get another couple hours cooking on the day!)