Stir Up Sunday

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

This is the Anglican collect for the 25th Sunday after Trinity - more commonly known as Stir up Sunday and the traditional weekend for making Christmas pudding.   Everyone seems to have a different trigger for the start of Christmas.  For retailers it seems to be immediately after the August Bank Holiday (whereas for Mr Vitty it's about 4pm on Christmas Eve).  

 

Wet and Dry Ingredients

For me Christmas really begins with the making of christmas pudding.  This year I did actually make it on the traditional weekend.  The weather was predicted to be awful, (cold, wet, windy) - so ideal for putting on soppy films, getting the fire going and steaming a pudding for eight hours.  But this not only marks the start of Christmas but a calorie laden baking and cooking extravaganza that includes stollen, borrochuelos, hot water crust pastry pork pie, and of course Christmas cake and mince pies.

The Anglican prayer is exhorting us to do good works to benefit those around us and be rewarded in heaven.  The reward for a day of pudding making will be on Christmas Day when a blue flamed pudding is eaten with rum sauce and shared with family (if they're lucky).

Delia's mix

The recipe I use for my Christmas pudding is Delia's. It's really easy, tastes great and keeps really well.  In recent years I've used plastic pudding basins with lids as they're much easier than faffing about with foil, paper and string.  This is also the time of year my steamer comes into its own.  It makes the steaming really easy, just change the water every hour and let it do its thing.

Ready to steam

8 hours later