The Chapman Christmas Pudding

2019-12-06 09:48 by Mark Chapman

Christmas is only days away, so I decided to share with you the recipe for my family’s traditional Christmas Pudding. The recipe has been handed down from my English great-grandmother Florence Lucy Craven-Jackson, pictured here, to my grandmother Winnifred Chapman-Craven but might even go back further in my family’s ancestry. And my Nanny used to bring the pudding to Switzerland when she visited us for Christmas.

Every year in November, after my parents and I visited the Annual English Bazaar in Zurich, we prepare the traditional family Christmas Pudding. At the bazaar, we buy a few necessary last ingredients we cannot easily get in Switzerland because they do not sell them here – Suet, and Mixed Spice. The Mixed Spice is a very British mix containing Cinnamon (40%), Coriander Seed, Caraway, Nutmeg, Ginger, Cloves. I think one could make the mix instead of buying it ready-made – but it would be a break of our tradition. For a working-class family – which is my background –, the ingredients must have been quite costly at the time and, therefore, a real Christmas treat – and to this day, the pudding is special to my family and me – no Christmas without.

Apart from the dried fruits, groundnuts, and bread, there are some ingredients you would maybe not expect, like Guinness Draught and Jamaican Rum. Unlike other recipes, ours is not so sticky and sweet – the pudding is slightly tangy and rich with warm fruity flavours.

While preparing the pudding, we drop a small silver coin – a Threepence piece – into the pudding mixture before cooking. Whoever gets the coin in his/her piece of the pudding on Christmas Day can make a secret wish – and it shall become true.

It doesn’t take much time to make the mix, but the pudding requires a very long cooking time in a water-filled saucepan – at least 8 hours of gentle simmering. You cook it twice. The first time, soon after mixing the ingredients, it is cooked for 6 hours. The second time for 2 hours on the day it is to be served. The pudding can be made weeks in advance and be kept covered in the pudding basin until Christmas Day.