Stir Up Sunday

MSE_James

This Sunday (26 November) is 'Stir Up Sunday' - traditionally a day to make your Christmas pud and/or cake.

Will you be stirring your Christmas pudding this weekend (or perhaps you've done it already)?

In this thread from 2012 several Forumites shared their family recipes, and there's also a 2004 thread with another pudding recipe handed down through the generations.

Here's a thread from 2007 with more on Stir Up Sunday:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/605840/its-stir-up-sunday

And this 2008 thread has more Christmas pudding talk:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5921392/christmas-pudding

What are you top tips for the perfect pudding? 

We'd love to see photos of your pudding preparations too. 

(For me brandy butter is the essential accompaniment to Christmas pudding - my grandmother used to make her own and bring it to our family Christmas gatherings. This year my wife and I have been put in charge of the brandy butter.)

-taff

I made two last year so the other one is ready for this year. I used a combination of Delia and Nigela recipes with added nuts because i like them. And my prefered accompaniement is rum or brandy sauce, basically a white sauce with butter and flour, added sugar and alcohol.

As you can see, I used the recipe before I put it in the sleeve..

CapricornLass

Auntie Delia's recipe, every single time. Partly because it is so much better than commercial ones, and partly because I can adapt it for my food allergies (gluten, nuts and coconut), so is therefore safe for me to eat.

I make Rum Sauce to go with it.  Basically, as Taff says, a white sauce with flour, butter, milk, sugar, cream and rum.

maryb

Delia’s recipe is virtually identical to the one in the cookbook that came with my old Prestige pressure cooker.  That little book also tells you how to scale it up or down.  I always do mine in the pressure cooker and it always turns out beautifully 

I prepare it on Stir Up Sunday but cook it next day after all the flavors have had time to develop 

Rosa_Damascena

It is indeed stir-up Sunday for me! 

Dried fruit has been soaking in a spiced rum and whiskey mixture for the past fortnight and there is a LOT of it - maybe 4kg? - with the intention of baking a couple of gigantic Christmas cakes this Sunday. I think I am going to need more than 12 eggs first though!

gwynlas

I have always made sweet white sauce with cornflour milk and sugar before adding brandy or rum.

sarah1972

Made mine last week, feeding it weekly with brandy. 

Rosa_Damascena

sarah1972 said:

Made mine last week, feeding it weekly with brandy. 

That looks good! How many hours in the oven? And did you use any strips around it to stop the outer edge from over-baking?

sarah1972

Rosa_Damascena said:

sarah1972 said:

Made mine last week, feeding it weekly with brandy. 

That looks good! How many hours in the oven? And did you use any strips around it to stop the outer edge from over-baking?

Thank you 🙏
Bottom left pic is with triple folded baking parchment strips to stop over bake. From memory it was 2 hours 15 mins or so. I was checking with a metal skewer after the 1 hour 50 point x

Rosa_Damascena

Just checked on my fruit, looking plump and tasting de-lish! I haven't made Christmas cake for the last 3 years so am looking forward to this! 

Eta: just looking at your recipe @-taff : I used to put loads of nuts in mine but I found that the cake didn't keep for as long with them. If I do use them on this occasion it will be almonds on top to give a Dundee-cake look. I don't marzipan and ice them as I personally think such decoration actually detracts from the taste of the cake.

-taff

That's not the cake recipe, that's the christmas pudding recipe. I use the recipe that was in the older [80's] version of the Readers Digest The Cookery Year book, which is completely different to the more modern ones with some tweaks in that too [ orange zest and juice instead of a lemon, half the amount of currants one and half times the amount of sultanas and also nuts in that too -  it was a recipe my father always used]. I made six this year, mine lasts for at least six months which is good enough for me, my cousin told me she'd had the last of hers last week, so it lasted over a year.

I'm only marzipaning one cake for my sister because she likes it. Everyone else will get it as is. I did used to put almonds on top like a dundee cake but I found I spent time picking them off instead of leaving them