Easy Steamed Pudding

There are two things one needs to make steamed pudding - pudding basin, and pot large enough to boil it in.  (Three, if you count the TIME you need to steam the pudding.)

Devotees of steamed puddings might regard this as heresy, but I cut the process short by having a pudding basin which gets heat to the centre of the pudding straight away ...

and a pressure cooker....

...the combined effect of which is to cut steaming time to less than half the recipe time.

Whatever your choice of equipment, here is the easiest steamed pudding recipe I know.  This came from Mum and was possibly the ONLY steamed pudding recipe she used.  You can very easily make you own variations on it.  You make it in the basin you intend to steam the pudding in, and it doesn't seem to be a problem that the basin wasn't greased (because you were using it as a mixing bowl).

Hints on the recipe below:
- for tablespoon read "one of those large spoons that often accompany a cutlery set and are used for serving". 
- Heaped in this case means as much flour as you can get on the spoon. 
- Use any jam you like.  Mum always used raspberry.  Below I used Oregon Grape jam.  It is very black stuff and the uncooked pudding mix becomes a particularly unappetizing shade of grey - which is why there are no pictures of the uncooked pudding mix. (Photo of cooked pudding to follow.)

Easy Steamed Pudding.

Melt together 1 tablespoon each of butter, sugar, and jam
Add 3 heaped TB flour,

1/2 tsp soda dissolved in 1/2 cup milk, and
a handful of dried fruit

Cover and steam 1 and half hours (or 40 minutes in a pressure cooker)

Easy Christmas Cake

I have already posted this recipe along with a slightly more complicated one near the start of this blog.

I made my Christmas cake a bit late this year a couple of weeks ago so I went for the easy recipe. 

Now we are 'feeding' it - a shot glass of brandy every couple of weeks.  It doesn't need it. and never got this treatment when my Mum made it, but then we don't have any youngsters around our Christmas table.
 Easy Christmas Cake


Put 3 lb mixed dried fruit in a pot with

8 oz brown sugar,
8 oz butter,
1 Tb glycerine and
1 cup water.
Boil 10 minutes and leave to cool.

Separate 4 eggs and beat the white and yolk separately. Add the beaten egg components time about with

1 lb flour
1 tsp Baking Soda
2 tsp pMixed Spice

Bake in a lined 9" deep tin in a slow oven (about 130C) for 3.5 hours

 

Post on icing it coming soon.

Cold Tea Fruit Punch

Wrong time of year I know but you might want a no-alcohol punch recipe for the Xmas party.  I needed one for a very large birthday party a couple of years ago and after hours of careful research found and adapted up with this 'cold tea' punch.  The recipe (like so many I adapt) was lost immediately after but I work on the assumption that it shouldn't be beyond the wit of  man  this woman to do again what she has managed to do once already.

Fortunately for those who commented that they had enjoyed that particular combination of flavours, I did eventually find the advertising postcard on which I had written the shopping list for ingredients. So here goes:

Cold Tea Fruit Punch

2.5 litres cold tea & 450 grams sugar  (I added a mint tea teabag to the brew)
2.5 litres grapefruit juice
1 litre pineapple juice
1 litre orange juice
4.5 litres ginger ale
Juice of 12 lemons

Add fruit, mint leaves, ice etc ..... serve in a very large bowl.

In imperial measurements it is something like 1/2 gallon of tea, 1 lb sugar, 1/2 gallon of grapefruit juice, 1/4 gallon each of pineapple and orange juice, 1 gallon of ginger ale and juice of 12 lemons.