3 Traditional Sauces for Christmas Pudding (2024)

FAQs

What is traditionally served with Christmas pudding? ›

The traditional accompaniment to the Christmas pudding was a sweet custard or a hard sauce (nowadays known as brandy butter). It was customary to hide a number of small trinkets in the mixture, a bit like the twelfth night cake.

Although the pud is undoubtedly the star, all that rich, fruity filling needs a dollop of something creamy and cool to serve alongside. Pour over double cream, spoon on thick clotted cream or serve with a scoop of vanilla ice cream for a quick win, or whip up your own boozy brandy butter for ultimate indulgence.

The is the all-time classic sauce to slather over the traditional Christmas Pudding is a brandy sauce. A pudding already will have either brandy or rum in it depending on your taste, so a splash added to a lovely white sauce becomes a perfect partner.

For a long time it's been common practice to include silver Christmas pudding coins, charms or tokens into Christmas pudding. Finding a Christmas coin in your slice of pudding is believed to bring good luck and especially wealth in the coming year.

A Touch of Silver

You'll no doubt be familiar with the act of adding silver coins into Christmas pudding. This tradition came from the notion that whoever finds the coin in their pudding serve can keep the coin, AND has the added bonus of “good luck” for the new year ahead.

Christmas pudding is traditionally soaked with alcohol, preferably brandy, for flavour maturation. However, many people prefer rum and whisky spirit with high alcohol content.

Put the cornflour in a small bowl and whisk in 3tbsp of the milk. Pour the remaining milk into a pan and add the sugar and cornflour mixture. Bring to the boil, whisking constantly, and heat until sauce thickens. Take off heat; stir in vanilla seeds, brandy and cream.

Use gluten-free white flour and breadcrumbs made from gluten-free bread, and replace the stout and barley wine with the same amount of sherry.

Superstitions say that Christmas pudding must be prepared with 13 ingredients, which are said to represent Jesus and his twelve disciples. It is also said that the mixture should be stirred in turn from east to west, by each family member, to honour the disciples' journey.

What are the trinkets in Christmas pudding? ›

A few different variations of these charm sets existed, but the following were commonly added to Christmas pudding mixtures: a coin to represent wealth in the coming year, a wishbone for good luck, a silver thimble for thrift or spinsterdom, a button for an enduring bachelor and an anchor for safe harbour.

Christmas Pudding (also known as plum pudding or figgy pudding) is a dish as famous as it is misunderstood.

In America, Christmas Pudding (also known as plum pudding or figgy pudding) is a dish as famous as it is misunderstood.

Plum duff, one of the fortifying puddings of Old England, is essentially the same in its beginnings as plum pudding, before it went up-market to become Christmas pudding—in other words a plain boiled suet pudding enlivened with a more or less generous addition of raisins or currants (duff represents a former northern ...

Naturally there will be exceptions, but most people in the U.S. do not serve Christmas pudding. Instead we are likely to eat other desserts, often pies ranging from apple or pumpkin to pecan or Mincemeat.

It was believed it would bring good luck. In 1644 the Puritans tried to ban the pudding as they said it was 'sinfully rich' and 'unfit for God-fearing people'! In 1714 King George reestablished the pudding and it was enjoyed as a dessert for Christmas.