Eating Christmas in England

We spent Christmas with my parents in England while the country was wearily digging out from the tail end of a two-month snow emergency.





Though things were more or less back to normal, we were happy to embrace snowboundness and stay home, where there was a cozy fire and copious quantities of Christmas foodstuffs.

On Christmas Eve, The Boy and I made the traditional Puerto Rican dinner, more or less: roast pork (pernil), here in its "before" state:



and the coconut custard tembleque for dessert. We used this easy tembleque recipe, which was made more entertaining by the use of my mom's magic stirring gadget:



Christmas lunch, of course: roast beef, roast potatoes done in goose fat, Yorkshire puddings ditto, roast parsnips and carrots, Brussels sprouts and lovely cauliflower cheese.



And the very necessary Christmas pudding with custard:



Christmas pudding is one of my favorite things, possibly because I know there's only one serving a year. I love the sticky-sweetness of the fruit and the extra-hot custard. Actually, I'd still love it if I could eat it all year round.

The family came over on Boxing Day. We made sandwiches and chocolate cake, benne wafers and key lime pie. And there were quiches and cheeses and prosciutto and dates. And people brought more chocolate cake, and carrot cake, and my aunt's famous corned beef pie:



My dad did a ham, which means not pre-brined, pre-flavored meat, but raw fresh pork leg. This is also one of my favorite Christmas things.



So are mince pies, here served warm with Greek yogurt (okay, not traditional Christmas fare, but it works):



And not particularly related to Christmas, but certainly connected to fabulous pork products, black pudding.



Also, my mom makes an amazing fruited tea loaf.



And none of this includes our trip to York. Mayhap we found pork and pastries and cheese there too, hmmm?

Ten foods that mean Christmas

10) Snowballs
When I was younger, they came in individual 6oz bottles. Now you have to make your own.

9) Mince pies
I should love mince pies more, but they're generally too sweet, which means you can't have more than one, especially if it's topped with whipped cream, in which case what's the point of Christmas, anyway?

8) Turkish Delight
Blah, blah, Narnia, White Witch, blah. Whatevs. For me, Turkish Delight came in two varieties: the Fry's version, which was the everyday candy bar; and the special stuff we had at Christmas. Sultan's. Everything about it was exotic: the six-sided box, the clouds of powdered sugar, the perfect cubes of rose-petal-flavored jelly.



Even its consumption seemed special; this wasn't some cheap candy you could chow down. There was a ritual: carefully pull back the wax paper, pick up a cube between thumb and forefinger (pinky extended), and gently tap off the excess sugar. And then chow down.

7) Ham sandwiches
Very particular to my mom's side of the family, this one. Every Boxing Day, we'd gather at my Aunty Molly's house to catch up and get slightly tipsy and watch the Big Movie Event (whichever blockbuster had come out two years earlier) on TV. And while the dining room table was heavy with food, I had a particular soft spot for the sandwiches: soft white bread, thickly spread butter and slices of salty, thin-sliced baked ham. To this day, a good ham sandwich takes me back to watching Star Wars with my cousins and drinking Blue Lagoons until I had Smurf lips.

6) Arroz con gandules
Our first Christmas together, The Boy and I lived in a tiny apartment with an even tinier kitchen. Despite the Russian roulette-like quality of the stove, he made pasteles (Goya frozen, but still), plantains, and rice and pigeon peas. Even if I weren't crazy for him, I'd still have eaten the whole thing. Arroz con gandules always reminds me of that Christmas. Our tree was a string of lights around a coatrack, but heat was included in the rent and it was warm enough that we didn't have to wear very much ...

5) Egg nog
In my lame attempts to be healthier, I've tried suggesting to The Boy that we replace the traditional full-fat Nog with a sugar-free soy-milk variety. He threatens to have me certified. Get it now before the stupid government takes it away.

4) Dominosteine
Discovered on a trip to Berlin in January 1993, these chocolate-covered squares contain layers of gingerbread, apricot jelly and marzipan. Cardullo's usually stocks them over Christmas. They are necessary. That is all.

3) Stollen
A more recent addition to the list, but no less lovely. I'm not sure when The Boy and I made Stollen part of our complete Christmas breakfast, but now it is. We usually pick up a loaf imported from Germany, but in the past I have successfully made it from scratch. Not this year, though: my attempts at baking (two with homemade marzipan, two without) were foiled by my oven's crazy thermostat and ended with four loaves burned black on the bottom. That which I could salvage will make insanely rich bread pudding. And I'll buy someone else's loaf for Christmas.



2) Christmas pudding
This almost made it to first place—as edible symbols of Christmas go, it's certainly one of my favorites—were it not for the time it takes to cook. Traditionally, Christmas pudding comes in a bowl, which you place in a pan of water and boil for hours (literally, if you make your pudding from scratch). These days, of course, it's expected that you'll nuke it in the microwave; the Walker's pudding we're having doesn't even include instructions for boiling.

1) Christmas cake
Naturally. And as I've mentioned before, I'm not talking about the American abomination that pretends to be fruitcake. I mean a dark, buttery, booze-soaked slab of beauty, fragrant and moist, topped with marzipan and Royal icing.



And if you're still not hungry, please to check out this 2006 ad for venerable British store Marks and Spencers' Christmas goodies:

It's official: Santa hates us

He hates us and everyone we hold dear.

What cause do I have for making such an outrageous claim? Oh, I don't know; maybe it was the fact that we tracked his movements on Christmas Eve, thanks to NORAD's high-tech spy satellites (the same ones used "in providing warning of possible missile launches aimed at North America").

You see us when we're sleeping, Santa. But we know when you're slacking off.

By the time we checked in with NORAD's Santa-tracking operations center, around 7pm on Monday night, he'd already finished throwing presents down the chimneys of most of Europe and was wandering around South America. And then, for no apparent reason, he shot up to deploy gifts over northeast Canada. And then zipped back down to Argentina.

Not exactly efficient, for sure.

He spent a serious amount of time in Cuba--that is to say, in Guantanamo. And then he started working his way up the southern US states, from Florida to Tennessee.

At which point we gave up and had some nog.

We checked in with NORAD later. Goodness! Santa had been everywhere!



Well ... not quite everywhere.

See, he hadn't been to England, apart from a cursory flyover of London.



And he hadn't been to Puerto Rico at all, apparently oblivious to the call of sweet, sweet lechón.



I suspect he assumed we'd be on one of those islands, as we've spent Christmas in one place or the other for the past few years.

In which case, he'd have no trouble visiting Boston. Right? Right??



Worcester? WOOSTAH? (Raises fist) Saaanttaaaaa!!!

What we done fer Christmas

1) Dinner on Christmas Eve: The Boy brought together Puerto Rican and English influences with pork tenderloin massaged with garlic and oregano, roasted alongside brussels sprouts, carrots, fennel, golden beets and beet greens with garlic, served with a fresh redcurrant sauce, accompanied by a fruity young Australian pinot noir.

Before:



After:



2) Breakfast on Christmas Day: somehow it has become tradition that we always have Stollen (has to be the kind with marzipan in the middle). So we did.



3) Frenzy of wrapping paper destruction.



The cat is indifferent about her new toys. But I love my camcorder. And The Boy loves his parmo t-shirt.



4) Tearful excitement over the discovery that The Boy is taking me to Aruba for my birthday. He kept it a complete surprise, the sly dog. Oh, no--what should I pack??

5) Lunch and dinner: a selection of cheeses (Maitre Seguin, Idiazabal, Wensleydale with cranberries, also a soft goat cheese wrapped in cherry leaves), prosciutto, olives, grapes, cherry tomatoes, pate and a crusty baguette ("Baguette?"). It was nice not to have to do the peeling/chopping/cooking/cleaning thing for once, and instead just nibble at stuff over a glass of Veuve.

6) Oh, also, a smackerel of something around four-ish: real proper Christmas cake with marzipan and icing, and a mince pie. Mr. Kipling's, of course.

7) That was pretty much the limit of our exertion. We read, watched TV, listened to festive music, pulled crackers and made some charitable donations (check out the options at Changing the Present).

8) Oh yeah--and we wore our pajamas all day long. Mostly.

I know fruitcake. You, sir, are no fruitcake

One of the best things about Christmas is fruitcake. And when I say that, I'm speaking English, not American. I have come to understand translation is required.

Fruitcake in England is a true celebration cake, served at weddings as well as during the holidays. It's rich, dark, buttery, moist, loaded with raisins and currants and sultanas.

(And more: my grandmother always made her cake at the end of October and spent the intervening weeks feeding it brandy until it was an aromatic fire hazard.)

In contrast, fruitcake in America is a block of concrete topped with neon fruitlike food substances.

People laugh at fruitcake, because that's the only practical use it has.

I must admit, at first I thought this was an exaggerated reaction to a couple of bad experiences, inflated for comedic purposes. So I bought a fruitcake from WholeFoods to find out for myself. And then I realized that we laugh because we don't want to cry.



The black things are dried prunes. Oh yeah. Enjoy, wontcha?

I mean, it wasn't bad. It was a little dry, and the cake itself was bland and underseasoned. The main problem was that it was hopelessly overstuffed with candied fruit, and every mouthful held big, chewy chunks of the stuff, the flavors indistinguishable from each other. It would be kind to say it was ... an unsubtle experience.



Which leads to the question: why does it appear every year? Who is buying this stuff in great enough quantities that bakeries across the country think it profitable to produce?

Answers below, please.

Meanwhile, I stand by my conviction that real fruitcake is a wonderful thing. One day I'll show you. I'll show you all.