From Dear as Salt to Nun’s Beads
Via Fairy Lights, Stir Up Sunday, Finding Glorious Stillness in the Dark of the Year & A Sage Gargle.
Dearest Gentle Reader,
How are you in this interesting period that exists in the greyness post bonfire night and pre fairy lights? There are only really two folkloric dates that mean anything to me at this time and one has just passed (Stir up Sunday) and the other (St Andrews Eve/Day) is 29/30 November. I will explore the St Andrews celebration next week, examining the connection between the saint and Garlic and Romania which I think you will all love or at the very least mumble something along the lines of ‘how interesting’. This week however, we will concentrate on Stir Up Sunday, the folklore around it, and some ramblings about my own personal Christmas celebration and how it has changed from traditional to personal.
However, I think before all that you deserve a wonderful Italian tale full of food, family and clever queens. I hope you enjoy this version of a very old story: Dear as Salt
I have added it to my website just because it is a little longer than my normal stories and wanted to give you an option to skip it if Italian tales with mouthwatering food and clever women aren’t for you.
That story always makes me hungry, so we should probably move along to the folklore before we all have to move along in search of snacks and a recommendation for the nearest good Italian restaurant.
Stir Up Sunday is peculiarly British and is always the last Sunday before the start of Advent which this year fell on 20 November. The name comes from the Church collect which is read on this day “Stir up, we beseech thee O Lord, the wills of thy faithful people.” However most people know it as the day to make the Christmas Pudding where the pudding is stirred by all the family, always stirred East to West to follow the route the Three Kings are said to have taken to visit the very young Jesus .
Although the tradition of Stir Up Sunday only really started in the 19th Century, folklore abounds: the ingredients should number 13 for Jesus & the Apostles, the spices are supposed to remind people of frankincense and myrrh that were gifts of the 3 Kings. There are also charms hidden inside: a thimble will mean a year of being single to the finder, a sixpence is a sign of a year’s good fortune and the ring suggests a marriage within the year. Often people also use it to make mincemeat/Christmas Cake as like Christmas Puddings or Christmas cake, mincemeat can also use a little bit of time too mature to be at its best.
I’m not as fanatical about Christmas baking as I used to be, up until about 10 years ago I would spend the whole of this day in an increasingly steamy kitchen, giving myself callouses on my knife chopping hand from cutting up ingredients for Nigella’s Christmas Pudding, BBC Good Food’s Simmer & Stir Christmas Cake and my Nan’s mincemeat for the freezer recipe. I’d start mid morning and by early evening I would have a Christmas pudding enjoying its first steaming, a Christmas cake and two tubs of mincemeat cooling. It smelled sensational, gentle warming whiffs of cinnamon, mixed spice and cloves, cooked apples, dried fruit, warm brandy, butter and cake.
I would have listened to a substantial chunk of The Hogfather audiobook and some Christmas music and be ready for future weekends devoted to baking of mince pies, sausage rolls and cheese straws all ready to go in the freezer ready to be whipped out again at the first sign of possible festive visitors. Although I didn’t use the recipes I was devoted to Delia Smith’s Christmas timetable and Stir Up Sunday was Day 1 of the big countdown.
That isn’t my Christmas anymore although I have retained the Hogfather on audio (I can heartily recommend the newest version available from last year). I don’t make Christmas Cake, Christmas Pudding or mincemeat anymore but I truly celebrate anyone who does. I still make sausage rolls and cheese straws but I use the amazing recipes from Olivia Potts now and they get eaten and enjoyed warm out of the oven rather than frozen for the future. I also no longer cook a giant traditional Christmas dinner with innumerable sides and a Kelly Bronze free range turkey at an ever increasing price; which was eaten on Boxing Day because we had to go to family (not mine) on Christmas Day itself. I don’t try and outdo Delia or Nigella at every turn anymore because I don’t need to. I got a divorce instead.
Now I have my own Christmas traditions, that I have evolved myself and they make me incredibly happy. I know I promised to avoid a Marie Antoinette moment in these difficult times but please indulge me this once whilst I share the most indulgent meal I eat all year. I fry ridiculous amounts of Latkes in advance and then reheat them in the oven on Christmas Eve to serve on a big platter with perfectly rare roast beef, sliced thinly, gorgeous smoked salmon, cream cheese, homemade horseradish cream sauce, homemade smoked mackerel pate, tiny jacket potatoes, sour cream, lumpfish caviar and lemon wedges. This feast is eaten whilst watching Christmas films (Muppet Christmas Carol is mandatory) and drinking very cold cava. I also buy good cheese, bread, charcuterie and lebkuchen. In the last few years I have also been the lucky recipient of a Christmas Hamper which contains all those wonderful festive sweet treats and nibbles and I enjoy every bite of it. It really makes my Christmas and fills out the gaps that I no longer make myself like cake and pudding, chutneys and crackers. It’s essentially a true box of surprise delights.
After Christmas Eve, we then eat incredible picnic & leftovers meals out of the fridge for days accompanied by vast amounts of tea, wine and mimosas. My Christmas isn’t a family Christmas, it doesn’t look like TV adverts; although I do always speak to my much loved ones on Christmas Day. My Christmas is sometimes solitary, which I love, sometimes not, which I also love. Christmas for me is about a complete pause, a glorious stillness in the dark of the year when I can breathe, when I can be thankful for the opportunity to indulge in reading for hours without interruption or watch ridiculous films whilst knowing a fantastic meal is moments away with very little effort on my part. I have the luxury of time to just sit and think or just walk and think. I can recharge all my batteries and I can’t express how good that feels.
I’m lucky that I can afford this annual indulgence of wonderful food and drink plus I have family who give me fantastic food related gifts, but I honestly think that if I had the indulgence without the pause in my year, the magic would truly disappear. I hope however that the space for reading, relaxing and breathing would be just as recharging even if I only had a good omelette and a glass of wine à la Elizabeth David. I must admit however that I think it’s the combination that makes it really special. I’m a creature that loves comfort.
What sort of remedy can follow all that? Well how a a mildly antiseptic herbal mouthwash and gargle from 1830 from a book called The Practice of Cookery adapted to the Business of Everyday Life by Mrs Dalgairns? I feel the Port could be an interesting addition, the sugar likewise. I can’t imagine Listerine using it any time soon:
I will leave you with what sounds like a cheese & walnut stuffed deep fried pastry which would definitely be my cup of tea. Don’t they have an excellent name?
With that, Gentle Reader, I must bring this letter to a close. Please don’t hesitate to get in touch via the comments or via any of my social media profiles/my website . If you have enjoyed this and would like to read further such nonsense and have not yet subscribed, please don’t hesitate to subscribe for free at the button below. You’d be very welcome and it would be a joy to write to you.