Stir up Sunday comes early

Have you heard of Stir up Sunday? It’s the day when you make your Christmas puddings. They taste best if are cooked in advance and left to mature for a few weeks. Now is the time to get yours ready for Christmas!

Stir up Sunday came very early this year. Traditionally Stir up Sunday falls on the last Sunday before Advent, this year that will be Sunday 26th November. However we made a head start on ours at half term when we visited my mum.

The first thing we did was to leave the dried fruit to soak overnight. You can leave it longer if you like, but 24 hours is the minimum amount of time. The children each had their own tupperware boxes, poured in the dried fruit and added generous helpings of whisky. They loved shaking the boxes to make sure everything was covered. We put them to one side until we were ready for the next step.

We were making two Christmas cakes and two Christmas puddings. Yes, we all love Christmas food! We got everything ready for a fun afternoon of festive baking.

The children are the perfect age to get involved with baking. They were able to measure, pour and mix. Don’t worry, we did let them use a mixer! When everything was ready they poured the cake mixture into glass bowls for the Christmas pudding, and lined cake tins for the Christmas cake.

Everything smelled really good. Then we put the puddings and cake in the oven to cook slowly.

Once they were gone we wrapped them and put them away. We can’t wait to ice and marzipan the Christmas cakes when we go back in a few weeks!