My Nana Lynne’s Christmas Pudding

It had been five years since Nana’s death, and many more years since she was the woman all her family remember. Sometimes it felt as if it was only yesterday that she was whirling around the kitchen, her shrieking and laughter filling the room whenever one of the numerous pans scattered across the hob began to boil over. Whenever she cooked, clouds of flour hung in the air until the room resembled a snowy winter scene. My nana’s name was Lynne, and she was famed for her cooking, her signature dish was a Christmas pudding. However, Lynne’s Christmas pudding was no ordinary Christmas pudding; Lynne loved to make recipes her own, to add ingredients that do not belong and give them a place within her masterpieces, to empty the contents of those old wooden cupboards and create something uniquely her own. This particular Christmas pudding had been perfected over many years of joyous experimentation and it was now time for me to recreate it for our annual Christmas party.

Unfortunately, Lynne did not believe in recipes per say, she believed that a good baker knows their own recipes by heart and because of this there was no trace of Lynne’s famous Christmas pudding. “Right,” I spoke aloud to myself, “I think I can remember some of what was in this cake”. I gathered up flour, brandy, sugar, eggs and cherries, every moment replaying a different memory of that stylish woman I used to know. I thought of her; hair tied up in a sleek grey bun, a colourful apron thrown on, dancing through the flour-filled air to the duck-egg blue retro radio that remained on the same station for its whole existence.

“Right, I need to concentrate”, I thought. So, I shook those lingering memories from my mind and laboriously began adding ingredient after ingredient, stirring almost mechanically. No music filled the room in my small cottage, I dipped my finger silently into the mixture and watched it droop and fall back into the bowl. This certainly wasn’t how it used to look, “maybe it would be best if I try and find a similar recipe and follow that,” I thought. So, I again set about my work, following every word of the old recipe book but to no avail. I slumped into my tattered armchair that evening feeling defeated and more distant from my nana than ever before. I decided to give my sister Frankie a call and see if she could give my spirits a boost. I explained that I had been trying to make our nana’s famous Christmas pudding but that I was getting nowhere. “Hm,” replied my sister thoughtfully, “why don’t I come round tomorrow and help you? It might be more fun to do it together, I’ll bring the kids too if that’s okay?” she asked.

“Yeah, that will be nice,” I smiled, “I’ll see you tomorrow then”. We said our goodbyes and hung up. I then settled down into my armchair, my favourite book in one hand and a glass of red wine in the other before clambering along the cold marble floor into my bed for the night.

The next morning brought a crisp, bright winter day. The sun glistening off the frosty grass that surrounded my little stone cottage. Before I knew it, my sister was at the front door with her two little red-cheeked companions. Her children, Amelia and Bertie, both whirlwinds of energy and sunshines of joy, they certainly inherited their nana’s free-spirit and enthusiasm for life and everything within it. The little ones bustled into my small cottage, appearing to fill it to the brim with noise and joy, like a log fire filling the room with its smoky, comforting warmth. My small cottage was suddenly alive again. “Now, what went wrong yesterday? Talk me through what you did,” Frankie said with command.

“Well, I started off by mixing the fruits and brandy into a bowl overnight to soak and then just followed this recipe.”

“You followed a recipe?!” replied Frankie with a look of amusement and surprise.

“Well, yes,” I replied, a bit confused, “how else am I supposed to know how to make it?”

“That’s the whole point!” Frankie laughed, and seeing the confusion on my face, added, “Nana never used a recipe book! She cooked with freedom and joy; we must do the same!”

“Hmm, I suppose you could be right but how on earth do we recreate what she made?”

“Let’s just give it a go and enjoy ourselves. You need to loosen up!” So, Frankie called in her two little tots, turned up the radio that often sits dormant in my kitchen. The radio crackled out the words ‘toys in every store, but the prettiest sight to see is the holly that will be…’. Bertie and Amelia immediately starting dancing and singing, we all laughed. “Much more like it!” Frankie giggled, “Now kids, we’re going to be baking just like Nana Lynne used to. Are you ready to help?”

“Yes!” was the emphatic response given by the pair of excited young children.

We got to work straight away; the wooden cupboards were scoured for ingredients before all being thrown into a bowl with a lot less precision than I had previously employed but with a lot more love. The ingredients were mixed, the eggs beaten, the fruit added before being placed in the oven. After what seemed like hours of mayhem, the Christmas pudding was pulled out from the oven as its aroma filled the kitchen. “It’s perfect!” everyone cried in unison. I smiled at Frankie and her children and said “I feel as if Nana is here in some way,” she smiled back and said, “She is, she is alive in our mind and in our laughter.”

“Yes, I think you are right.” And so, the sisters hugged and the children laughed, “Now, to decorate!” cried Frankie.

If you were to stand outside of that little cottage, you would see that the sky had turned grey around the merry little scene as snowflakes began to drop gently from above. Now, if you peep your head through that cottage’s window you would see a flurry of activity. You would see Amelia’s golden pigtails whizzing around the kitchen with her little brother in tow, you would see the two sisters laughing together amongst all the commotion. And, if you were to rest your ear upon that small cottage window surrounded by old stone you would hear screams of joy and excitement, you would hear the old radio blaring out Christmas song after Christmas song to joyous shouts of recognition from the children, and, if you looked really, really closely through the small old window of that small old cottage. If you hold your hands around your eyes and really look, you would see the figure of a slender woman with a sleek grey bun wearing a flour-covered apron. You keep on looking and see that she is dancing. She is dancing and she is smiling among this little family, because, in the memories of our loved ones, we never truly die. And so, our beloved Lynne lives on in our hearts, in our memories, and more importantly, in that delicious Christmas pudding.