A Christmas Carol: Christmas baking

Christmas baking is its own special category – and don’t we know it. And normally, it’s a tradition I happily participate in.

This time round – the weekends got a bit overly full in December. So for once, the baking has fallen by the wayside.

Part of me would like to mourn this a bit more – and part of me knows I made the sensible decision this year.

But even if I’m not there, mixing bowl at the ready, I can still write about it, can’t I?

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Christmas Past

There are such strong precepts for Christmas baking, for starters.

A special date designated for when you put together your Christmas puddings (in the British tradition, at any rate), Stir-Up Sunday.

One year, purely out of coincidence, I was making a Christmas cake on that date. (I’ve not yet attempted a Christmas pudding.)

Small D was a great (and very proud) helper, but, as we soon discover with Christmas cakes, they do take quite a lot of eating up. Even if you are keen on all the constituent parts.

(I am a self-appointed helper to anyone who doesn’t want the marzipan layer, of course.)

I don’t think my mother made Christmas pudding – for a long time, not everyone at home liked it. But she did make Christmas cake – and mince pies.

Part of her homage to traditions in fruit cake making was to wrap the cake tin in newspaper, something to do with helping the cake cook slowly and not dry out too much, I think.

I don’t think there was ever a great deal of decorating of the top. Being Good Eaters, the focus was much more on tucking in, I suspect.

The mince pies were an early instruction in the importance of letting baking cool before sampling it. There’s nothing quite like hot mincemeat to scald the roof of your mouth.

Truth be told, it was probably more about Mum getting on and making them. But I think I was in the kitchen at times when the mince pies were being made, playing with leftover bits of pastry and making them into shapes.

I can also remember Mum’s mum buying those boxes of candied orange and lemon rind – the kind you tend to get in the shops in the lead up to Christmas.

Granny’s specialism was lemon cake, a plain sponge with lemon in the sponge and in the glace icing that went over the cake. The candied peel was cut up into little fan shapes to decorate the top of the cake.

I did know of other Christmas baking, through my childhood cookbook. There were exciting options like stringing popcorn, frosted fruit (always fancied that one), and chocolate log (aka buy made swiss roll, chop it in a particular way, stick icing on, and pretend you are eating a log).

If you haven’t grown up with the tradition of making edible decorations, your requests to your mother to try doing so may not fall on receptive ears. At any rate, they still remain untried (for now).

—

And that was that, really, for quite some time. It was when I was married, and experimenting with my own cooking, that I discovered other options for Christmas baking.

I had had a heads up, though. The year that the flat included a German flatmate, she was underwhelmed at our lack of Christmas preparations – including on the baking front.

Our ignorance was to be our reward, as we were served treats like Zimtsterne (cinnamon stars) and Vanillekipferl (little crescents made with almonds). I’m pretty sure she had to make double batches of both.

Fast forward a year or two. Gaining a biscuit cookbook (back in the days of commandeering cheap cookbooks in the bargain shops), I discovered a whole series of extra Christmassy options to try.

There were the tree-shaped biscuits with jelly sweets, which were meant to look like baubles. I don’t think I got the right kind of sweets – they looked OK, but did not melt in the mouth. (The sweets went harder, rather than softer. They biscuits did not get repeated.)

There was a phase of making Italian biscotti for presents – the fun there being cooking them, slicing and turning them on their sides, then cooking them a bit more.

I had a good recipe from a magazine, and made a few different kinds – which went down well with relatives as little foody presents.

Then the lebkuchen took over – and became the main Christmassy baking. I’ve written about lebkuchen quite a bit, but let’s just say that, although it’s an effort on the beating the ingredients together, it’s one that rewards.

The plus point of making a large batch of lebkuchen is that you are then all done when it comes to presents for school, sports teachers, other friends where you don’t exchange presents properly but want to give a little something.

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Christmas Present

Baking changes when you are adapting it for food intolerances. Luckily, lebkuchen works quite well in this regard (biscuits seem to be OK if you are swapping in alternative flour and butter options. No worries about things rising.).

This Christmas, with two of us off wheat and dairy, I could have persevered. But actually, there’s a lot of other cooking that goes with this territory, and it doesn’t always leave you raring to go on the baking front.

So this time round, it seems my best response is to admire others’ efforts. Looking on at various options for building gingerbread houses (maybe another use for the lebkuchen recipe).

The Czech friends who make multiple biscuit types, as well as special tree decorations that look like gingerbread but are actually made of saltdough. (Good job we were informed which was which.)

Our German friend, discovering that Dan was without stollen, leapt to the rescue, and provided proper Christstollen from Dresden, as well as the beautiful moulded Spekulatius biscuits.

Maybe the future is in the dried cranberry (or ‘craisin’), which has become a bit of a hit at home recently. I’m sure some form of biscuit with cranberries in would feel suitably Christmassy.

I’m also considering the decorative possibilities of hanging metal biscuit cutters on the Christmas tree.

Sometimes the gleam of the metal, and the promise of biscuit, is just the right level of excitement for Christmas.

A Christmas Carol: pantomime

Time for another Christmassy post. Oh no it isn’t. Oh yes it is…

When I started planning out subjects for this month’s posts, pantomime was one that made the list early on.

Others will choose to focus their Christmas ‘must dos’ on elves on shelves (or not, depending on this year’s press about it), cookie exchanges, or indeed recipes for beach barbecues for the big day.

It all goes to show that Christmas really is very different, depending on where you live, and the traditions that have grown up around that location.

In the case of pantomime, it’s many things. Call it an alternative reason to get together – instead of the carol concert or the Christmas outing.

Call it a reason to test out multi-age entertainment – with jokes that work for the kids and others very much aimed at the adults.

Call it a reason for grandparents to treat the grandkids, and soak up a little of their excitement. Call it the need for a good story, and a happy ending, in the season of dark mornings and short days.

For those somewhat mystified as to the nature of a pantomime (or panto for short), Wikipedia leaps to the rescue as ever – reminding me that it is an entertainment of generally British beginnings (with plenty more influences too).

Meanwhile, time to line up the performers.

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Christmas Past

I’d love to tell you that I remember my first panto – but I don’t. But I do remember the one that set the standard – for many things, as it turns out.

Aged eight or so, my Brownie Guides pack arranged an outing up to Edinburgh to see a proper panto – one with known names. It was only an hour away, really, but it felt like a big deal.

We went in a coach, for starters. We came back in the dark. It felt very grownup and exciting.

I suspect we were at the King’s Theatre, the classic Edinburgh theatre for Christmas pantos. These are the real deal of pantos, often with celebrities included.

But part of the pattern with pantos is that many performers get hooked, and appear in new pantos year by year. (I say new. Most pantos stick determinedly to fairytale subjects.)

In this case (as currently in Edinburgh), part of the attraction is the familiar faces, still identifiable in new costumes and a new storyline.

The year I went, the key attraction was the Scottish comedy duo Francie and Josie, which my father certainly knew of old. I don’t remember who played which parts – I don’t even remember which story it was, to be honest.

But it was an early introduction to pantomime set in a local tradition – in this case, lots of use of Scots, and lots of jokes relating to Edinburgh and Glasgow.

Thirty-odd years on, I can still sing the song that they taught that night, Parliamo Glasgow. So that’s a fairly clear indication that it had an impact on me.

(Stanley Baxter was the comedian who started the notion, and the song was evidently written for him – for pantomime performance. I have been able to find the words, should you want to learn it yourself.)

The other key aspect of the trip was: chips. With brown sauce – or as it’s better known:
salt ‘n’ sauce. It was a treat, partway back on the coach.

I’m sure the place must have reeked of vinegar, but the comfort factor was high, especially important when getting back relatively late.

—

Having set up such expectations, the next step was to be in pantos myself.

Fortunately, at secondary school, our drama teacher was also the director of the local amateur dramatics society, whose performances included an annual panto.

One year I was in both the school panto and the local panto, along with a good number of friends. (I was never anything particularly important – usually a member of the chorus.)

The rehearsals were a huge source of fun, even though my parents must have been pretty fed up with all the ferrying me about. Singing and limited gesticulation with arms: those
I could do.

(And I do remember some of us getting locked in a music practice room, along the corridor from the stage, and only just getting out at the last minute, thanks to someone’s nifty work with a hairpin to unpick the lock.)

And while the school panto (‘Scrooge’) was only on for one night, the one in the local theatre (‘Jack and the Beanstalk’) ran for a good ten days, I recall – matinee and evening performances.

There was no point coming home in between, so we would all stay on (probably with leftovers sandwiches), play card games and so on.

I don’t know whether there was a veto on more after that – or whether the school work went up. I had probably reached the outer limit of my ‘am dram‘ abilities, in any case.

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Christmas Present

We’ve been to a panto with Junior Reader in the last few years – thanks to the efforts of the local theatre near where my parents live.

Two years in a row, a cast almost entirely of kids impressed us all, firstly with ‘Ebeneezer’ (a musical version of A Christmas Carol), and the following year with ‘Oliver!‘ (the popular musical based on Oliver Twist).

This year, no panto – and timings weren’t quite right for alternatives here either.

But today, we made up for it a bit. We had our own extra mini tradition of watching the annual children’s TV panto – where the presenters of various programmes come together to perform a pantomime, one which is also done live and filmed.

Part of the fun is ‘spot the presenter’ – where the storylines usually incorporate some catchphrases of particular shows too.

And this year, I was able to point out some of the special guests, including ones I had watched in my own childhood.

There were audience participation songs. The baddie saw the error of his ways, even if there was less opportunity to shout ‘he’s behind you!’ than in some years.

Familiar storylines, in-jokes. Familiar cast – maybe with special guests.  Slapstick moments, and little times of genuine pathos. Doesn’t that sound like most people’s notion of their own Christmas?

 

A Christmas Carol: the Christmas concert

It’s the end of term here today. Time for a Christmas sing-song.

To be honest, it’s the first time we’ve graduated to attending a concert, rather than a nativity. It feels appropriate to mark it somehow.

I keep writing about A Formal Feeling as one of my Christmas reads. One of the elements
I like about it is the description of rehearsals for the carol concert – some that work, some that don’t, where the sound is off and everyone is feeling chilly.

I found myself thinking back to Christmas concerts of my own, as well as today’s one
I attended. They hold the potential to move us forward into Christmas – if we want to.

It’s one thing to nudge elbows alongside shoppers on the streets or in the supermarkets.
Or to practise our best Christmas smiles as we count down the people we won’t see for a couple of weeks: school teachers, sports instructors.

I’ve written earlier about how Christmas can pull us in so many different directions – and take so many forms. But when we stand and sing the same words – or even share that hour where others sing them to us – we share an experience, side by side.

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Christmas Past

It began with the class visit to the old people’s home. I was all of five or six. We lived in a small village at the time. My granny was still in her own home, but had friends in the old people’s home.

There were the lights, the tree. There was the intent focus on our singing, be it ever so thin and (probably not very) tuneful. There was the generous applause.

It was probably our first experience of volunteering in some way. I remember a certain puzzlement on my part: we had turned up and sang, just as we had at school, but the response was far greater.

Having seen things from the other side, visiting my other granny in a similar home in recent years, I recognise now the impact of children coming in to visit.

However the residents are feeling about themselves, their health, their neighbours across the lunch table – all of this is lifted by the spontaneity of children.

Children come and bring songs, but really they bring themselves, their vitality, their lack of pretence. No wonder there is applause, warm congratulation.

—

Later, there were concerts at secondary school. The year the choir was tasked with trying an oratorio for the first time.

We did our best to keep up with the rhythms of Vivaldi’s Gloria, and later we tackled Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols.

The thing that interests me about Christmas concerts is that they seem right, whatever note the music takes. It can be the sparseness of medieval sounds, the richness of regular carols.

It can be the intrigue of carols in other languages, or even be the fun and bounce of particularly upbeat songs.

We may be singing about the dark, the difficulties of the world – or the warmth when we come inside. The diversity of the world to which we wish peace; the gladness we can experience in feasting.

Any or (if possible) all of these are quick to speak to our hearts. We feel them, as performers. We understand them, as listeners.

And best of all, we join together in singing, choir and audience, all of us appreciating the contrasts and confusions of Christmas.

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Christmas Present

Today we had a mini version of lessons and carols at school. Readings, carefully practised by each class, learned off by heart and carried off with confidence.

There were violins. A gentle reenactment of the Christmas story. Vocal solos. Songs that encompassed not just English, but also Spanish, French, Polish and even (for one verse) Latin.

There were also the anticipated elements of a school Christmas production. A key headdress that didn’t quite stay in place. The singing that was not always entirely in tune.

But with these came a genuine enjoyment from the performers – and a chance for the audience to join in, bit by bit.

I may not have retained all the actions for The Twelve Days of Christmas, but I am impressed by all the staff who did – and who performed them with no embarrassment.

I was reminded again of the straight-forwardness of children singing, the volume increases that show when they are enjoying it:

‘FOUR calling birds, three French hens…’ The wonderful downhill chase towards the partridge and its pear tree.

These moments of connection over Christmastime may be brief. They may require considerable effort to bring off.

But even an hour of goodwill among men (and women and children) is noticed. We shared a space today in the school hall: parents, teachers, children.

We gave our attention, and our feelings, wintry with the heavy snow of pre-Christmas responsibilities, began to thaw and warm again.

Santa has not been good

The origin of this idea is the phrase ‘Has Santa been good to you?’

It’s more of a thing in Scotland, by my reckoning, though it seems to be in lots of places now.

I wondered what it would be like if Santa had not been good: not that we’re having bad Santas on this page, but because he was in someone else’s bad books.

So here’s a little exploration of what that might look like. Page breaks marked in below.
And if anyone fancies illustrating it, do let me know.

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Santa had not been good.

He was on Mum’s naughty list.

He got his first warning on 6 December, the feast of St Nicholas.

—

He was getting out of bed to go to the workshop, and see how it was all coming along.

He put his feet into his boots and – there it was! He couldn’t get them on.

He knew he hadn’t eaten so much that his boots wouldn’t fit. Boots, after all, do not change size after mince pies.

—

He upended the boot on the right, and checked.

A fat lump of coal rolled out, and trickled its dust on the rug beside the bed.

Santa blinked. Slowly, he tried the other boot.

—

An even bigger lump of coal – tied round with string.

The note had got a bit sooty, but Santa could read it:

‘You have not been good, Santa. You are on my naughty list! Mum.’

—

What was it all about? Santa racked his brains to think.

The reindeer might have trecked some of the magic reindeer food into the flowerbeds, while he was inside. That was possible.

He tried to be in and out, quick, but the reindeer spent more time standing than flying, some nights. It depended on how firm the fruitcake was.

—

Maybe he’d been spotted at that department store, back at the start of November!

Santa blushed. He knew Mum was not keen on That Sort of Thing.

The trouble was, Santa’s factory system needed an upgrade. Presents for everyone else, but not for him, ho ho!

—

It was the same story every year. He ended up having to do public appearances to fund the Christmas Eve activities.

He even lent out the reindeer to those ceremonies where they switched all the lights on.

Santa put the coal on one side, in case he wanted to make a snowman later. Then he set off for the workshop.

—

The next day, there was another warning. The bells were missing from the reindeer harness. There was a note:

‘Santa. I am fed up with the kids not going to sleep until all hours on Christmas Eve. They say they are listening for the bells on the reindeer.

I am going to to tell them that Neighbourhood Watch has banned you for too much noise on Christmas Eve.’

—

Santa gulped. It was one thing for Mum to be cross, but another to get a whole group of grown-ups involved.

(Santa wasn’t too keen on grown-ups. They had funny ideas about whether Christmas was worth it.)

And so it went on. Every day, another sign; another note. His belt had gone, so he couldn’t hold his trousers up properly.

—

There was a sudden mysterious disappearance of tape for the presents. Santa donated all his bootlaces, and some worn out reins.

The elves turned up one morning to find Congratulations! You’re Married! wrapping paper on their benches.

(They’d already wrapped a few smaller islands’ worth of presents before anyone spotted it. Those had to be done again.)

—

After a week’s worth of  warnings, Santa had had enough. He decided that, as he wasn’t too sure where Mum lived, he would need to go public.

He put up a special notice on his website: ‘To the bringer of mysterious gifts!

Let’s talk. Send me an email, so I can respond to you.’

—

Then the emails started coming. Trouble was, it wasn’t just Mum who was a bit hot under the collar about it.

It was all the others: Mummy, Mama, Mom, Mutti. You name them, they were not pleased.

‘Why do you get the kids so excited? I am worn out the next morning, because they come into our room so early!’

—

‘What do you mean, not finishing those gingerbread biscuits properly? Weren’t they good enough?’

‘Why did you rebrand? Wasn’t Father Christmas good enough for you?’

Santa hung his head. He had enjoyed being Father Christmas. St Nicholas, that was his real favourite.

—

The list went on and on. There was all this cooking, and not enough sleep for parents.

There was last-minute costume making out of tinfoil, and travelling in bad weather.

But the main difficulty was that Mum had been Very Good, all year, and especially in December. And no one seemed to notice.

—

Santa nodded thoughtfully. He knew that feeling.

There he was, trying to Do It All, every year (with some obvious support from the elves, and the reindeer).

Turned out Mum felt the same. They were both trying to cover everything – and getting tired in the process.

—

Santa looked at his inbox. So many mums and mummies, muttis and mamas.

All trying to get it right too.

All hoping for a bit of mystery and excitement for their kids – maybe even for themselves.

—

Santa sent out a big email to them all. He sighed when it had gone (if only the presents themselves could go out that quickly!).

He didn’t get the bells back, but his belt did turn up.

And on Christmas Eve, under every mince pie, every solitary glass of sherry, there was a little note.

—

It said: ‘OK’. That was all. And every time, Santa replaced it with a note of his own:

‘Dear Children. Enjoy the special day. And next year, I will only bring your stocking.

Mum, Dad, aunties, uncles, neighbours down the street - they will do the rest.’

—

Santa arrived home. It had been a long night.

The snowman with the coal eyes stood on sentry duty outside. There was a small package tied to his broom.

Santa removed the package, and carried it indoors.

—

And inside was a little book, full of recipes. Mince pies, Christmas cake, gingerbread…everything he loved, and everything he usually had to wait all year for.

Santa smiled. He could eat, drink and be merry at any time he fancied.

And with a whole year to try them out, he could afford not to eat so much at one sitting.

—

And there was the note too. ‘To Santa. Thank you for the new arrangement.

I am sure you are going to be very good next year.

Love from Mum.’

A Christmas Carol: Christmas films

The thing about Christmas films is the looove. Love to the extent that small children will watch them, repeatedly, even in August. That’s how much love.

I haven’t had to watch full-on snow-and-Santa outside of December too many times.
But there are a couple of kids’ DVDs in our collection where the Christmas version seems to have much more pulling power than the other episodes.

I guess we like it when we know what to expect. Misers get invited to the party, whatever their previous behaviour. There is sharing – meals, possessions, and so on – and there is of course caring.

And if we’re lucky, there is also a hint of mystery. The strange, the unexpected, the mind-bogglingly amazing (if we’ve been really good, that is). We may know what’s coming, but we’d sure like to be surprised and amazed too, if we can.

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Christmas Past

Back in the mists of the two-week double edition copy of the Radio Times, I’m sure there were properly Christmassy films. But I don’t really remember being aware of them.

Films at Christmas: check. Films about Christmas: I drew a bit of a blank (apart from The Snowman). So I went off to check.

The ever-kindly Wikipedia informed me that, really, there wasn’t much going on in the 1970s and 1980s that I would be allowed to watch.

It took until 1990, and Home Alone, for there to be something that might be classed as a family Christmas film. (Although, as you know, there’s not so much focus on family for much of the film.)

All of a sudden, others followed suit. The Muppets, reliably, raised the bar for Christmas films with their version of A Christmas Carol.

By this point, I was looking more towards life after leaving school, rather than the Christmas film options. And by the time things got seriously underway, with films like Elf (early 2000s), I was being indoctrinated by Dan into the delights of earlier Christmas films.

It’s a Wonderful Life appeared fairly soon on. In fact, Casablanca can kind of count as a Christmas film (it’s set in December, you see).

When Harry Met Sally counts as a Christmas film. It’s not all Christmas, true, but it has buying Christmas trees, and of course the big final build-up just before New Year.
(It’s obviously not ‘early early’, but late 1980s, which is a long time ago in the Christmas film stakes.)

But in the early 2000s, there was competition. Peter Jackson was getting underway with the Lord of the Rings films, which conveniently premiered shortly before Christmas.

Back in the pre-kid days, we were there, folks. In fact, it was required activity for our little group of friends.

We might have very different likes and dislikes in some areas, but we could agree that, come December, we’d spend some time with Gandalf and co.

They weren’t Christmassy films per se (though you can argue that there’s often snow, lots of eating and drinking, and of course, that important bit of gold jewellery).

But they did fulfil the expectation of a film-at-Christmas. Excitement. Derring-do. Thrills, heart-stopping moments, and battles hard won.

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Christmas Present

Parenthood allows you another go. If you want to go the Christmas film, or Christmas animation, route to mark the build-up to the big day, there’s very little to stop you.

Plus, these days, every animated film franchise seems to need to have its own Christmas special. Shrek. Kung Fu Panda. Madagascar (because whatever the four lead characters may think, it’s really all about the penguins).

In fact, with the increased popularity of streaming films, you can scratch the Christmas film itch pretty much whenever you please.

So we may not have made it to either Hobbit film when it came out. That’s OK. We’ll catch up later, and we’ll even bring our own snacks.

For now, we’ll settle for something a little lighter, but where we can all join in. Maybe we’ll have another go at The Polar Express. Or even see the Grinch in action.

Will it become a tradition? Don’t know. But when the light levels outside are low, cuddling up and keeping warm are priorities. And a Christmas film might just do nicely.