Nigella

Ultimate Christmas Pudding

I don’t deny it: there is something unattractively boastful about calling one’s own recipe “ultimate”. But having soaked my dried fruit for this pudding in Pedro Ximénez — the sweet, dark, sticky sherry that has a hint of liquorice, fig and treacle about it — I know there is no turning back. It’s not even as if it’s an extravagance: the rum or brandy I’ve used up till now are more expensive and do the trick less well. This is sensational — it is the Queen of Christmas puddings. It has to be tried, and clamours to be savoured. I know that many of you, tradition be damned, are resistant to Christmas pudding, and I do understand why. But you must try this. For until you do, you probably think all that dried fruit is, well, dry, and the pudding heavy. Yet this is far from the case: the fruit is moist and sticky, and the pudding mystifyingly, meltingly light. For US cup measures, use the toggle at the top of the ingredients list.