We only have pudding after Sunday Lunch. It has always been this way. My memory doesn't allow me to recall any weekday puddings from my childhood. although there probably were some, I don't remember them and so they couldn't have existed. I do remember Sunday puddings though. Pies and crumbles were the favourite. My mum is a pastry genius and my dad swears he married her for her Cornish pasties and then spent a lifetime trying to persuade her to make them. We used to be given tins without labels on by a neighbour who was some kind of sales rep and my mum would often make a pie from one of these tins. The fruit was often stoned, cherries, apricots or plums.
If the unlabeled tin contained stewing meat (or dog food, as we used to joke) then Sunday pudding would be made from apples from the garden and cloves were added. The cloves made a good substitute for the stones of the fruit. The apple pie was my favourite. I didn't like tinned cherries but they had to be eaten or your fortune couldn't be revealed. Cloves are brilliant, they have a fantastic flavour and we used to try to brush our teeth with them because we knew they were somehow good for teeth.
At the end of the meal, we would tell our fortunes with the cloves or stones left on our plate. It was all about who we would marry and was the highlight of our week. I'm not really sure why because when I was a child I was not going to get married, not ever, no way, thank you very much, boys were just yukky. And the choices weren't fantastic either.
When shall I marry? This year, next year, sometime, never.
Who shall I marry? Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor, Rich man, Poor man, Begger man, Thief.
What shall I wear? Silk, Satin, Rags, Tags.
Have my children missed out? They will never know that they are going to marry a poor man, next year in satin, nor have the experienced the delights of unknown fruit pie.
No comments:
Post a Comment