A dark, domed plum pudding studded with fruit on a white plate, a sprig of holly with two red berries in the top, on a red cloth beside a jug of white sweet sauce and a spoon. — Plum pudding with a sprig of holly and a jug of sweet sauce.

Plum Pudding (1854)

Name: Plum Pudding
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 4 h 10 min
Total time: 4 h 40 min
Cuisine: British
Ingredients: 10 g butter, for the basin; 225 g raisins; 225 g currants; 340 g beef suet, chopped, or shredded suet; 170 g sugar; 55 g candied mixed peel, sliced; 85 g flour; 85 g fresh white breadcrumbs; 0.25 tsp grated nutmeg; 4 large eggs; 140 ml water

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Alexis Soyer’s 1854 Christmas plum pudding of raisins, currants, suet, sugar, peel, flour and crumbs, boiled four hours in a mold: a working family’s Christmas pudding, with flour in it like Mrs. Cratchit’s.

By The Forgotten MenuPublished Oct 31, 2026

Recipe makes: One 2-liter pudding, 10 servings
Prep: 30 min
Cook: 4 hr 10 min
Total: 4 hr 40 min

The pudding steams for 4 hours and stands for 10 minutes before turning out. Made ahead and refrigerated, it steams again in about 1½ hours.

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Plum pudding with a sprig of holly and a jug of sweet sauce.

The story behind the recipe

“The above is only for Christmas,” Alexis Soyer wrote under this pudding in 1854, before giving a plainer one “for every day.” It’s the Christmas pudding of A Shilling Cookery for the People, the book the chef wrote for working families, and it shares three things with the pudding Mrs. Cratchit carried in to her family in A Christmas Carol: a cloth, a speckling of fruit, and flour.

Doubts about the flour

When her pudding has come out of the copper and been praised, Mrs. Cratchit confesses to “her doubts about the quantity of flour.” Isabella Beeton’s Christmas pudding of 1861 uses none at all. Soyer’s has as much flour as breadcrumbs, binds its raisins, currants and beef suet with eggs and water, and, unlike Beeton’s, is sweetened with sugar and spiced with a little nutmeg.

His raisins are Malaga raisins, to be picked and stoned, and the pudding goes into a papered mold tied in a cloth. It came to the table turned out, with “sweet sauce round.”

Earlier in the same book, Soyer’s “Our Christmas Dinner” plans for a pudding made ahead: “a plum pudding boiled the day before, and rewarmed in boiling water in the pot whilst eating the soup and turkey.”

Making it today

We steam the pudding in a covered basin, our choice in place of the cloth, and check the center with a thermometer, since it holds raw egg. Seedless raisins save the stoning. Mrs. Cratchit lit hers in brandy with holly stuck in the top; Soyer doesn’t mention brandy, so it’s left out here.

Beeton’s version, Christmas Plum Pudding (1861), is the one set beside the soldiers’ puddings of the 1914 Christmas truce. Mrs. Cratchit’s entrance with hers, blazing and stuck with holly, is quoted in What Did the Cratchits Eat for Christmas Dinner?

334. Plum Pudding.—Pick and stone half a pound of Malaga raisins, wash and dry the same quantity of currants, chop, not too fine, three-quarters of a pound of beef suet, put it in a convenient basin, with six ounces of sugar, two ounces of mixed candied peel sliced, three ounces of flour, three ditto of bread-crumbs, a little grated nutmeg, four eggs, a gill of water, or perhaps a little more, to form a nice consistence; butter a mould, put a piece of white paper over the top and round the sides, tie it in a cloth, boil for four hours in plenty of water; when done, remove the cloth, turn it out of the mould, take the paper off the sides and top, and serve with sweet sauce round; it may also be boiled in a cloth.
The above is only for Christmas. Now for every day.

Alexis SoyerA Shilling Cookery for the People (London: Geo. Routledge & Co., 1854), Plum Pudding, no. 334, p. 128

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Ingredients

For One 2-liter pudding, 10 servings. Quantities are shown as written.

Quantities as written here, for One 2-liter pudding, 10 servings.

Butter, for the basin10 g
Raisins225 g
Currants225 g
Beef suet, chopped, or shredded suet340 g
Sugar170 g
Candied mixed peel, sliced55 g
Flour85 g
Fresh white breadcrumbs85 g
Grated nutmeg1/4 tsp
Large eggs4
Water140 ml

Ingredients as written here

10 g butter, for the basin
225 g raisins
225 g currants
340 g beef suet, chopped, or shredded suet
170 g sugar
55 g candied mixed peel, sliced
85 g flour
85 g fresh white breadcrumbs
0.25 tsp grated nutmeg
4 large eggs
140 ml water

Equipment

2-liter (3½-pint) pudding basin or heatproof bowl
Parchment paper, foil and kitchen string
Large pot with a lid, deep enough to hold the basin
Trivet, upturned saucer or folded cloth for the bottom of the pot
Kettle
Instant-read thermometer

Instructions

Rub the inside of the basin with the butter and press a round of parchment into the bottom.
In a large bowl, mix the raisins, currants, beef suet, sugar, candied peel, flour, breadcrumbs and nutmeg until the fruit is evenly coated.
Beat the eggs with the water and stir them into the dry mixture until everything is moist and holds together. If it still looks dry and crumbly, add a little more water, a little at a time.
Spoon the mixture into the basin and press it down; it should come to about 1 inch (2.5 cm) below the rim. Cover it with a sheet of parchment and a sheet of foil, both folded with a pleat across the middle so the pudding can swell, and tie them on tightly under the rim with string.
Set the trivet in the pot, stand the basin on it, and pour in boiling water to come halfway up the basin. Cover the pot and keep the water at a steady simmer for 4 hours, topping it up with boiling water from the kettle whenever it drops.
Lift out the basin and push an instant-read thermometer into the center of the pudding through the covers: it should read at least 160°F (71°C). If it doesn’t, cover it again and steam for another 30 minutes before checking again.
Let the pudding stand for 10 minutes, remove the covers, run a knife around the edge and turn it out onto a warm plate. Serve hot, with a sweet white sauce or custard.

Nutrition

590calories per serving

Recipe makes: One 2-liter pudding, 10 servings
Servings: 10

Estimated per serving (10) from USDA FoodData Central values for raisins, currants, beef suet, sugar, candied peel, flour, white breadcrumbs, eggs and nutmeg.

Recipe notes

When adjusting quantities

This is Soyer’s full quantity. Whatever the size, steam it until the center reaches 160°F (71°C).

Notes

Quantities mentioned in these notes don’t change when you adjust the servings.

To make it ahead, as Soyer did for his Christmas dinner, cool the pudding in its basin, refrigerate it within 2 hours and use it within 4 days, following USDA guidance on leftovers, or freeze it. Steam it again in the basin for about 1½ hours, until the center reaches 165°F (74°C). Vegetarian suet keeps beef fat out of the pudding. Our changes: a covered basin steamed in place of the papered mold in a cloth, seedless raisins, and amounts for his “a little grated nutmeg” and the butter for the basin. Soyer’s gill is an imperial quarter pint, about 140 ml. Contains wheat and egg.

Scaling changes the ingredients only; pan sizes and cooking times need their own judgment. To adapt this recipe further, try the recipe tool at TuneMyRecipe (opens in a new tab), our sister site.