Panettone All Year, and Seasonal cakes and desserts

Last Christmas in UK supermarkets we could buy Christmas pudding and Christmas cake, French yule logs, the seasonal favourites, plus year round scones and crumpets. From Europe, German stollen and Italian Panettone. The UK now has an outlet devoted to Panettone. Supermarkets, from upmarket department stores to Waitrose, middle market Tesco and Morrisons, and budget friendly German Lidl and Aldi, stock a variety of European and worldwide specialities. Amazon and ebay also have links to lovely food specialities. These include

Italian Panettone

Panettone - Italian, popular in the run up to Christmas, but also increasingly Easter. The spelling is only one double letter, double t, I remember tut tut.

Panettone. Picture from Wikipedia.

Wiki explains

In Italy, historical accounts of panettone invariably state that it originated in Milan. The word panettone derives from panetto, a small loaf of bread. The augmentative suffix -one changes the meaning to 'large bread'

A one word oxymoron, small large bread. The popular size is the large one which can last in its tin all year, going gradually drier and losing flavour and aroma. It can be used up as bread pudding, bread and butter pudding.

We used to be given Panettone when we visited an Italian restaurant in Hatch End. The tinned panettone came packed inside a circular zip up bag.

Now many Italian cafe outlets before Christmas sell a few choices of Panettone on the counter beside the cashier to tempt you to make a last minute purchase of a gift for others or yourself.

The Panettone Store sells panettone from small stocking fillers to extra large. Also preserved fruit, and Italian soft nougat.

What about the rest of the world. Wiki helpfully says

Turron

Soft nougat. 

Torrone

Italian soft nougat

Nougat

Usually white chewy bars which might contain nuts, and sometimes fruit. Could be wrapped in foil for freshness and then a soft card cover.

Useful Websites On Panettone And Seasonal Food

https://thepanettonestore.co.uk/

https://thepanettonestore.co.uk/stocking-fillers/

https://www.thetimes.com/world/europe/article/spaniards-fear-italian-invasion-of-panettone-replace-roscon-bread-6mcwbv5f9

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Angela's Seasonal Xmas Quiz for travellers

 Where will you find a black cake at Christmas? What does Feliz Navidad mean? 

Do the quiz and check the answers to compare the number you get right with other members of your friends and family.  Learn the answers, and get all completely right by doing the quiz again.

See how many points you get. I hope it is not pointless.

 A The word croissant means

1 Crescent, in French

2 Cooked, in French

3 Cross shaped in French

4 Crescent in Italian 

B Spumante means

1 Sparkling in Italian

2 Sparkling in French

3 Spilled in Spanish

C Rosé means

1 Rose coloured in French

2 Rose shaped in Spanish

3 Rose perfumed in Italian

D Whiskey

1 Comes from Scotland

2 Comes from Ireland and America

3 Comes from Native Indians

E Whisky

1 Comes from Scotland

2 Comes from Ireland

3 Comes from Antarctica

F Christmas Pudding

1 Traditionally contains only a silver sixpence

2 Traditionally contains a three penny bit, sixpence, pea, bean or thimble

3 Traditionally contains a gold coin or gold foil wrapped fruit

Xmas crackers

G Christmas Crackers

1 Are named after the sound they make when pulled

2 Are named after the two creases

3 Are named after their appearance when pulled apart

H Christmas Crackers were invented by 

1 Tom Smith

2 Tom Jones

3 Billy Bunter

I In England at Christmas at tea time you eat

1 Christmas cake

2 Mince Pies

3 Christmas cake or mince pies

J The Yule Log comes from

1 England

2 Scotland

2 France

K Stollen comes from

1 Germany

2 Russia

3 Canada

L Panettone comes from

1 Spain and Italy

2 France and Portugal

3 Australia and New Zealand

M At Christmas in Belize they eat

1 White cake

2 Black cake, sometimes with Yellow cake

3 Green cake 

N Champagne comes from

1 France

2 Spain

3 Italy

4 France, and the USA under license

O Cava comes from

1 France

2 Spain

3 Italy

P Prosecco comes from

1 Spain

2 Italy

3 Portugal

Q Sherry comes from

1 France

2 Spain

3 Madeira

R Madeira comes from

1 Spain

2 Madeira which is Portuguese

3 Italy

S Christmas Day is Dec 25

1 In the lunar calendar

2 In the Gregorian Calendar

3 In the Julian Calendar

T Dec 26 Is

1 Boxing Day only

2 St Stephen's Day only

3 Both Boxing Day and St Stephen's Day in different countries

U A hanukiah is

1 The same as the menorah - 7 branches, for 7 days of the week

2 Has only 8 branches, for the 8 day festival

3 Has 9 branches, 8 plus the helper candle to light the others

V

Champagne is 

1 The shape of the bottle

2 A region of France and name of the drink

3 The name of the man who invented the bubbly drink

4 The name of a grape

W The Star of David (Jewish star, also called the seal of Solomon by Moslems)_

1 Has 5 points

2 Has 8 points

3 Has six points

4 Has any number of points

X Feliz Navidad is Spanish for

1 Happy Birthday

2 Congratulations

3 Happy New Year

4 Happy Christmas

Y Traditionally in the UK you kiss under

1 Holly

2 Mistletoe

3 The Christmas tree

Z What is the official name of the UK royal broadcast on Christmas Day

1 The Queen's Speech or the King's Speech

2 The Christmas message because the Queen's Speech or King's Speech opens Parliament

Answers

A1 B1 C1 D2 E1 F1 G1 H1 I3 J2 K1 l  L1 M2 N1

O2 P2 Q2 R2 S2 T3 U3 V2 W3 X4 Y2 Z2

-ends-

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Winter Celebrations Worldwide

 

UK

Turkey with stuffing.

Christmas cake

Christmas Carols

Christmas Crackers containing a paper hat and a riddle and usually a tiny toy or puzzle.

Christmas Pudding

Mince Pies

On Fridays a Toastasters International Club, Online Dynamic, meets to practice speeches. I gave a speech about winter festivals around the world. I also gave this in person at HOD the evening before.

Ice Skating on artificial Outdoor Rinks

Pantomime

Santa's Grotto in Department Stores

TV family films such as The Sound of Music and American movie Home Alone, a slapstick comedy about a child who beats a couple of bungling would-be burglars.

USA

Candy Cane. Red and swhite spirals of sugar, resembling a shepherd's crook. They recall the story of the shepherds who, as the Christmas carol goes, watched their flocks by night.

Plum pudding (like Christmas pudding) is available all year, although more prolifically at Christmas.

Turkey is eaten for Thanksgivingso most Americans don't want to eat it again at Christmas.

BELIZE

Used to be called British Honduras and still has British traditions with an added Central American flavour.

Christmas carols played by steel bands.

Fairy lights on palm trees. (The lights are not installed by cranes but by local agile young men who climb the tree, sometimes hanging upside down as a stunt to amuse and astonish passers-by. 

FRANCE

Yule logs cakes with chocolate topping, recalling the tree trunks chopped up for fires giving light and heat in winter before we had electric lights and heating..

GERMANY

Stollen - a cake or soft sweet bread with sultanans, shaped like a log, with a rod of yellow marzipan horizontally down the centre. 

Marzipan is ground almonds mixed with fine sugar, bound together by liquid such as egg white?

ITALY and Roman Catholic churches

Nativity scenes in churches.

Panettone, a large dome shaped soft sweet dough bread. Nowadays you can buy it not only with traditioal luurious cut dandied peel and sultanas, but, instead chocolate chips, and fillings ingredients and numerous flavours. 

Italians claim it comes from Northern Italy, specifically Milan, and a specific bakery.

SPAIN

Panettone, same as Italy.

Songs such as Feliz Navidad.

VENEZUELA

Panettone.

What goodies does January bring for the traveller - or stay at home traveller?

 More Sunlight and Daylight In America and Europe

In The Northern Hemisphere

Every day is brighter and longer. Soon the little white crocuses will be peeping out. 

Lovely Leftover Food

But supermarkets are still stocked with Christmas goodies. 

Christmas Pudding

We still have English Christmas pudding.

German Stollen

Another recent favourite in the UK is German stollen with its sweet marzipan filling, 

Italian Panetonne

Italian panettone - yummy. I love the high, domed bread. The classic panettone is plain, or with currants. Nowadays many more flavours are sold in caffes.

Panettone. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Leftover Drinks

Bubbles - Kings' Ginger. Champagne. Cava. Prosecco. 

Spirits

Harveys Bristol Cream Sherry - at least it keeps. Let's take a closer look.

Nibbles

Scottish shortbread biscuits. Chocolates - Belgian chocolates. Chocolate from Hotel Chocolat.

Just around the calendar corner of the year, in Asia, China, Singapore and Chinese areas of big cities such as New York and London there will be Chinese New Year with orange lanterns and decorations on buildings, oranges, and boxes of biscuits for neighbours and friends and club members and colleagues.

Christmas Food and gifts Around the World: UK, USA, Europe and Singapore - turkey, Yule Cake and stollen

UK

In the UK the usual Christmas dinner is turkey with roast potatoes, sprouts, and cranberry sauce. 

Christmas pudding is served with custard. For added drama, some people set fire to the brandy. I have enough excitement in my life, without that worry. 

After lunch, 3 pm, you listen to the Queen's speech. More Champagne is sold at Christmas (and for New Year's Eve) than any other time of the year.

Homes have Christmas trees.  Hung with baubles (round or spherical ornaments). A star or angel is on top. Parcels, real containing presents, or empty

A big Norway Spruce is in Trafalgar Square, London, England. The tall tree was given by Norway to the UK after WW2 as a thank you for help. Carol singing, in aid of charity, and other performances take place around the tree. The tree, over 20 feet high, has to be the biggest gift I have ever seen.

I save wrapping paper. It is cheap after Xmas. 

After Christmas the prices of Christmas pudding come down. My husband likes to be given and to buy books. I have a lucky dip bag from when I was organizing events for Toastmasters and had to supply small gifts for lots of people. I went around Daiso and kept spotting things which looked useful. I over-bought.

Lucky dip usually works well. We get to pick out one item each, or two, or three. I and my husband are very strange. We like different things each year. What wasn't wanted two years ago, and raised a frown, (a puffer for cleaning a laptop keyboard) turned out to be just what was wanted a year later and was pounced on with glee. 

USA

Turkey is eaten at Thanksgiving so the Americans want a change at Christmas time. In the USA, Christmas pudding is called plum pudding. You can find it all year!

France

The French have yule cakes. Log cakes. You can make your own chocolate spiral cake, with chocolate icing on top. Use a fork to make wavy lines across the top. 

Germany

The Germans eat gingerbread biscuits, gingerbread men and gingerbread women and animals, make gingerbread houses. Best of all, they eat stollen! Stollen, with a centre of marzipan, is my favourite.

We have bought stollen in supermarkets in the UK, in Tesco, Stollen bites in Lidl (which is a German supermarket, low prices) ; and in Singapore this year from Cold Storage supermarket in Jellita shopping mall, a couple of stops on the bus from Holland Village.

Stollen in Tesco in the UK. Photo credit by Angela Lansbury.

Czech Republic

In Prague we had a hotel dinner (when all restaurants were fully booked in addition to charging high prices). The meal featured fish soup followed by carp with potato salad.

Alas, Christmas is over. But you can still buy plum pudding in the USA. You can look forward to panettone in the supermarkets in London, England, at Easter.

Useful Websites

https://germanfoods.org/recipes/dresdner-stollen/

Stollen, Marzipan covered in chocolate and other German food:

https://germanfoods.org/shop-german-foods/?s=&bc-sort=featured&bigcommerce_category=christmas-cakes-and-stollen

Youtube has many videos on making stollen.

About the Author Angela Lansbury

BIOGRAPHY

Angela Lansbury B A Hons ACG ALB PM5 EH5 DL5 VC5 
The Author of several books including  Etiquette For Every Occasion. Wedding Speeches & Toasts. How to be the Best Man. Quick Quotations. Who Said What When.

Blogs travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com

dressofthedayangela.blogspot.com

translateforfun.blogspot.com

Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Speakers Club Vice President Public Relations (VPPR), Previous President

Join BHA 1st Wednesday 7pm and 3rd Saturday 2 pm Singapore time 

Vice President Public Relations (VP PR) of Tampines Changkat Advanced;

Secretary of weekly online Singapore International Dynamic Toastmasters Speakers’ Club;

Member and past president of Harrovians toastmasters club, UK; Past member of HOD Toastmasters, London. Past member in Singapore of: Toastmasters Club of Singapore (TCS); Tiarel; and Senja Cashew.

More details from Toastmasters International find a club.

Regular attendee at annual Swanwick Writers’ School, England.

Regular attendee at annual Writers’ Holiday, Wales.

Contributor to poetry readings, and after tea courses on: Speaking On Radio To Promote Books; and Plots And Character.

Winner of many club and area speaking contests in the UK and Singapore.

Language advisor to Empire Toastmasters club in Indonesia.

Language and speech workshops in Singapore.

Speaker on radio and TV in England, Scotland, the USA, and Australia.

Compiler of a school course on public speaking for teachers to prepare pupils for school open days with attending ceremonies before government ministers, Singapore.

Former member of Harrow Writers’ Circle, London, and two writing groups in Singapore.

Angela is on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Twitter. She would be delighted to link up with new friends.

 Please share links to your favourite posts.

 

Stollen - yes' you can buy it in Singapore. At Cold Storage, Jellita, worldwide, or make your own.

Stollen - German Christmas cake, log shape, with a marzipan centre. In the huge Cold Storage at Jellita I asked an assistant to point out the stollen and on a large display I saw three varieties. 

Three types of stollen in a supermarket in Singapore. 

One packet trumpeted traditional. Another attracted me with almonds. The third mentioned marzipan. Ah! The picture showed the yellow centre. That was the one we bought. 

Photo shortly. When I find where the family have hidden it from me! 

How much did it cost? Eleven Singapore dollars or more, depending on the size and ingredients. 

(I had searched in vain for Stollen previously in other supermarkets, such as Fairprice in Bukit Panjang.) Last night at an online Toastmasters International meeting of the Nee Soon South Toastmasters, the President who was Topics Master of the Day asked, 'What is your favourite Christmas food?" 

For a moment, I thought, Christmas pudding. But I decided to mention stollen, which is less well known. 

I succeeded at selling the idea. The topics master asked me for the recipe.  I advised her to do what we do with French recipes. Go the country of origin, find a recipe, and run it through Translate Google. 

Simple English wiki says

Stollen (German pronunciation: [ˈʃtɔlən] (listen) or [ʃtɔln] (listen)) is a fruit bread of nuts, spices, and dried or candied fruit, coated with powdered sugar or icing sugar. It is a traditional German bread eaten during the Christmas season, when it is called Weihnachtsstollen (after "Weihnachten", the German word for Christmas) or Christstollen (after Christ).

Simple wiki shows this picture

The general Wikipedia article has much more information. 

Stollen is stocked in supermarkets until Christmas. In Germany it was originally a pre-lent food. It is sold by the slice in the outdoor or indoor Christmas markets in Germany. If the shops are out of stock, or it is out of season, you can make your own.

You might want to allow time for the currants and raisins to soak overnight in alcohol, and for the bread to rise is using yeast. You can buy the candied peel and marzipan or almond paste, or make your own. 

Almond Paste

Almond paste has bigger chunks of almond but less sugar and is designed for spreading and cooking, rather than Marzipan which is sometimes sold as a thicker solid lump, texture like fudge, for carving (or spreading on top of cakes. 

Beware Of The Sugar Content

My late father was diabetic and loved marzipan. When I went to buy it, I was horrified to see that one month the blocks of marzipan were fifty per cent sugar. But the next month - even worse, 75% sugar!

What is Frangipane?

Frangipane is not just the Italian word for marzipan, as I used to think, wrongly, I have just learned. Frangipane has extra ingredients besides the sugar and almonds, flour, eggs and milk, maybe more. It is more like an almond flavoured yellow custard.

YouTube has many videos on how to make stollen and one on the factory in Germany which makes stollen.

Useful Websites

https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stollen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stollen

My previous DIY stollen made using a Tesco kit, Waitrose bites and more.

https://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com/2017/11/almonds-marzipan-stollen-and-costa.html

Recipes

Without the marzipan but with pecans (leave out nuts for those allergic to nuts)

https://recipes.fandom.com/wiki/German_Stollen_Bread

https://www.internationaldessertsblog.com/german-christmas-stollen-recipe/

Complete guide including the marzipan

https://www.daringgourmet.com/stollen-german-christmas-bread/

Recipes

https://germanfoods.org/recipes/dresdner-stollen/

Buy Online

https://germanfoods.org/shop-german-foods/?s=&bc-sort=featured&bigcommerce_category=christmas-cakes-and-stollen

About the Author Angela Lansbury

BIOGRAPHY

Angela Lansbury B A Hons ACG ALB PM5 EH5 DL5 VC5 
The Author of several books including  Etiquette For Every Occasion. Wedding Speeches & Toasts. How to be the Best Man. Quick Quotations. Who Said What When.

Blogs travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com

dressofthedayangela.blogspot.com

translateforfun.blogspot.com

Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Speakers Club Vice President Public Relations (VPPR), Previous President

Join BHA 1st Wednesday 7pm and 3rd Saturday 2 pm Singapore time 

Vice President Public Relations (VP PR) of Tampines Changkat Advanced;

Secretary of weekly online Singapore International Dynamic Toastmasters Speakers’ Club;

Member and past president of Harrovians toastmasters club, UK; Past member of HOD Toastmasters, London. Past member in Singapore of: Toastmasters Club of Singapore (TCS); Tiarel; and Senja Cashew.

More details from Toastmasters International find a club.

Regular attendee at annual Swanwick Writers’ School, England.

Regular attendee at annual Writers’ Holiday, Wales.

Contributor to poetry readings, and after tea courses on: Speaking On Radio To Promote Books; and Plots And Character.

Winner of many club and area speaking contests in the UK and Singapore.

Language advisor to Empire Toastmasters club in Indonesia.

Language and speech workshops in Singapore.

Speaker on radio and TV in England, Scotland, the USA, and Australia.

Compiler of a school course on public speaking for teachers to prepare pupils for school open days with attending ceremonies before government ministers, Singapore.

Former member of Harrow Writers’ Circle, London, and two writing groups in Singapore.

Angela is on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Twitter. She would be delighted to link up with new friends.

 Please share links to your favourite posts.

Christmas Gifts From Travellers To Travellers, from Journals, Maps and Suitcase Covers, to Aprons, Chocolates, Key Rings, Umbrellas and More

My ebook on improve your English with alliteration is available for download from Amazon. 

English dictionaries of all sizes can be bought on line. 

If you are obsessed with Stonehenge or the Loch Ness Monster, or know somebody who is, then, failing a trip to visit the original and/or the museum, a key ring, poster or book is a cheaper alternative to stick inside a Christmas stocking for amusement. Or inside a Christmas cracker, the DIY sort.

I bought towelling bath mit from Primark with a Union Jack.

Gifts From England

Chocolate

Passing through Heathrow airport? We bought Terry's white chocolate  and orange bar. It tastes good. It's different.

Tesco Express in London often has cakes topped with Thornton chocolates.

Also look for Kendal Mint cake.

English Heritage

Union flag (union jack) golf umbrella, twenty five pounds (plus postage?) with navy outside and the Union Jack inside.

The cheapest union Jack tee-shirts are on ebay. Some of them have messy edges to the flag. You can buy tee-shirts with the flag large or small and the normal way up or sideways.

Stonehenge

Spinner key ring; oven glove. Socks. Bottle opener key ring. 

Book: I never knew that about England. Tells you where Wendy and Long John Silver are buried, and where King Alfred burned the cakes.

British food includes:

Bakewell tart, malt loaf. Cadbury's chocolates. Quality Street chocolates. Scones. Mrs Beeton recipe book. Fray Bentos tinned steak and kidney pudding. Marks & Spencers thick cut marmalade. Ginger in syrup in glass jars from supermarkets.

Harrods goods with their symbol. Toby jugs. Wedgwood crockery. (All cheaper in the January sales - which often start online as early as Boxing Day, Dec 26, or even Christmas Day, Dec 25.)

Diabetic and gluten free goods from pharmacies. 

Kosher and halal goods from supermarkets and speciality grocers.

Large numbers of Chinese and Indian (mainly Pakistani and North Indian) restaurants, some vegetarian restaurants. Indian sarees and items from areas such as Southall in London. Bit Chinese mall on the Edgware Road in London.

Numerous art galleries and museums and stately homes have shops. Sherlock Holmes items from their shop near baker street station.

UK flag mask

https://fineartamerica.com/featured/united-kingdom-union-jack-england-britain-flag-vintage-distressed-finish-design-turnpike.html?product=face-mask-flat

Winter Novelties

Paperweights which show falling snow when turned upside down.

Travel Novelties

You can buy a suitcase, a suitcase set, or suitcase cover with pictures of the UK, the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France, or the words New York.

I bought a cover to cover a scruffy suitcase. The cover prevented me from reaching into the outside pocket which was a nuisance. However, you might find it adds security by preventing things from falling out or to stop petty pilferage.

Gifts From Scotland

Loch Ness Monster

Scottish shortbread biscuits

Tartan hat or kilt, tee-shirt or teddy bear toys or key rings wearing tartan kilts and hats .

Whisky

Gifts From Wales

Welsh cakes

Welsh love spoons

Tee towels with words of Welsh or Welsh recipes

 

Gifts from Ireland

Aran sweaters

Items in green and with four leaf clover motifs

Personalize

Personalized with your surname in the middle, Monopoly, ordered from Selfridges.

Looking for a bargain?

Lidl, the low price German supermarket in London, England, before Xmas sells stollen bites from Germany.

Hanukah theme gifts will be reduced price after the end of hanukah, widely sold in London UK supermarkets, Jewish delis and shops, and the USA bargain stores.

After Christmas you can stock up on Christmas theme items for next year.

Soon to come, more ideas for you. 

Classic companies in the UK include department stores Hamleys, Selfridges, Harrods, Marks & Spencer, Tesco. 

Classic chocolates are Cadbury's, Thorntons, After Eight, Hotel Chocolat, Terry's.

Classic flags are the Union Jack, flags of Scotland, Wales, and Eire, the USA, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, England, Football teams.

Classic US authors include Dickens, the Brontes, Jane Austen.

Classic US authors include Edgar Allen Poe.

Classic Christian gifts are from churches and cathedrals.

Classic Jewish gifts are from synagogues and Jewish gift shops and Jewish museums.

Travel Diaries

Cheap Travel Diary For Children

If you cannot travel, you can cut out or print pictures for a wishlist. Or start collecting stamps. I remember as a child seeing pagodas and Ankor Wat. When I finally reached Ankor Wat, at retirement age, it exceeded my expectations, and it was not the only building in that style but one of many. Also, by then it was not remote and eerie, but surrounded by sellers of postcards and drinks and even restaurants in huts and one storey wooden buildings. 

Finally, there's the KrisFlyer shop.

Useful Websites

Child's union Jack cap

https://www.lazada.sg/products/union-jack-uk-england-flag-united-kingdom-united-kingdom-england-london-kids-baseball-hats-childrens-cap-hip-hop-caps-childrens-cap-hat-hats-for-children-childs-summer-cap-sun-hats-cap-for-boy-

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-10274603/Christmas-gift-ideas-traveller-life-luggage-tags-heated-jackets.html

https://www.english-heritageshop.org.uk/

https://www.english-heritageshop.org.uk/collections/exclusive-collections/stonehenge-medallion-collection

https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/stonehenge/things-to-do/shop/

https://www.selfridges.com/GB/en/cat/board-games-monopoly-by-you-silver-tokens-personalised-board-game_R03866787/

https://www.notonthehighstreet.com/

https://www.britishcornershop.co.uk/

https://www.theirishstore.com/irish-gifts

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Traditional_foods_of_the_United_Kingdom

Tee shirts with Union Jacks on ebay

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/282830021956?_trkparms=amclksrc%3DITM%26aid%3D1110006%26algo%3DHOMESPLICE.SIM

https://www.facebook.com/KrisShop/

https://fineartamerica.com/featured/united-kingdom-union-jack-england-britain-flag-vintage-distressed-finish-design-turnpike.html?product=face-mask-flat

About the Author

About the author of this blog

About the Author of this blog, Author Angela Lansbury

BIOGRAPHY

Angela Lansbury B A Hons ACG ALB PM5 EH5 DL5 VC5 
The Author of several books, including: Etiquette For Every Occasion. Wedding Speeches & Toasts. How to be the Best Man. Quick Quotations. Who Said What When.

Blogs travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com

dressofthedayangela.blogspot.com

translateforfun.blogspot.com

Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Speakers Club Vice President Public Relations (VPPR), Previous President

Join BHA 1st Wednesday 7pm and 3rd Saturday 2 pm Singapore time 

Vice President Public Relations (VP PR) of Tampines Changkat Advanced;

Secretary of weekly online Singapore International Dynamic Toastmasters Speakers’ Club;

Member and past president of Harrovians toastmasters club, UK; Past member of HOD Toastmasters, London. Past member in Singapore of: Toastmasters Club of Singapore (TCS); Tiarel; and Senja Cashew.

More details from Toastmasters International find a club.

Regular attendee at annual Swanwick Writers’ School, England.

Regular attendee at annual Writers’ Holiday, Wales.

Contributor to poetry readings, and after tea courses on: Speaking On Radio To Promote Books; and Plots And Character.

Winner of many club and area speaking contests in the UK and Singapore.

Language advisor to Empire Toastmasters club in Indonesia.

Language and speech workshops in Singapore.

Speaker on radio and TV in England, Scotland, the USA, and Australia.

Compiler of a school course on public speaking for teachers to prepare pupils for school open days with attending ceremonies before government ministers, Singapore.

Former member of Harrow Writers’ Circle, London, and two writing groups in Singapore.

Angela is on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Twitter. She would be delighted to link up with new friends.

I  also have a blog on comic poems.

 Please share links to your favourite posts. 

Top twenty desserts - here's my list - what's yours? Where to see, eat, try and buy or make them - anticipating Xmas holiday meals

Would you like a cake like dessert to finish lunch, or dinner? A surprise to make a grand end to a dinner party?

What about Christmas? In England people make Christmas cake or Christmas cake well in advance. The alcohol helps preserve it.

The French instead have buche Noel. 

The Italians, Spanish and Venezuelans have Panetonne. It keeps in a tin for months. 

1 Sicilian Pishacio layer cake 

(muffin)

Italian. In the UK from Etna Cafe

 

2 Lokshen Pudding

Jewish, Ashkenazi style, from B & K

Lokshen pudding from B & K, Hatch End. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Noodles with succulent sultanas (large dried grapes from the island of that name) and lemon juice for added flavour.

3 Christmas cake or wedding cake or fruit cake with yellow marzipan and white icing. Make sure it has almonds, marzipan, not just white icing. The hard icing helps keep it moist. The marzipan adds flavour, and nutrition from the almonds.

English

From Wiki.

Recipe from

https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Cookbook:Christmas_Cake

4 Stollen with a Marzipan centre

German

From Marks & Spencer or Tesco and other supermarkets around Christmas holiday time

Check the picture to see the amount of almond paste in the centres.

5 Yemas de Cartagena

Spanish

Cartagena is in the Murcia region of South East Spain, up the cost from Marbella. We tried this declidious dessert in a Parador hotel, a former historic ruin reconstructed and turned into a tourism-attracting hotel as part of the nationwide network serving local food.

Yemas are eggs. We had a creamy dessert in the hotel.

There are also wonderful solid chestnut or almond bars or bite size pieces in divided chocolate boxes. 

https://nativespain.com/celebrations/christmas/turron-de-yema-tostada-spanish-christmas-egg-yolk-turron-spanish-recipe/

6 Apple Strudel

B & K deli take away or eat it, Hatch End or Edgware in NW London, England 

Apple Strudel. Pastry folded over filling of apple chunks. Photo by Angela Lansbury

7 Baklava

With real nuts. Avoid the sort made with cheaper peanuts.

Greek and middle European and middle eastern.

Baklava in Sofia, capital of Bulgaria. Wiki.

8 Summer Pudding

From Waitrose.

9 Bread and Butter Pudding

Bread pudding, or bread and butter pudding. Layers of bread soaked in milk. With sultanas or raisins.

10 New York style Cheesecake

Baked. A cake. Not a mousse! 

From Carnegie deli in Wikipedia.

11 Tarte Tatin

French apple torte. Also known as upside down cake. Thin pastry base and thinly sliced apples with apricot see-through glaze.

Can also be made with pears. Overlapping slices in a circle, or on a grid.

12 Mango Sticky Rice pudding 

Fresh mango and sticky rice. Singapore and Asian countries. Thailand. The Philippines uses coconut and chocolate.

13 Ipswich Almond Pudding

A cold dessert. Unusual. A great cake if you can't cook or don't want to risk something going wrong, or want to prepare in advance. I found the recipe in a looseleaf file or regional UK recipes issued by the tourist board years ago. We used to make this for dinner parties when we were just married. 

You use sponge fingers as the base and sides, soaking them in milk plus alcohol. Add layers of alternating double cream with ground almonds, more soaked sponge fingers, and whipped double cream. Refrigerate to help it to set and keep the cream fresh. Even better the next day when evaporation intensifies the flavour.

14 Surprise Mock Egg

From the now no longer Haro restaurant which was at Little Bedwyn. We would drive hours there and back for their expensive but exquisite meals on special occasions such as a birthday or wedding anniversary. The egg served like a boiled egg in an egg cup with a meringue outside and a mango flavoured yellow inside. 

To counteract over sweetness and add crunch and sustaining cereal, a salted shortbread biscuit as a reminder of the oblong 'finger' slice of toast dipped in a boiled egg when we were children.

Photo by Angela Lansbury.

15 Chocolate Lava Cake/ Melted Chocolate Puddings/ Chocolate Fondant (Chocolate bomb)

Served at Petrus (expensive) and many other restaurants. Other versions have cold white ice cream centres for contrasting colour.

Hot outside chocolate pudding with molten chocolate or chocolate pudding centre.

French bombe glacee from Wiki.

Chocolate with ice cream centre was the dessert at the wedding of Queen Elizabeth II.

16 Welsh cakes

Best served fresh and hot with melting butter. I had them hot at tea time in the Fishguard Hotel in Wales at Writers' Holiday.

17 Meringue with fruit - Pavlova

Hard white meringue base ring with chopped or whole fresh fruit in the circular centre, such as strawberries. The national dish of Australia and New Zealand, both countries claiming it was invented there. Broken up meringue in the UK is called Eton Mess. Easier to make.

From Wiki.

18 Christmas Pudding

UK. Americans serve it all year and call it plum pudding.

Heston Blumenthal added a whole citrus fruit in the middle. This was sold through supermarkets at a premium price.

Photo by Angela Lansbury.

19 Large thin Crepes (Pancake) with Grand Marnier liqueur.

Feature of Mont St Michel in the north of France.

20 Salzburger Knockerl

A huge dish to be shared. In Austrial we had soft meringues floating in sauce. Salzburg. Vienna.  The French version is Isles flottentes or floating islands.

Post draft saved to guard against loss. More text and photos being added.

For tea time in the UK we like hot crumpets with butter and jam. Some people like waffles, which come in at least two varieties, Belgian, thick, with the square or oblong holes, and American, thin, any shape, and can be served for breakfast, or Vietnamese as a snack, round thin and folded over the filling.

I haven't mentioned my former favourites which no longer have a novelty value.

1 Crème brulée or burned cream. 

2  Pot de chocolate (chocolate pot).

3 Fruit salad with caramelised ginger which we make at home.

4 Gulub Jam/Jamun. Indian. Two or three balls in syrup. Our favourite dessert in Indian restaurants (which is London are often owned by Pakistanis or people from Bangldesh who have lived in London for years.) We like it more than kulfi (Indian ice cream). We bought a packet mix from Mustaphas' store in Singapore. However, we found it hard to keep the balls from falling apart. 

Useful Websites

https://nativespain.com/celebrations/christmas/turron-de-yema-tostada-spanish-christmas-egg-yolk-turron-spanish-recipe/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molten_chocolate_cake

About the Author

Angela Lansbury was born and bred in Britain, and has lived in the USA and Singapore. Her family have worked in or lived in Spain and Switzerland. She is a member of Toastmasters Clubs meeting on Zoom with visitors from the UK and USA, India, Sri Lanka, Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Australia. Through the Toastmasters mentoring program Angela has connected with individuals in Vietnam and Romania, a different connection each month. Please come to the next BHA Toastmasters meeting on the 3rd Saturday afternoon every month. 

Christmas Customs, Food and Drink Around The World - turkey, carp, midnight mass, Christmas cake, Christmas pudding, stollen and panettone

Turkey lunch.

Christmas dinner in London consists of turkey with red cranberry sauce, green Brussels sprouts and roast potatoes. Other options include a bread or bread and chestnut stuffing; and small sausages wrapped in bacon, called pigs in blankets.

Why turkey? To make a change. Because a turkey is larger therefore more convenient when you have extra visitors to entertain to a Christmas meal. After that, what's next?

Christmas Pudding

This hearty, filling dish is followed by dark, dried fruit Christmas pudding. Accompanied by cream.

I find this too rich. I prefer the contrasting colour of yellow custard. 

Christmas Pudding in Dona Theresa Restaurant, Hatch End. The restaurant used to find customers were ringing another Dona Theresa Restaurant elsewhere in London, so the restaurant name was change to Zia Theresa, meaning Aunt Theresa.

You can see on the right of the picture the words Dona Theresa, which is hte name of a restaurant in Hatch End.

An individual Xmas pudding with a single portion of cream at a Christmas dinner in an Italian restaurant in Hatch End, London, England. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

We used to make a Christmas pudding weeks in advance. As it dries out, the flavour improves. An alcoholic drink can be added to the mixture as a preservative.

Another year, we bought three small size Christmas puddings from different supermarkets and compared them. When we made our choice, we bought a large one for Christmas Day.

This went on for years. Until the revolution. Heston Blumenthal introduced a citrus fruit in the middle of a Xmas pudding. The novelty sold out.

Now it has become a Xmas staple. Not cheap. Sixteen pounds sterling when I looked on Dec 17 2020.

In England Xmas pudding is sold for Xmas. The price comes down in January. 

When we went America we found that Xmas pudding was available all year. But it was known by its old name, plum pudding. A pudding made, no longer with plums, but with dried fruit such as currants.

As a child growing up in in London, England, I assumed that turkey, Christmas pudding, and Christmas cake were all the standard all over the world. To a limited extent this is true, Many countries, those still in the Commonwealth, continue to enjoy the old traditions. Europe does things differently.

However, the English speaking Americans also don't eat turkey at Christmas. Why? Because they have already had turkey for Thanksgiving dinner in November. 

When we spent Christmas in Prague, Czech Republic, we had Christmas dinner there at our hotel. The main dish was fish. 

Afterwards we went to midnight mass at the nearby church. The service was in the Czech language. No translation into German, Russian nor English. Luckily, we could copy the others standing up and sitting down when instructed to do so by the priest. I could see the page numbers of the hymn book of the lady standing next to me. I recognized some of the famous music. If I remember rightly, we recognized Silent Night, Ave Maria and a classical piece of music.

In England, after Christmas Day dinner (lunch), when we Brits are in England, we watch the Queen's Speech. (Actually it is called the Queen's Christmas message. The  Queen's speech is what she give to Parliament when she opens it after their recession.)

It's a treat to hear the Queen speaking the Queen's English. Here I am at Heathrow airport, London, England, beside a cut out model of the queen.

Tea time is the time when we produce the Christmas Cake. A heavy fruit cake. With white icing on top. Reminding you of snow. Most supermarkets can supply miniature cake topping such as red hat Santas, green plastic Christmas trees, reindeer.

Or you can buy a complete cake. Marks and Spencer usually stock one in a round, square or oblong shape. It must have marzipan under the icing. Make sure the expiry date is after Xmas day!

One year we left for Singapore before Xmas. I bought a Xmas cake. When I got it home, I discovered that the expiry date was before Xmas day.

Again, I had always assumed Xmas cake was universal. Until the foods of Europe reached the UK supermarkets.

Another British favourite is mince pies. Found everywhere in supermarkets. Cheap.

Mince pie.

Yule Log

If you visit Prague for Xmas, as we did, you can see the statue of composer Smetana, and a star commemorating him in the walk of fame.

France offers the world what the Americans call the Yule log. The English call it a log cake. The French call it buche noel. (Not to be confused with the French word bouche which means mouth.) This alternative cake can be a a Swiss roll, or spiral of sponge, with a chocolate covering, You scrape the chocolate icing with the tines of a fork to make it look like a log. Reminders of a log fire to warm you at Christmas time, in the snowy winter.

Stollen - Germany

Stollens are a solid roll shape cake with a scattering of dried fruit inside, white icing sugar covering the outside and, ideally, a marzipan centre. Stollens vary wildly in size and marzipan content. You can buy a traditional large roll, or cheaper individual miniature portions, which is more calorie controlling. 

Stollens could have a large marzipan centre, a thin one like a pencil, or, disappointingly, no marzipan at all. If you are a marzipan addict, check the ingredients and/or photo on the packaging before buying. 

Small individual stollen.

Large stollen.

Stollen with individual filling.

One year I bought a stollen ingredients kit. I wanted to know how it is made. Simple, really. Soak dried fruit overnight. Next day, mix up a batter. Add the fruit, well distributed. Roll out your soft marzipan into the length of the intended cake. Roll the marzipan in the cake mixture. Bake. Dust with icing sugar. However, the results were not as good as the top quality ones. Timing is critical to get it done but soft, with enough marzipan but not too much. 

Marzipan is basically ground almonds mixed with fine sugar. When my late father was diagnosed with late-onet diabetes, which is diet related, I started checking sugar content of everything I bought. I found that marzipan content varied from 75% almonds for the dearer brands, to fifty percent sugar for the cheaper supermarkets own brand. 

Panettone - Italy, Spain and Venezuela

More photos and text and websites will be added later.

See Statues of Smetana in Prague.

To sum up, you can enjoy the best of every country now in supermarkets around the world. My top three countries for Christmas are the UK, Singapore and America. The UK has Christmas decoration and crackers in window displays and restaurants. Singapore has street lights and decorated malls. American has giant displays on home lawns and rooftops and office blocks and skyscrapers.

Useful Websites

https://www.waitrose.com/ecom/products/heston-from-waitrose-hidden-orange-christmas-pudding/700239-99398-99399

About the Author

Angela Lansbury is a travel writer and photographer, author and speaker, fashionista. Please share links to your favourite posts or one or more of the blogs

travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com

dressofthedayangela.blogspot.com