A Dickens dinner

Despite the Cratchits' blistering poverty, a feast not dissimilar to those that will grace many tables this holiday season. A roasted goose stuffed to bursting, mashed potatoes, gravy, applesauce, and of course plum pudding.

It's a portrait of celebration - first cast by Charles Dickens during the mid-1800s in his now ubiquitous "A Christmas Carol" - so appealing, and so lovingly crafted, it's as if Dickens invented the holiday himself.

He didn't, of course. But his words wielded considerable influence over how people celebrated during his era - and ours.

"That image of everyone sitting around the table with a great big goose - this is when it comes about, in the 1830s and 1840s," says Alex Werner, a senior curator of social and working history at the Museum of London.

During the early part of the 19th century, Christmas was a ho-hum holiday. But Victorian-era conservatives became enamored with a longing for simpler, more ordered times.

Dickens' tale of Scrooge, the Cratchits and the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future helped fuel the phenomenon.

First published on Dec. 17, 1843, the work "A Christmas Carol, In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas," sold more than 5,000 copies by Christmas Eve. Reprints followed. So did stage productions and movies.

Many of the ideas now associated with Christmas started during that era, Werner says. Family members scattered for work in the newly industrial era travel home. Chestnuts roast. Greeting cards are dispatched.

Even the Christmas tree, long a staple in German households, took off in Britain after a print appeared in the Illustrated London News in 1848 showing Queen Victoria, Prince Albert and their children gathered around one.

"An awful lot of things we're living with are legacies of the Victorian era," says Valerie Mars, an honorary research fellow and social historian at University College London's anthropology department. "It's the recent old. It's accessible old."

And of course, there's the feast, usually anchored by a big bird supplemented with side dishes and spiced up with exotic offerings from other lands - currants, Madeira - then newly accessible because of improvements in transportation.

Dickens loved writing about food. He goes on at length about the people and offerings of Scrooge's world. There are parties and feasts, young boys sent to fetch monstrous turkeys, and loving descriptions of the Cratchits' Christmas dinner.

Dickens' characters seem equally enamored with food. He describes Mrs. Cratchit's nerves as her expectant family waited to see if the plum pudding (dessert) had cooked properly.

She entered the room, flushed "but smiling proudly; with the pudding, like a speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in a half-a-quartern of ignited brandy and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top."

Bob Cratchit is in love.

"He regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs. Cratchit since their marriage," Dickens wrote.

Those culinary traditions fascinate contemporary chefs such as Steven Kitchen, who is anxious to preserve the Victorian era's legacies. Kitchen, the executive chef at the Novelli Academy cookery school, researched pudding - he wanted to get it right. Traditional offerings were made on "Stir Up Sunday," the Sunday after Pentecost. That was well in advance of the holiday, allowing the flavors to meld.

"It needs time," he said.

There also was great ceremony in the making of it: It had to be stirred from east to west in honor of the Three Kings who visit Jesus after his birth in the manger. Everyone in the family stirred it once, making a wish.

But the whole pudding thing baffled Susan M. Rossi-Wilcox, author of "Dinner for Dickens: The Culinary History of Mrs. Charles Dickens's Menu Books."

Rossi-Wilcox, studied the menu books Dickens' wife, Catherine, compiled under the pseudonym, Lady Maria Clutterbuck. She studied menu after menu - and only found a fried version of the dessert in an early edition of the slim volume. The recipe was later dropped.

Dickens' wife didn't have a Christmas menu in her book, but did have menus for large gatherings. Rossi-Wilcox believes a big feast like Christmas might have included a white soup of almond base and perhaps a green pea soup, together with a fish course, like turbot, and a meat dish, such as rabbit curry. The main course - turkey or goose, for example - would be served with sides such as spinach, broccoli or peas. Sweets would include shimmering gelatin molded desserts or ice pudding, which is similar to ice cream.

Dickens might have eaten plum pudding, but it would have been the equivalent of a comfort food - certainly not something for Christmas.

"He's going to be having these very large jellies that glisten in the candlelight," Rossi-Wilcox said.

The last course in Victorian times was often savory - which is to say that Dickens might have wrapped up his feast with a nice lobster salad or, maybe, potted anchovies.

Try these recipes: Goose was so important in the Victorian-era people would save - and save - for the big day, often joining the equivalent of modern-day Christmas club accounts to afford a plump, juicy bird.

And because many families didn't have ovens at home, they would cook their birds at bakers' shops.

Dickens himself captured the anticipation when he described Mrs. Cratchit plunging the knife into the breast.

"One murmur of delight arose all around the board, and even Tiny Tim, excited by the two young Cratchits, beat on the table with the handle of his knife, and feebly cried, Hurrah!"'

When shopping for your own goose, plan for about 11/2 to 2 pound raw weight per serving. Geese are incredibly fatty birds and will shrink considerably during roasting.

For that reason, during roasting it is a good idea to periodically check the level of rendered fat in the roasting pan. If it is getting to high, use a basting bulb to remove some.

The recipe for Peppercorn-Thyme Roasted Goose comes from acclaimed Chicago chef Charlie Trotter.

Traditional recipes for steamed plum pudding are enough to make a Scrooge of even the merriest cook.

Often calling for days - sometimes weeks or months - of prep and careful nurturing (puddings were considered at their best only after aging), it's no wonder the denizens of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" were such a miserable lot.

This streamlined version simplifies the prep with the help of a food processor. This approach may not induce the sort of suffering key to Dickens' plots, but it will get this tasty treat on the table a lot faster.

The inspiration for this shortcut version came from a recipe in an 1861 cookbook written by Eliza Acton, an influential food writer from Dickens' era.

Steamed pudding molds are widely available online, most selling for about $20. These resemble small fluted cake pans with tightfitting covers designed to keep moisture inside during cooking.

Alternatively, if you don't have a steamed pudding mold, a large metal coffee can can be used. You will need several layers of foil and kitchen twine to cover and tightly seal the can during cooking.

And true to original recipes, this pudding improves with age. It's delicious right from the oven, but if you let it sit overnight (refrigerated or not) it becomes dense, chewy and richly delicious.

<div class="infoBox"> <h1>More Coverage</h1> <div class="infoBoxContent"> <div class="infoArea"> <h2>Recipes</h2> <ul class="links"> <li><a href="/story/?id=259503">Peppercorn-and-Thyme-Roasted Goose</li> <li><a href="/story/?id=259504">Steamed Plum Pudding </a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div>