Nothing like family food to jog memories of Christmas Past. Merry Christmas 🎄

you finished EATING the whole cake.

It was basically butter, sugar, and a bit of bourbon (hence "hard&quot . You could substitute vanilla extract, brandy, or any other liquor but I never liked it as well as the bourbon. Of course, I like my bourbon straight up/no chaser.

even the teetotaling Baptist old ladies had to have that "flavoring"

I don't have anything to put it on, just love it

pour hard sauce over the pudding

But, going to try to get back on my low-carb food plan. the hard sauce was just a sweet fantasy Hope you had a merry Christmas!

so on holidays, she'd buy a few jars of ,maraschino cherries, chop the cherries, and use gelatin to thicken the boozy juice with the chopped cherries in a sheet pan. She'd cut the result into small cubes and put them into dessert dishes.

It was interesting but remarkably unsweet. It was also the first time I got buzzed when I was three or four. It had a quite a kick for a little kid.

I made plum pudding one year, one of those things that should be tried once so the amount of labor that goes into it can be appreciated in a restaurant, plus the hard sauce to go with it. I wasn't impressed enoigh with it to repeat it but everybody else seemed to enjoy it. I'd have preferred my grandmother's dessert jelly.

of course one could just spike the liquid. I hate those cherries so probably would not care anyway but it is interesting

but back in the day, sugar and booze were the preservatives.

Chocolate babka. The recipe comes from the Cook's Country cookbook.

I made the smart move of not mentioning it to family. If I screw it up, no one will miss it.

Ever since the "Babka" episode on Seinfeld I have wanted to try it

I love working with yeast dough

Family Christmas get together has been moved to this coming Friday due to a couple of sick members and a whole family out of town over the Christmas weekend

Consequently that chocolate pound cake is now history. Mr YD can't stay out of it when we have it in the house. He also finished off whatever custard I did not drink myself. So NOW I have to bake another one!!

I was watching "It's A Southern Thing" a couple of days ago and the video theme was Southern Christmas. Here is a quote: "Of course there will be egg nog...unless you are in Mississippi, Tennessee or Kentucky where you will get boiled custard" It's true!!

Another KY/TN Christmas tradition is Jam Cake, usually made with blackberry jam. It is basically a spice cake with the jam added and sometimes frosted with a cooked caramel icing. We always made one of those, a German Chocolate, and a coconut cake every year. My grandmother always made a brazil nut devil's food cake which was a ton of work because back then you could not get shelled Brazil Nuts, so she cracked and ground those suckers herself. They were folded into the batter; she slathered it with 7 minute frosting