Christmas in the time of Covid - Christmas Pudding Creation

I may have missed the boat this Thanksgiving Day with regard to 'Stir-Up Sunday,' but I'm never quite sure when that falls, so, in this household, it falls precisely when I'm ready and happen to have enough ingredients lined up - and even then there's usually a last minute pop to the shops to retrieve additional dried fruit or a bottle of stout. 

As with so many other things in 2020, this year I've opted for change, embraced the apple theme and gone full Somerset Brandy/Calvados, in generous proportions. The dried fruit has been soaking for 48 hours as I keep forgetting to assemble the rest of the ingredients; sloshing more apple brandy over the fruit as I pass is my way of preserving the future pudding, but perhaps not my liver! The addition this year of diced dried apple and grated Bramley will, I hope, make this year's pudding a little lighter than some years when, 'because it's Christmas and Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without the pudding, aflame, brought to the table,' we've wo/manfully had a slice, slathered it in brandy butter, double cream and clotted and sometimes a brandy custard sauce - Go Big or Go Home - and then collapsed in our respective sloth-like heaps only to stir from our fun amidst the wrapping paper and tinsel to replenish glasses and slake our parched throats. 

The 'lighter' pudding is partial acknowledgement that our waistlines may not be quite as they were back in March - and when we also have chocolate alternatives for the non-dried fruit members of the family, the temptation to double up is already too great. 

I know my limitations and I'm not good at restraint, so with the latest addition to our collection of Christmas whimsy, (see above), Stir up, Wish well and Have a glass! with/for the cook!