The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Christmas memories kept alive in the kitchen
Welsh traditions meet Southern ones during the holidays.
One of our family’s holiday traditions is a Christmas Eve reading of the Dylan Thomas classic “A Child’s Christmas in Wales.”
The celebrated poet’s stories of the Christmases of his youth are particularly meaningful to us since some of our own family Yuletide traditions (mainly food) have roots in the country known as the Land of Song, thanks to my Welsh mother.
Despite having trained to be a ballerina — and being advised by a teacher in a domestic science class (British for home economics) to marry a rich man because she was so hopeless in the kitchen — Mom became a celebrated cook in her new hometown of Athens after moving to Georgia as a war bride after World War II.
She adapted her own food traditions to those of her Georgiaborn husband, so my brothers and I grew up with a melding of Southern and Welsh customs.
Almost as enjoyable as the delicious treats that came out of Mollie Parry King’s kitchen at Christmastime were the stories of her childhood, and her vivid memories of her own mother making Christmas puddings, fruitcakes and mince pies.
Her family was large and hospitable, so a dozen puddings, six large fruitcakes and hundreds of mince pies were annually prepared.
In a Christmas reminiscence for a local weekly paper, Mom recalled that the pudding mixture contained raisins, currants, suet, several dozen fresh brown eggs, pounds of candied peel, chopped apples, lemon juice and rind, nutmeg (grated), cinnamon, bread crumbs, flour and sugar — liberally laced with “spirits.”
“Each family member had one big turn of the massive spoon and made a wish, then the pudding basins were greased and filled two-thirds of their capacity, covered with buttered muslin, which