From Proust’s madeleines to Nora Ephron’s key lime pie, life’s most profound moments with those we love are so often defined by the food we taste. For photographer Liz Brown and her mum, Jane Spencer, it’s the taste of Christmas cake that symbolises their bond – family love has been baked into it for generations, even before they were born.
“My grandma and my mum always used to bake their Christmas cake together, then my mum would bake with me as a girl,” says Jane, 71. She, in turn, continues the family tradition with her own daughter Liz. “The day we bake the cake is like a watershed day for us,” says Jane. “Everyone loves the smell of a fruit cake, it warms the whole house and marks the transition from autumn to winter.”
In centuries gone by, “stir-up Sunday” took place five weeks before Christmas – on the last Sunday before Advent. Family members would take turns to stir a pudding mixture (from east to west – the direction the wise men took when searching for the baby Jesus) and make a wish.
Jane and Liz share the fun as they bake their Christmas cake using the recipe Jane has followed for 50 years
Jane and Liz have adapted this tradition for the modern world. They tend to bake their cake over the autumn half-term because Liz, now raising her own three children – Lydia, William and Theo – has to schedule the stir-up to make sure the whole family is there. “My husband thinks I’m borderline insane because I’ll wait all day for everyone to come home so they can all have a stir,” she says.
“This means some years the cake hasn’t gone into the oven until 10 o’clock at night – and it takes four or five hours to cook. It was the same when I was growing up. Me and Mum would stay up until the small hours waiting for it to bake. Dad would stir it and go to bed.”
With each generation comes another evolution of the cake recipe. “When it came to having my own home, I decided to do things my way,” says Jane. “I bought a Marks & Spencer cookery book and I’ve used its Christmas cake recipe every year since 1972.
“My Nana was born in 1896, became a spitfire mechanic during the second world war, and was a teetotaller – so her Christmas cake recipe involved just a teaspoon of rum,” says Jane. “My mother wasn’t a very proficient baker and her motto was: ‘Be your own person,’ so she supported me in my change of recipe.”
Liz has adapted the recipe further by increasing the dose of rum that goes into the cake. “After we bake it, it sits quietly in a cupboard,” she says. “I feed it a little dribble twice a week – putting far more alcohol in than Mum ever did. When it gets to the third or fourth rum feed, that’s when I get excited about it.
Another change that Liz has introduced is the presentation. While for Jane, it’s the cake that counts, Liz has a flair for decoration, and her creations have become ever more elaborate. Last year, she made an Alpine village out of icing. “Mum’s icing is traditional,” says Liz. “She’ll rough up the top and stick on her Christmas ornaments.”
The pair are so close they often finish each other’s sentences. “When Mum dies, I’ll probably have to decorate our Christmas cake with all her ornaments every year,” Liz begins – as Jane finishes: “And that’ll be my legacy.”
The family’s Christmas baking ritual was an important part of Liz’s childhood, and when she became a mum herself, she realised it was a tradition she didn’t want to let disappear. “My second child, William, was due on Christmas Eve,” she says. “When I went into labour on 23 December, my first thought was: ‘But I haven’t finished the Christmas cake!’ So we called for the midwife and, while we were waiting for her to arrive, I iced and decorated the cake.
“When she walked into the kitchen, her first words were: ‘What the hell are you doing?’ because I was mid-contraction and making fondant penguins.
“I made a mummy, daddy, a little girl – which was my daughter, Lydia – and a baby penguin. That morning Lydia gained a brother and a Christmas cake, and she was more excited about the Christmas cake – on account of the penguins.”
Liz is looking forward to passing the tradition on to her own children. “William wants to be a chef and I can’t get him out of the kitchen, so I don’t think our tradition will die a death any time soon,” she says.
Christmas, like other religious festivals across the world, brings so many clans together year after year – even if it’s just for a single day. But it’s the specific ritual of baking together that bonds Jane and Liz, and links them to past generations. “All our traditions revolve around cake,” says Liz. “When you bake, you put your love into it.”
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