Preparation time: 2 hours
Cooking time: 10 minutes
Skill level: easy
Serves: 6
Recipe: David Myers and Simon King aka The Hairy Bikers

Ingredients

• double cream – 500ml
• caster sugar – 4 tbsp
• 3½ gelatine sheets
• raisins – 2 tbsp
• dark rum – 2 tbsp
• ground ginger – ¼ tsp
• ground allspice – ¼ tsp
• ground nutmeg – to taste
• 1 small handful berries, such as redcurrants, to serve

Place the raisins into a small bowl and cover with the rum. Set aside to soak for at least 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, soak the gelatine sheets in a bowl of cold water until softened. Drain and squeeze out any excess liquid using your hands.

In a heavy-based pan, heat the double cream, sugar and ground spices. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat until the mixture is simmering and simmer for 2-3 minutes, whisking until the sugar has dissolved.

Remove the cream mixture from the heat and whisk in the drained gelatine until dissolved. Drain the raisins and stir into the cream mixture (discard the soaking liquid).

Spoon the mixture into six moulds or ramekins. Set aside to cool completely, then cover with cling film and chill in the fridge for at least two hours, or until set.

To serve, dip the ramekins briefly into hot water to loosen each panna cotta and turn out onto serving plates. Scatter over some redcurrants to garnish.

Verdict: As we were at our Christmas residence in Berlin there were no ramekins, so a single bowl had to be employed; it took a little longer to extricate the Cotta from this receptacle but nonetheless it popped out in the end. The dessert was well set and super rich. The suggested portions are undoubtedly correct so if you see what you deem to be a small portion in front of you, fear not, you will be sated. The spices with the rum and the raisins give it the flavour of a delightfully creamy Christmas pudding, though obviously there needn’t be any seasonal constraints on its consumption

Drink: Don’t forget to knock back the raisin infused rum.

Entertainment: The Bickering of the Sisters, an occasional event that is literally not a joy to behold, even for the participants, doesn’t even require the fuel of alcohol, but the presence of a parent is usually sufficient as a catalyst.

So pick up a copy today and see how your Christmas could have been.

* Mustard and Cress – Press

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Interflora Merry Christmas Tray
£ 29.99

‘Send friends, family or colleagues something special for Christmas with this tasty collection of festive treats including two fine wines, mince pies, handmade fudge and fruit cake – all beautifully presented in a festive gift tray.’

Contents:

• Healthy Ideas Luxury Fruit & Nut Mix 160g
• The Old Chapel Bakery Luxury Hand Made Mince Pies X 3
• Maxwell & Franks 5″ Iced Fruit Cake
• Franks Luxury Biscuits Choc Chunk & Orange Mini Oat Biscuits 50g
• Elizabeth Shaw Amaretto Flutes 105g
• Kitchen Recipe Hand Made Vanilla Fudge 125g
• Cotes de Luberon Blanc Appellation Luberon Controlee 2008 37.5cl
• Cotes de Luberon Rouge Appellation Luberon Controlee 2008 37.5cl
• Presented in a Red Wicker Tray

As we cranked up the high-energy taste accelerator and prepared to bombard each component of the hamper with supersymmetry gustation beams (That’s enough clumsy Hadron Collider references – Ed) we were joined in the bunker by bon vivant and guest reviewer ‘Potkicker T’. We were excited. Our hair stood on end with anticipation and static electricity as we commenced the first historic tasting.

Cotes de Luberon Blanc Appellation Luberon Controlee 2008

Important things first, let’s crack open the booze. It’s good to see Interflora have sourced French wine rather than something heavier from the Southern Hemisphere and as a result have come up with a fine example of a light, fresh and very quaffable wine. We liked this.

Cotes de Luberon Rouge Appellation Luberon Controlee 2008

A quick search on the internet came up with a review which described this wine as ‘Fresh and forward, with solid plum and black currant fruit mingling with hints of garrigue and warm stone.’ Now I’ve no idea what a garrigue is and am struggling to conjure up the taste of warm stone, but I am in complete agreement with the reviewers conclusion of ‘Tasty. Drink now’ We liked this too.

Kitchen Recipe Hand Made Vanilla Fudge

Our guest reviewer happens to be one of the world’s leading experts in fudge, having devoured specimens of every hue and flavour in all five corners of the uncivilised world. So when she licks her thin cold lips and declares a fudge to be good, you can rest assured it is worthy of praise. Those lips were licked and that declaration was made… Interflora gives good fudge.

Elizabeth Shaw Amaretto Flutes

Bathing in the afterglow of a fudge rush our guest reviewer pointed out that not being hollow, these weren’t technically flutes and would more accurately be called Elizabeth Shaw Amaretto Sticks. This characteristic pedantry aside, all three us found this confection to be both smoothly chocolatey and generously flavoured of Amaretto. These were very tasty indeed and would make a welcome addition to anyone’s Christmas calorie intake.

Healthy Ideas Luxury Fruit & Nut Mix 160g

At the time of writing we have yet to open the fruit’n'nuts, however I don’t suspect these will be too controversial.

The Old Chapel Bakery Luxury Hand Made Mince Pies

Yumblog Towers hosts an annual mince pie and mulled wine party with Blogger-D’s mince pies being the talk of Bethnal Green Village, so any rival mince pie which claims to be hand made is bound to come under particular scrutiny. These pies were generous of filling and sweet of pastry with said pastry being just the right density thereby avoiding the perennial problem of pastry dominating filling which can afflict many a shop-bought pie. Pies aloft.

Maxwell and Franks 5″ Iced Fruit Cake

In a word – dry. In three words – dry and bland. In 54 words – despite looking lush and moist, this cake was dry and far too ‘cakey’ as it lacked both fruit and in particular ‘booze’. The marzipan didn’t have an almond punch and the icing tasted of little but lemon. It was by no means a disaster, just very disappointing considering the quality of everything we had tasted thus far. Blogger-D subsequently took this cake to work and put it before an undiscriminating 23-year-old intern with a very sweet tooth … a slice was eaten, but the rest was left in favour of a tin of Quality Street.

Franks Luxury Biscuits Choc Chunk and Orange Mini Oat Biscuits

And so to the one truly nasty item in the hamper. These little horrors were genuinely unpleasant and left us all with a greasy bitter aftertaste of margerine … not unsuprising considering this was a major ingredient.

Come on Frank, butter=luxury, margerine=budget.

Red Wicker Tray

The red wicker tray was a substantial structure which looked far too useful to throw away with the rest of the packaging. It could of course had been used to hold anything (probably not tropical fish though) and if left emptily lying around would quickly make itself useful by filling with bank statements, receipts, keys, loose change and the general detritus of modern life. At the time of reviewing, Yumblog Towers was having the Grand Entrance and Vaulted Hallway renovated and decorated, so ours conveniently became a handy DIY utility tray and combined storage solution.

Conclusion

All three of us were impressed and agreed that the ‘Interflora Merry Christmas Tray’ was well sourced, would make a welcome festive gift to anyone with a sweet tooth and at £29.99 represented very good value for money.

If Interflora improved the Christmas cake and ditched Frank and his bloody awful biscuits, this hamper would be near perfect.

If you would like to spread this message of Christmas joy, click on ‘Read more’ for our FREE Christmas card download.

Just imagine how lovely this will look on your Grans’ mantlepiece

It’s easy, click here to download the pdf, print out as many copies as you have friends, mount on card, cut, fold, write message, put in an envelope, address, stamp and post.