I got to tell you, they’re not the best of cooks. But the British still know how to do things right sometimes.
Anyways, first a little background. In Summer of 1986, I got this book by this British Wiccan. Gerald Ferrar, I think was his name. Anyways, I never became a member of Wicca. But I was nevertheless fascinated by the British outlook on life, and nature, that he put forward.
There are 4 main seasons, and 4 cross-quarter days. Cecil Adams even talked about this once, I am sure. But I can’t seem to find it in any search I do (a little help would be appreciated:)). And they are pretty universal, esp. in agricultural societies.
Anyways, owing to this balance, every holiday (pagan or otherwise) has a complimentary holiday, when the earth is on the exact opposing around the sun.
Around Christmastime, the British, and other people too, I am sure, eat Christmas pudding. Then, I have heard many places, around Summertime they eat Summer Pudding.
I was just curious, is there any special ritual or celebratory practice associated with Summer Pudding? I know the British people on these boards would know. But chime in other people too, if you know.
Also what else to Brits do around Midsummer, as they call this time of year? Big party? Nothing much? Etc.?
Hrm … I can’t find anything here: Midsummer - Wikipedia And Googleing for “Midsummer feast” only leads me to Swedish traditions. And bonfires. Traditionally, midsummer is a time of famine – nothing has ripened yet, so its not time for a feast. Seriously, the best Spain can do is sardines, and boiled potatoes. Midsummer - Wikipedia And they have a better climate than the British Isles.
I’ve never heard of any ceremony involving summer pudding: it’s just a pudding made with summer fruits, which there are glut of around that time. It’s not especially associated with midsummer, or anything like that.
I believe the sacred ritual goes ‘Ooh, summer pudding! Go on then, it’s got fruit it in, that makes it healthy, right?’
I don’t think it’s even that old, as British food goes, it’s not associated with anything other than having a glut of soft fruit.
The traditional quarter days were more of a convenient standard for organising the year than pagan tradition. Midsummer and Midwinter were both festival times, but they were quarter days because they were the start and middle of the year, they weren’t celebrated because they were quarter days.
Midsummer’s Day is still a common time for fetes and lots of places do have old traditions associated with the day but Lady Day and Michaelmas were pretty much only really significant because of them being minor religious holidays at roughly the right time. They were when the rent’s due, not party time.
Given that the dish only dates to the mid-late 1800s and the decidedly non-traditional hydropathic movement, no, there really hasn’t been any tradition or ritual built up around it. A lot of those kinds of Yuletide traditions - Boar’s Head Carol, Lord of Misrule, wassailing, etc. - either date back to Medieval practice, or are part of the Victorian pseudomedieval revival.
Nothing like Summer Pudding exists in the Middle Ages - the closest I know of is chireseye, which is a stewed cherry pudding thickened with breadcrumbs, but it’s nothing like Summer Pud in execution. Whereas Christmas Pudding does have very clear late Medieval antecedents.
That doesn’t make any sense - even here in the Chicago area, I have friends with ripe tomatoes and cucumbers now, and we had greens and strawberries in April and May, and tons of snap peas starting a month ago. In fact, it’s about time to harvest the garlic, and probably the beets and carrots, and those went in very late because we had such a cold spring. In Peoria, only a couple of hours away, I know someone who is already harvesting baskets of tomatoes and squash and eggplants and peppers, all warm-weather crops.
And I am no farmer, and much of Spain has a decidedly warmer climate than northern Illinois.
In the UK it’s pretty true, it even has a name- the ‘June Gap’. It’s typically the month when it warms up, so the traditional overwintered vegetables all bolt (even ones in storage), but the summer ones are only just getting started. With modern crops, short season varieties and different diet preferences it’s less of a phenomena than it used to be, but it still exists most years.
There are a few things like strawberries which are ready in June, but no root crops for the main bulk of the diet. Garlic is actually traditionally harvested on Midsummer’s day, though mine’s running late this year, and not ready yet. Peas were traditionally harvested for drying, not eaten fresh, so would be picked later. Beetroot are only just getting useful size now as are the first of the carrots. Tomatoes, squash, potatoes and eggplants are all New World crops and relatively recent introductions to our diet, but even with them, only the first new potatoes would normally be harvested outside here before the end of June, even in the mildest bit of the country.
Midsummer, near the end of June, could mark the start of the proper harvest, but in a late year it could still be a couple of weeks away, and while there would be things to eat, there wouldn’t be the sort of big glut that would lend itself to celebration feasts. Medieval feasts did not typically feature salad; if you can’t boil or roast it, they weren’t interested.
