The Second World War was over but there was still rationing and what a job it was trying to buy food or anything really because everything was in short supply. My cousin Rose was expecting her first baby and at that time she was living with her mother-in-law who was busy saving ingredients for Christmas, dried fruit, etc. for her Christmas cake and pudding. Rose had developed a craving for anything sweet and looking in the cupboard one day she found the tin of dried fruit and
thought that she would take just a little bit to eat and then put the tin back in its
place. But each time she wanted something sweet to eat, out came the tin of fruit
with the nice big fat raisins and golden sultanas.
The beginning of November arrived and her mother-in-law decided to make a start with making the Christmas pudding, so she prepared the suet she had managed to get from Mr French the butcher and had weighed the rest of the ingredients. She collected the eggs from the hen coop, (most people had to manage with dried egg, but living in the country they were lucky with eggs) Mother-in-law then went to the cupboard for the fruit, but what a shock she had on opening the tin – it was almost
empty .
‘Rose, Rose’ she called ‘have you been eating the fruit I saved for the cake and pudding?’
‘But I’ve only eaten some’, said Rose
‘Eaten some?! Nearly the whole darned tin full’.
When the neighbours heard what had happened, they all went round and took a little of the dried fruit that they had saved and the cake and a pudding were made.
During the war and for several years after, you couldn’t get icing sugar, so the cake was decorated on top with ground rice flavoured with almond essence and with home-made Merry Christmas decorations

It was 1946 and the Christmas dinner was a chicken from the farm, roast potatoes with sprouts out of the garden and mother-in-law’s small Christmas pudding that she had managed to make after all, thanks to the neighbours…..
So everyone enjoyed themselves. And the baby, a boy, was born in the New Year, the first of a large family. Anne Williams