Christmas Down Under… Back to Blog
The winner of TO TEMPT THE DEVIL is…Jen M. And the winner of the $15 gift card is…Anne! Congrats, ladies!!
Let’s go Down Under for the holidays! Awesome author CJ Archer is here to share some of her Australian traditions with us. And, in addition to the holiday fun and a great recipe that she’s posting, CJ is giving away a copy of her new release, TO TEMPT THE DEVIL, and there is a $15 Amazon.com or B&N.com gift card up for grabs (winner’s choice!).
CJ, I’m so glad that you came to the party! And thanks for sharing your Christmas with us!
A Dinky Di Aussie Christmas
(Translation: A real Australian Christmas)
Thank you for having me on your blog, Cynthia.
December is summertime here in Australia, and that means Christmas day could be celebrated in 40+ degree heat (translation: 104+ Fahrenheit). But we’ve never let that stop us from enjoying a traditional Christmas, with a few Aussie twists thrown in to make the silly season memorable.
In my family, no matter the weather, we have a full hot midday meal – Turkey, ham, more varieties of vegetables than you can count after a few glasses of bubbly, and warm plum pudding with brandy butter. Do not, under pain of death, forget the brandy butter.
But a lot of Aussies are moving to a more non-traditional, weather-appropriate feast, including ice cream pudding (recipe follows). I have a crazy aunt (doesn’t everyone?) who once made cold soup for entrée. The less said about that year’s Christmas the better.
Poor Santa hasn’t really worked out that he needs to dress accordingly when he stops Down Under. He turns up to the shopping centres in full red suit and black boots as if he’s trekking through the Arctic circle. He’s the “official” Santa, however, so I suppose he doesn’t have a choice. The jolly old fellow who joins my extended family’s pre-Christmas bbq lunch usually sweats it out for a few minutes in full garb, then starts to shed his clothing as the day warms up until he’s left in nothing but his singlet and stubbies (translation: shorts). Boots get replaced by thongs (translation: flip flops, NOT what you Americans think it is, unless that’s Santa’s preference too).
Christmas signals the start of our long summer school holidays, so Boxing Day is the day to head to the beach and soak up some sunshine and surf. It’s also the time that reminds me why I love the festive season in Australia – warm, lazy evenings sitting outside with family and friends, drinking a cool beer or white wine, and watching the kids play under the sprinkler. I wouldn’t want to spend Christmas any other way.
Recipe for (quick and easy) ice cream pudding:
Ingredients:
3 cups any mixture of dried and glace fruits and nuts
1/4 cup Brandy, Grand Marnier or Cointreau (or a 1/2 & 1/2 mix)
3 litres vanilla ice cream, softened
1/2 cups chopped blanched almonds or pecans
1 tsp mixed spice
1 tsp cinnamon
Chocolate Ice Magic and glace cherries (optional)
Method:
1. Soak fruit and nuts in alcohol for 2-3 hours.
2. If using blanched almonds, lightly toast them.
3. Fold everything into softened ice cream. Pour into pudding basin or similar shaped container. Cover and freeze until firm and set (approximately 2-4 hours).
4. Decorate with chocolate ice magic and cherries (optional).
***
Thanks for sharing that great recipe, CJ! Now it’s time for our commenters to share…what’s the most unusual holiday tradition that you have? Or a really fun one that you’ve heard of over the years? I think I want to start a Santa in thongs (and I’m not talking flip flops) at my house. Leave a comment to be entered in the giveaway for TO TEMPT THE DEVIL and the $15 Amazon.com or B&N.com gift card.
And, speaking of sharing…here’s the blurb for CJ’s new book, TO TEMPT THE DEVIL:
He’s dark and dangerous…and she can’t stay away…
Seven years have passed since Rafe Fletcher fled London. Now he has returned to make amends, only to find his brother, James, bound for debtors’ prison. Unable to clear James’s debts, Rafe does the next best thing, promising to watch over his brother’s betrothed in his absence. There’s just one problem: the shy, sweet girl he once knew has grown into an alluring young woman—one who wants absolutely nothing to do with a man like him.
Lizzy Croft isn’t fooled by Rafe’s dark good looks; she remembers all too well the hot-headed rogue he once was. But when Lizzy is framed for murder, she has no choice but to trust the man who once beat his brutish stepfather half to death, the man whose recent past is shrouded in mystery—the man who is slowly, inexorably winning her heart. Loving him would be the greatest risk of all…
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Here in FL Santa has to wear flip-flops and watch out for the palm trees…LOL. But this thong idea has merit also…hum!!!!
No odd traditions here. We do take our granddaughters out to see the lights though.
I don’t have a strange one but we have a tree trimming party every year that’s a blast!
Nothing out of the ordinary here but I would love to try the recipe with brandy!!!
I don’t have any strange traditions (at least that I think are strange), but my favorite one is jumping in the car with my sister and driving around town looking at all the Christmas lights and decorations. We’ve done that for years and never miss it. Your ice cream pudding sounds yummy, I’ll have to try it.
If I’m home for the holidays, I have a huge cook-off with my family. Gets pretty competitive! If I spend Christmas at school with friends, we usually go on Christmas-themed scavenger hunts or pull a huge Christmas prank. Either way, our traditions are what make the holidays so fun. Thanks for the ice cream pudding recipe. Sounds delicious.
A scavenger hunt sounds like huge fun. What a great tradition.
The ice cream pudding is really delish. I can highly recommend it. 🙂
Great recipe yummy
The usual Christmas here. The recipe and book sound great!
Most unusual tradition… sour mushroom soup made with sauerkraut juice. sounds funny, tastes delicious
LOL, Yes, Allison, it does sound, um, interesting.
I don’t think I have any strange traditions.
But I do like the idea of a hot santa in a thong!
Most families have a traditional Christmas dinner, but mine sounds more like a Jewish Christmas Dinner. My mother always works on Christmas because she is a nurse at a hospital and I am an only child of only children. My grandparents come over to the house in the afternoon and we order Chinese food for dinner. When I was growing up my father could only cook TV dinners and my one set of grandparents are vegetarian. So what could we all agree on and that was available to us? Chinese Food!
Now the true sign of patience? We didn’t open presents till my mother got home after 8pm and all the dishes were cleaned and put away. That was killer, hearing what all my friends got and knowing I have to wait till the day was almost over. But I wouldn’t give up our crazy traditions for anything!
We don’t really have any unusual traditions.
YUM!
We have pretty usual ones: Tree, movies, songs, food…
🙂
Our most unusual holiday tradition is pretty prosaic. One person sits by the tree on Christmas morning and hands out the wrapped presents one at a time, so each present can be properly appreciated as it’s opened.
I don’t really have any unusual Christmas traditions, although there’s plenty of time to develop one ** LOL **. Thanks for the awesome giveaway!
I don’t think any of our traditions are strange either. Guess we are the typical family. LOL!
I’ve never heard of brandy butter! It sounds like something I need to taste! Thanks for the great recipe. We usually have ham, mashed potatoes, green beans and rolls on Christmas Eve. Sometimes the vegetable changes, but we always have ham.
Perhaps brandy butter is an Aussie or British tradition? It’s really yummy. Some make it softer, more like a sauce, but in our family it’s hard and melts into the warm pudding. Mmmmm.
Since we don’t actually celebrate Christmas, our tradition is to go out for Chinese food that day, since those are usually the only restaurants that are open.
Haven’t heard any strange or funny traditions.
Not a current tradition, but when I was young, we went to Florida during Christmas so my Father could have a (warm) vacation from work. We usually had a skinny Santa in swim trunks under a palm tree!
I love the recipe. Plum pudding with brandy butter well I never had that but it seems like something to try
Our unusual holiday tradition comes from when I was a kid. Anytime we went to see Santa the car would break down and we would never make it there. It really lent itself to the magic of Santa because we could never make it to him.
Great recipes… no unusual traditions that I can think of though… We do boxing day shopping here in Canada and that’s about it.
Don’t have any unusual tradition to talk about. But my friend and her younger brother each takes a turn choosing a theme for their christmas tree every other year. Last year it was my friend’s turn and she choose to make her tree pure Pink…everything had to be pink. This year it’s her brother’s turn and i’m waiting to see what her 6 year old brother will pick that hopefully won’t flip her over. Lol 😀
we don’t have any unusual traditions but that ice cream pudding sounds fantastic.
We don’t have any unusual traditions here. Normally the only reason the family goes all out decorating is because my birthday is so close to Christmas and I love them. Everything we do is pretty normal. Of course I say that now I’m sure something could come up.
I’m Aussie too so totally feeling the 40 degree Christmas, which leads to us all sitting inside under the air con, playing with presents and eating all day. And for food we don’t usually have anything traditional, it’s all easy to prepare and usually cool, so ham and cheese, chicken skewers, salads, store bought baked potatoes, and this amazing Mango sorbet/icecream thing for afternoon tea.
Another Aussie, yay! Mango sorbet…swoon.
I love that recipe! We always play Rook at Christmas and really every holiday we all get together. It is pretty fun and you hear the words I want a divorce at least once from someone playing lol.
My family is half Finnish heritage so when we gather for the holidays, someone always brings pickled herring. It is gross but they all eat it up.
My younger cousins started hiding all the gifts the night before Christmas so everyone has to go hunting for gifts on Christmas morning.
I live in Florida and even though it is warm, people still decorate for Christmas. Palm trees with Christmas lights looks pretty funny to me. 🙂
This recipe sounds interesting. Thank you for sharing, CJ!
It’s not weird, but I always got to open a present early. Usually a week or two early. Thanks for the giveaway!
No unusual holiday traditions here… but it’s fun reading what everyone’s different traditions are!
Funny no traditions fo r us
no really a weir tradition ( oki i count the day with my dog in the sense of he ( and the cat) got a limited numbers of time they can be bad before the Day so it’s a small calendar starting 10days before and they can have only 3red cross or no gift (red cross= bad cat or dog that day) strande they become angels as soon as they see the board and red pen^^
isabelle(dot)frisch(at)gmail(dot)com
thank you a lot for the giveaway
The only odd thing that our family really did was celebrate Christmas the Saturday before. That way there was no you have to run from here to there to there all in one day. After the second Aunt eneded up in tears because of her family they had enough.
we never have traditional holiday foods (ham, fruitcake, etc.) at our holiday parties. it’s always a mix of filipino foods, hawaiian foods, barbequed meats, etc.
I married into a Danish family and love the traditions. The one that struck me as most unusual was that the tree is put up and decorated very shortly before Christmas. I believe the earliest that they have done it was two days before. It is a fresh cut tree that’s base is kept soaking in water so the thing is very well hydrated. And it is decorated with real candles placed in holders that hook onto the branches. It is beautiful when it is lit.
I don’t know if I’d recognize Santa without his red suit…and I’d rather not see him in less than that! Thanks for sharing, it’s amazing to think of triple digit temps in conjunction with Christmas! Good luck on the new release.
Eek – an *unusual* holiday tradition? :\ We don’t really do anything exciting for the holidays… I know when we were little my dad was in charge of the stockings and would almost always forget XD So he’d have to run to a gas station that was open and get us stuff. I remember clam chowder and other canned soups being tucked in there.
I took over the stockings though a while back. 😛
We don’t have any unusual traditions but we always have Italian food of some kind on Christmas day in addition to traditional foods.
Happy Holidays, CJ! One tradition I find interesting is that the Japanese eat Kentucky Fried Chicken for Christmas dinner.
I would LOVE to win and read DEVIL. I would read it now and get lots of people to purchase it for Christmas! 🙂
LOL, thanks Mel.
We do not have any unusual traditions. Maybe I need to start some
I confess, we dont really have any unusual ones.. my boyfriends mother makes jello pineapple rings tho.. those are kinda weird.. (cut open the top of a can of rings, drain the juice – but keep it! – make jello, use the juice in replacement of water… pour into can of rings.. cover with saran wrap, and let sit overnight.. in the morning – cut off the other end, push out slowly – cut each ring as you go!)
I don’t have any strange traditions but I have been thinking that I should start one with my family so they have something to carry with them when they grow up.
The most unusual is that we don’t celebrate it anymore since we don’t celebrate “right” according to my mother. Before that probably the fact that on Christmas day we had an all day antipasto on the table, no formal meal. When we were kids, we weren’t so thrilled with italian deli meats, olives,crudite, cheese etc. so she started making a crock pot of sloppy joe mixture for the kids which was very rare in our house and really enjoyed.
On Christmas Eve we all stand in a table and dance to Satisfaction by the Rolling Stones.
I’d like to see that!
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