Chocolate cherry pudding

'Delivery for Claire.' Oh how I love those three words. I raced out to the door to see what the Santa-like man had for me today. It was in a pretty little bag with a swing tag for my address.

Racing inside to open it, I found a big box of plump, ruby red cherries. Now to a lot of people, 2kg of cherries would be a very welcome surprise but you're about to learn yet another thing about me. Until that day, I'd never tried a cherry. Yes I'd had many many people try to convince me to try them but remember, I was the world's fussiest child and I somehow convinced myself that I didn't like fruit.

I was wrong. My first bite into the sweet, plump flesh was like a burst of tart sweetness (yes it can be tart and sweet). I quickly devoured a handful of them while standing over the sink. Very glad to have discovered them at the start not end of their 100-day season, my brain started ticking with ideas. Similar to raspberries in tart/sweetness, they seemed like they'd go rather nicely with chocolate.

We were heading off to Perth two days later so I laboriously de-pipped (yes that's a word) about half of them and popped them in the freezer. They were just delicious in my morning smoothies for the next couple of weeks.

Some random cherry facts for you:

• 100g of cherries have just 60 calories and zero fat making them a pretty good treat (although no so much if you dip them in chocolate)
• bright green stems are a sign of healthy fruit
• they're packed with vitamin C & antioxidants
• they're ranked 14 in the list of top 50 foods with the highest antioxidant level - imagine the antioxidant hit you'd get if you dipped them in dark chocolate and washed them down with a glass of red!
• there are 50 varieties of cherry in Australia (50!)

I didn't expect the rest of them to last so well but even a week later they were still fresh as a daisy. Apparently, if you keep them in an airtight container in the fridge they last a couple of weeks. Just don't wash them until you're about to eat them.

We needed a festive dessert to go with our Christmas ham on December day one and I'd spotted the perfect recipe - chocolate cherry pudding.

The original recipe, from the Coles free magazine, used cherry ripe bars. Why use processed chocolate bars when you can use the real deal I say?

It was really easy to whip up and I just folded the chopped up cherries into the batter before scooping it into the pudding basin. I would highly recommend buying a cherry pitter if you're going to be eating a lot of them. I don't own one and was getting a little bit over doing it all by hand but it was worth the effort.

My second steamed pudding ever, after golden syrup pudding last Christmas, this one turned out beautifully. It took a little longer to cook than the recipe said but I'm never sure quite how to have the water. My advice would be to leave a few extra hours just in case.

Steamed puddings should be more popular than they are. Gooey in the middle and oh so moist, this particular pudding won me over. I kept it on the kitchen bench for the week and rarely resisted cutting a tiny slither every time I walked past.

We served it warm with homemade vanilla gelato and it was the perfect way to balance out the richness of the chocolate. You can make this one in advance so if you like, make it this week, wrap the whole thing (basin and all) in foil and pop it in the fridge then when you want to serve it, re-boil it for 30 minutes. Enjoy!

What about you? Do you make steamed puddings? What's your favourite type?

Recipe

Chocolate cherry pudding

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Servings: 12

Author: Claire Cameron

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Ingredients

• ▢ 150 g butter melted plus extra for greasing
• ▢ 1 cup brown sugar
• ▢ 2 eggs
• ▢ 200 g dark chocolate melted and cooled
• ▢ ½ cup milk
• ▢ 1 ¼ cups self-raising flour
• ▢ ¼ cup cocoa powder
• ▢ 150 g cherries de-pipped & chopped finely

Instructions

• Use butter to grease an 8-cup capacity pudding bowl and line the base with a round of baking paper.
• In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter and sugar together until they are a light an creamy.
• Add the eggs and beat until the mixture it thick.
• Pour in the cooled chocolate and milk and mix on low until they're combined and then up the speed for about 30 seconds.
• Sift in the flour and cocoa and beat them through until there are no more dry bits.
• Take the bowl off the stand and fold through the cherries.
• Scoop the batter into the pudding basin and smooth out the top.
• Either secure the lid on your basin or cover it with a greased round of baking paper and two layers of foil then ties it on with string.
• Place a trivet (you can just use an upturned plate if you don't have a trivet) and pop the pudding on top.
• Fill the pot with enough hot water to come ⅔ of the way up the pudding dish.
• Bring the pot to a simmer, put the lid on and simmer it for at least 2 ½ hours or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean.
• Check on the water every so often to make sure it doesn't evaporate.
• Mine took 3 hours and was a little gooey in the middle so allow enough time just in case.
• Leave the pudding to cool in the basin for 10 minutes and then invert it onto a serving plate.
• Serve warm or at room temperature with ice-cream or cream and extra cherries.

Have you made this recipe? I'd love to hear what you think. Tag me on Instagram @clairekcreations

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