Make-ahead holiday desserts
A Polish mountain of choux and whisky cream, a Greek custard with spiced peaches, and the relief of making dessert ahead
We make an awesome Christmas pudding which, for me, is the flavour of the season. It’s prepared over months, ready to be warmed and lit up when you need it.
Some love this sort of thing, some don’t, but whichever side of this fence you sit on, you have to make sure your holiday dessert is one you can make ahead of time, so it doesn’t get in the way of the rest of the cooking.
But before I get into that I want to stop for a second - I know I am going to regret this! - and talk about the words pudding and dessert, which are often interchangeable in British English.
Often, but not always.
When it comes to savoury dishes, like black pudding (a blood sausage) or Yorkshire pudding, you definitely cannot replace pudding with dessert.
But also when applied to the sweet dish you have at the end of a meal you need to be cautious: summer pudding is not the same as summer dessert. I mean it is a summary dessert, but a very particular one: it is made by encasing tons of summer berries and all their juices inside a parcel of white bread slices and leaving to soak overnight.
I know… but it tastes so much better than it sounds.
It’s a minefield, I am afraid, but it’s one we need to cross together.
The team and I clearly decided not to offer a Christmas pudding recipe this year, and instead opted for two Christmassy puddings. You get my drift? Not the traditional dessert known as Christmas pudding - made with suet, dried fruit soaked for weeks in brandy - but our own celebratory puddings.
So here goes… what I have are two centrepiece desserts that feel properly festive without the weight of all that tradition. One takes its name from the Carpathian mountains - the Karpatka - those craggy Polish peaks that inspired a dessert just as dramatic: towering choux pastry filled with whisky cream, scattered with coffee pralines, everything merry and bright.
The other comes from the Greek Galaktoboureko, reimagined here as a wobbly semolina custard topped with spiced peaches, and it’s completely vegan.
It’s not a coincidence that they’re so different from each other. Some years - some meals, some moods - you want the drama of mountains, the boozy, creamy, over-the-top puddings that everyone’s been waiting for (the karpatka). Other times you want something smoother and easier on the belly, something fruity that feels like a bit of lightness after all that heaviness (the Galaktoboureko).
What they share, though, is this: both are better made ahead. The custard needs an overnight rest to set properly, the peaches get sweeter and more aromatic as they sit in their spiced syrup, and the choux for the Karpatka benefits from resting a day before you assemble it.
To me, this is the most important thing when it comes to holiday desserts. Do the work early - when you’ve got space to think, clean counters, time to fix something if it goes wrong - then just plate up when people are ready.
Choose whichever suits your meal. Or make both - one for Christmas Day, one for Boxing Day. And if someone at your table is the Christmas pudding keeper, the one who makes it every year out of love or duty or both? Let them. These can sit alongside, ready for those who want something different.
Orange semolina custard with spiced peach syrup
This is inspired by a Greek set custard dessert called galaktoboureko made with fine semolina. The spiced peach syrup adds a festive touch. You can make both elements the day before and store them separately, ready for a quick assemble just before serving.
Festive praline karpatka
This is a real festive choux-stopper. Our take on the much-loved Polish dessert cake, Karpatka - inspired by the Carpathian mountains thanks to its craggy, snow-dusted peaks - is even more epic and dramatic. We’ve added a layer of craquelin (crisp, cookie-like topping usually found on choux buns) for extra texture and crunch, then filled it with whisky cream, coffee praline, and plenty of festive flair. Best of all, there’s no need for fancy equipment: everything can be made by hand, though a stand or hand-held mixer will make light work of it.
Get ahead by making the craquelin, praline, and praline paste up to two days in advance. Bake the choux layers the day before, then revive them briefly in the oven (180°C for 5 minutes or so), then cool back down before assembling. It’s a spectacular dessert for the table - and the leftovers (if there are any) keep brilliantly in the fridge for the next day.
Note: if making this for the whole family, feel free to omit the coffee and whisky - there is so much going on texturally and visually, it will still be super delicious without!
