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Next: 22 Nov 2026

Stir-up Sunday

The Sunday before Advent, when families stir the Christmas pudding mix and make a wish.

A tile drawn for this day, not a photograph.

Spices for Stir-up Sunday

The name comes from a prayer that begins "Stir up, we beseech thee", and the day has become the time to mix a Christmas pudding five weeks before the feast. Each family member stirs from east to west, in memory of the Magi, and makes a wish. The mixture of suet, dried fruit, brandy and spices, with cinnamon, nutmeg, mace and clove, is steamed for hours and kept until Christmas. The long maturing gives the spices time to blend into the fruit.

The spices

Mixed spiceIn the pudding.

Also part of it, and being written: Mace (Fine warm note in puddings.).

About this page

Written by the EveryMasala desk with AI assistance. Background: "Stir-up Sunday" on Wikipedia. Customs differ from place to place and family to family. If this is your tradition and we have it wrong, tell us.

Photo credits on this page

The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.

The weekly digest

Every Monday: seven spices you may not know, what is cooking this week, and one blend explained step by step.