Pass the butter. And a shovel.

Have you seen Nigella lately? If not, take a good hard look.

This is the Domestic Goddess at 53. Yes, you read that correctly—53!!

If this is what ‘middle age’ with lashings of butter on the side looks like, we want in. The big question: is she just eating butter or smearing it over her skin as well? Wrinkles don’t appear to have rumpled her glowing complexion, so maybe that’s her secret?

Or maybe it’s the combination of butter and great family genes? Perhaps we’ll try her grandma’s bread and butter pudding which combines both … where’s that shovel?

Nigella’s Grandmother’s Ginger Jam Bread and Butter Pudding

Serves 6

‘This is the wholesome, comforting version of a trad English (white) bread and butter pudding that my maternal grandmother always made. Use apricot jam or regular orange marmalade if ginger’s not your thing.’

• 75 grams unsalted butter
• 75 grams sultanas
• 3 tablespoons dark rum
• 10 slices brown bread
• 10 tablespoons marmalade (or ginger conserve)
• 4 medium egg yolks
• 1 medium egg
• 3 tablespoons caster sugar
• 500 ml double cream
• 200 ml full fat milk
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 2 tablespoons demerara sugar        

Preheat the oven to 180°C/gas mark 4.

Grease a pudding dish with a capacity of about 1½ litres with some of the butter.

Put the sultanas in a small bowl, pour the rum over, and microwave them for 1 minute, then leave them to stand. This is a good way to soak them quickly but juicily.Make sandwiches with the brown bread, butter and ginger jam (2 tablespoonfuls in each sandwich); you should have some butter left over to smear on the top later.

Now cut the sandwiches in half into triangles and arrange them evenly along the middle of the pudding dish. I put one in the dish with the point of the sandwich upwards then one with flat-side uppermost, then with point-side uppermost and so on, then squeeze a sandwich-triangle down each side - but you do as you please. Sprinkle over the sultanas and unabsorbed rum that remains in the bowl.

Whisk the egg yolks and egg together with the caster sugar, and pour in the cream and milk. Pour this over the triangles of bread and leave them to soak up the liquid for about 10 minutes, by which time the pudding is ready to go into the oven. Smear the bread crusts that are poking out of the custard with the soft butter, mix the ground ginger and demerara sugar together and sprinkle this mixture on your buttered crusts and then lightly over the rest of the pudding.

Sit the pudding dish on a baking sheet and put it in the oven to cook for about 45 minutes or until the custard has set and puffed up slightly. Remove, let sit for 10 minutes - and spoon out into bowls, putting a jug of custard, should you so wish, on the table to be served alongside.

Recipe via nigella.com