I’d never seen a spotted dick up close before. Once as a teenager, I’d seen a picture of one while I was rifling through the miscellany of Mum’s third drawer. It was an unappetising sight even in black and white. Mum had written on the top of the cutting in capitals: “MUST TRY THIS.”

Twenty years later and here was my first spotted dick in the flesh: a cup-sized mound of tea-coloured sponge dotted with currants and swimming in a pool of custard. The waiter slid the plate in front of me with a flourish. That pudding was trying to look exotic, but to me, it was just freckly and dull.