Abi and the Pudding

The bell rang: it was lunch break. Abi and her classmates packed away their books and ran across the courtyard to the dining hall. As soon as they opened the door, they were greeted by a wonderful smell.

“Yum! That smells like sponge pudding and custard, my favourite!” exclaimed Abi with delight.

It was true. Although there wasn’t a single food she disliked, sponge pudding and custard was one of her top favourites. Her mum always made her custard to cheer her up when she was ill and had to stay in bed, and almost always on her birthday too.

“This school pudding is almost as good as my mum’s,” Abi thought, as she scraped up the last of her custard from the edges of the bowl. Then she joined the queue again hoping for seconds. In the end she got thirds too, although the cook did remind her to let others go first.

Some boys from year five overheard and started laughing. One of them shouted:

“No more for you or you’ll turn into a pudding, look at you!” Abi just stuck her tongue out at him and ran outside to join her friends, feeling embarrassed. What the boy had said bothered her for the next two days, but she kept it to herself. When she got home from school on the third day, she went into the kitchen where her mum was busy making pancakes for tea, and told her what had happened. She was worried that everyone at school would start making fun of her.

“Mum,” she said, “I really do love sponge pudding. And when there’s something really tasty for lunch, I can’t help going up for more. What can I do?”

Abi’s mum began to explain to her all about…