Christmas Dinner 2016

homemadecider

Beef wellington, OH MY GOD. We're never eating turkey again.

OldMrBrennan83

This post has been deleted.

BaZmO*

homemadecider wrote: »

Beef wellington, OH MY GOD. We're never eating turkey again.

I think it's thats what I'll have next year! I'll also have ham. You should always have ham.

Gloomtastic!

Invited to friends for dinner. We brought gravadlax which I cured for 4 days, a dill and mustard sauce and pumpernickel bread (without the caraway seeds- yuck!)

They made baked Camembert with crusty rollls



Pate with cornichons(?)



For the main event we had baked ham



And an amazing Rib of Beef



Served with roasties, carrots and garlic beans.

Cheeseboard for dessert.

Good food, lots of booze and great company - a gastronomic delight of a day!!

vicwatson

If I do say so myself yesterday's dinner was best ever in my home. I think I'll have to repeat it today !!

OldMrBrennan83

This post has been deleted.

The Black Oil

Very happy with how things turned out. Bread sauce was slightly burned, but other than that, no complaints. Have been free of dry turkey for a few years. :P Still might look into the salt or buttermilk option for the future.

The pics above look great.

Miaireland

I was a bit lost yesterday. We normally don't eat till about six. For the first time I did most of my pre the day before so it felt really wrong to be able to sit down on Christmas afternoon and watch a movie rather than cooking, setting tables etc.

Dizzyblonde

Our Christmas dinner this year was the best yet. We bought the ham from a proper butchers instead of a supermarket for the first time in years and it was amazing. It was pale in colour which I prefer, and I did a simple wholegrain mustard and demerara sugar glaze. Thanks to Neven Maguire's buttermilk brine the turkey crown was perfect again, moist and full of flavour.

Bubble and squeak day today

leahyl

God bless my mother, she outdid herself again - the dinner was unreal....turkey, ham, corner beef, mash, roasties, potato croquettes, cheesy garlic potato, bread stuffing, potato stuffing, Brussels with smoked bacon (which I did), cauliflower, mushy peas and lashings of gravy.....absolutely epic

the beer revolu

leahyl wrote: »

God bless my mother, she outdid herself again - the dinner was unreal....turkey, ham, corner beef, mash, roasties, potato croquettes, cheesy garlic potato, bread stuffing, potato stuffing, Brussels with smoked bacon (which I did), cauliflower, mushy peas and lashings of gravy.....absolutely epic

No baked potatoes?
WTF?
(joke)

Surreptitious

I see croquettes on everyone's plates but I never had them for Christmas dinner. I feel sad.

Miaireland

Surreptitious wrote:

I see croquettes on everyone's plates but I never had them for Christmas dinner. I feel sad.

I haven't had them in 14 years!

now online

I feel like a stuffed turkey myself! Delighted how everything turned out.
Starters
Soup
Mushroom vola vonts
Smoked salmon turrine
Melon for the kids

Dinner
Turkey, ham, spiced beef served with potato stuffing, garlic potatoes,roasties and veg. Lashings of turkey gravy and Yorkshire puddings

Desserts
lemon posset with lemon biscuits
Tiramisu
chocolate biscuit cake

Turkey was lovely, I was in fear in would be dry. Spiced beef was the nicest ever!
Veg were a bit mush but because they were cooked in the ham water they were still yum

Lemon biscuits were a bit too buttery, they turned out nicer the first time I made them.
Kids made the sausage stuffing balls and " helped make the other desserts that was part of the fun Christmas eve while listening to Christmas fm and checking the Santa tracker.

Great few days good food,wine and company.
I loved it all.
Turkey is stripped and what's left is planned for a turkey and ham pie tomorrow.
All done for another year.

I loved following and participating in this thread. Hope you all had a lovely Christmas too

Day Lewin

Ours was the best meal of the year.
A handsome chunk of sirloin on the bone...and a couple of pheasants: chestnut stuffing...and our vegetarian had some of the stuffing on his Portobello Mushroom Wellington. Béarnaise sauce, yellow and slick with butter, egg yolks and fresh tarragon..almost sobbingly good.
With spicy red cabbage and crisscross potatoes.
Then, Christmas pudding with lemon syllabub and marzipan ice cream.
Only poor note...I didn't make the pudding but bought the best Tesco one I could find. Cakey texture...not the best pudden ever. )But I don't care much for any plum pudding and the fanciers voted it acceptable.)

beertons

I've only had a slice of toast today, still full.

Miaireland

Day Lewin wrote:

Ours was the best meal of the year. A handsome chunk of sirloin on the bone...and a couple of pheasants: chestnut stuffing...and our vegetarian had some of the stuffing on his Portobello Mushroom Wellington. Béarnaise sauce, yellow and slick with butter, egg yolks and fresh tarragon..almost sobbingly good. With spicy red cabbage and crisscross potatoes. Then, Christmas pudding with lemon syllabub and marzipan ice cream. Only poor note...I didn't make the pudding but bought the best Tesco one I could find. Cakey texture...not the best pudden ever. )But I don't care much for any plum pudding and the fanciers voted it acceptable.)

Day Lewin wrote:

Ours was the best meal of the year. A handsome chunk of sirloin on the bone...and a couple of pheasants: chestnut stuffing...and our vegetarian had some of the stuffing on his Portobello Mushroom Wellington. Béarnaise sauce, yellow and slick with butter, egg yolks and fresh tarragon..almost sobbingly good. With spicy red cabbage and crisscross potatoes. Then, Christmas pudding with lemon syllabub and marzipan ice cream. Only poor note...I didn't make the pudding but bought the best Tesco one I could find. Cakey texture...not the best pudden ever. )But I don't care much for any plum pudding and the fanciers voted it acceptable.)

Bernaise is my idea of heaven!

The Black Oil

Saw some spiced beef in Super Valu today. Tempting...

trixychic

Well we had our big day. And it was the best Christmas I've had in years. Apart from the soup (texture went wrong) everything was fab. Turkey was gorgeous and with the ham and all the trimmings??? Oh my God!!!

Thank you for all the tips. Best Christmas ever.

Whistlejacket

_Jamie_ wrote: »

This is interesting. I once heard that you shouldn't add the sugar until the end or the skins will harden. But other recipes say to add it with the water. Wonder if the former is true?

I was curious about this too so I split a packet of cranberries and made two batches of sauce, one with the sugar in from the start and one added later. Turns out, Darina Allen is right (as always): the sugar in at the start did result in slightly tougher skins (and noticeably fewer of the entertaining popping noises as the cranberries split) but the end result was perfectly edible.

It had no discernible effect on the taste but the texture wasn't as good, so I'll be sticking to stirring in the sugar near the end for Christmas 2017!

Dubl07

I have a packet of fresh cranberries left in the veggie drawer of the fridge. Time to whip out the old "Live at Three" cranberry cheesecake recipe to use them up. It's a tattered photocopy they sent out on request over twenty years ago. The cheesecake is virulently pink but delicious. That should be our Christmas over just before Epiphany.

_Jamie_

Whistlejacket wrote: »

I was curious about this too so I split a packet of cranberries and made two batches of sauce, one with the sugar in from the start and one added later. Turns out, Darina Allen is right (as always): the sugar in at the start did result in slightly tougher skins (and noticeably fewer of the entertaining popping noises as the cranberries split) but the end result was perfectly edible.

It had no discernible effect on the taste but the texture wasn't as good, so I'll be sticking to stirring in the sugar near the end for Christmas 2017!

Good to know! I thought I had imagined it and so have been adding the sugar at the start for a good few years but I thought the sauce didn't seem as broken down when I did it this way as when I added the sugar at the end.

Flippyfloppy

Thanks for all the tips guys! I buttermilk brined my turkey and cooked it the day before, slicing it and leaving it in gravy, and it was positively delicious!!! So thanks for that!

I also rolled my potatoes in semolina and mustard powder before roasting, after boiling- again amazing!

Did my ham in the slow cooker in coke, with pepper corns etc. again amazing.

I couldn't of done it without all the tips here! It was a lot of work though think I'll take next year off

pwurple

Well hullo all. Christmas dinner was very relaxed for us, all the prep helped a lot. I salt-brined the turkey, but can't say it made much of a difference to me. Don't think I'd do that again, but it wasn't too much of a biggie anyway.
The different veg went down a treat. Big bowl of green veg with garlic butter was devoured, and the stand out star was that fennel crumble from the ottolenghi recipe. I'll be doing that again. It was divine, and leftover veg held well and reheated deliciously also. Can't normally say that for the sprouts. Recipe here: http://www.dutchessroz.com/2014/09/fennel-cherry-tomato-and-crumble-gratin.html
On leftovers, I'll mention the green saffron spice mix we used on the leftovers as well... Those guys are at all our local markets in Cork, and stocked in some of the local shops. I used the "Turkey delight".. Those Spice mixes are so good, really fresh and pungent. Yummm. 
http://www.greensaffron.com/shop/seasonal.html

goat2

Flippyfloppy wrote: »

Thanks for all the tips guys! I buttermilk brined my turkey and cooked it the day before, slicing it and leaving it in gravy, and it was positively delicious!!! So thanks for that!

I also rolled my potatoes in semolina and mustard powder before roasting, after boiling- again amazing!

Did my ham in the slow cooker in coke, with pepper corns etc. again amazing.

I couldn't of done it without all the tips here! It was a lot of work though think I'll take next year off

I love the idea of the ham in the coke, must try that, do you mix water with the coke, is it coke only liquid in t he pot

Flippyfloppy

goat2 wrote: »

Flippyfloppy wrote: »

Thanks for all the tips guys! I buttermilk brined my turkey and cooked it the day before, slicing it and leaving it in gravy, and it was positively delicious!!! So thanks for that!

I also rolled my potatoes in semolina and mustard powder before roasting, after boiling- again amazing!

Did my ham in the slow cooker in coke, with pepper corns etc. again amazing.

I couldn't of done it without all the tips here! It was a lot of work though think I'll take next year off

I love the idea of the ham in the coke, must try that, do you mix water with the coke, is it coke only liquid in t he pot

Coke is the only liquid in the pot, you can keep topping up but I found I didn't need to. It really was tasty I think I'll do it regularly and not just for Christmas hope you enjoy it too!