Countdown to Christmas Dinner with NanLT

Posted by NanLT in Meal Planning, Special Features | 4 comments

Not a turkey but a large chicken but roasting is the same.

I suspect for many families the most stressful thing about Christmas Dinner is just cooking the meal. By following these helpful suggestions, I will help to take the stress out of your Christmas.

The traditional Christmas Dinner in our family consists of turkey with 1 or 2 types of stuffing, roasted potatoes and parsnips, bacon rolls, sausages, one or two vegetables, bread sauce, and gravy. This is followed by at least 2 desserts and a Christmas Pudding. By the end of the meal, we are all as stuffed as the turkey.

Without a bit of organisation, this meal would be difficult indeed to put together. A bit of thought, and a bit of planning though will have your family marvelling at how wonderful the entire meal was.

To make our Christmas dinner you will need:

A turkey – I recommend buying the fresh turkey 2 – 3 days in advance from a reputable butcher and keeping it in the fridge. If necessary, order it in advance. If you do buy it further ahead and freeze it or buy a frozen turkey though follow recommended guidelines for defrosting it.

How big a turkey do you need?

The handy guide I’ve linked to will give you a rough idea.

A typical family gathering for us is around 10 – 12 people, with 3 of those being young children. Most serving charts says to allow about 350g/12oz turkey per person, including the weight of the bone. For our family, that would be around a 15 – 18 pound turkey.We’d be inclined to go for the larger size just for the leftovers.

My rule of thumb for cooking meats and poultry is 25 minutes per pound + 25 minutes at Gas Mark 6/400F/200C.  When you pierce the thigh and breast of the turkey with a skewer, juices should run clear once cooked.

You can get the weight from the packaging, but I suggest weighing the turkey yourself. The bathroom scales work well for this. Bring them out of the bathroom and place on a sheet of newspaper on your kitchen counter. Place a large plate or tin on the scales and either zero it out or note the weight, place the turkey on the plate and subtract the difference. It is especially important that you weigh the turkey yourself if you add stuffing.

Our 15 pound turkey plus stuffing equals around 17 pounds. Cooking time would be (15 X 25) + 25 = 400 minutes divided by 60 = 6 hours 40 minutes.

Stuffing – Every family has their favourite stuffing. Ours include a Nut Stuffing and a Parsley, Lemon and Thyme stuffing. Double these recipes for a turkey.

These will be stuffed into the turkey and cooked at the same time, the nut stuffing in the neck cavity and the parsley, lemon & thyme into the body.

Potatoes and parsnips for roasting – allow 2 – 3 potato and parsnip pieces per person. A medium sized potato can be halved for roasting while a large can be quartered. Parsnips can be cut into 3 – 5 pieces, depending upon the size. For a gathering of 10 people that would be 5 – 6 large potatoes and 4 – 5 large parsnips. These will take around 45 minutes to cook.

Bacon rolls – allow 3 – 4 slices bacon per person. These can be wrapped plain or wrapped around a small cooked mushroom. We buy the tinned button mushrooms for this purpose. These can be placed under a grill to be cooked for about 10 – 15 minutes.

Chipolata sausages – allow 3 – 4 sausages per person plus a few extra for the kids. These will cook around the turkey in about 45 minutes. Turn halfway through cooking.

Vegetables – the traditional vegetable for Christmas Dinner is Brussells Sprouts, but if your family doesn’t like these miniature cabbages, choose a couple of family favourites. I’ll show you some good ways of cooking sprouts that even my youngest child likes though. Most vegetables will steam or cook in 10 – 15 minutes.

Bread Sauce – this typically English sauce goes well with poultry. The milk needs to be prepared early on so that it can infuse at least one hour in advance. The sauce itself takes about 10 minutes to prepare.

Gravy – Again, every family has their favourite gravy. I will share my recipe with you but do use your own. Most can be made in about 10 minutes.

Then, we come to the desserts.

Another English tradition is the Christmas Pudding. For full flavour this really should be made in October but pre-made ones can be purchased in most English grocery stores. If you don’t have access to any Christmas pudding at all, you could always set a goal of making it for next Christmas. Serve the Christmas pudding with brandy butter. If you do have a Christmas pudding it needs to be placed in a double boiler for steaming at least 2 hours before eating.

Ideas for Christmas desserts are endless. Again, every family has their favourite.

When family members ask what they can bring to help out, I suggest asking them to bring a dessert.  Most puddings can be made a day or two in advance.

My final suggestion for making Christmas Dinner less stressful is to accept offers of help. If someone offers to bring a vegetable, let them! If they ask what they can do to help out in the kitchen, give them a job! Don’t try to do everything yourself if you don’t have to.

Too many people try to figure out when they’re having dinner by approaching it from the beginning, then end up eating dinner later than they anticipated. This is one time when it works better to start at the end and work backwards to the beginning.

In our family, we plan on having Christmas Dinner around 2PM.

This would be our planning time table.

4- 6 days before:
Do a shop and buy any non-perishable food items or those things which can be frozen.

3 days before:
Check that you have all the roasting and serving dishes that you need. Borrow what you don’t have if necessary. Many stores sell disposable roasting trays for turkeys this time of year that work perfectly well.

Do a shop and get perishable food items. Pre-order a turkey if possible and pick it up today.

2 days before:
Make the brandy butter. Place in a ramekin and keep in the fridge.

One day before:
Prepare the bacon rolls and ready sausages, cover with cling film and keep in the fridge.

Make any desserts. Sticky chocolate pudding can be made up to a week in advance and frozen until Christmas morning.

Prepare stuffing, wrap in cling film and keep in the fridge.

Peel the potatoes and parsnips. Place in a large pot and add enough cold water to cover completely. Cover with the lid and place on the back burner out of the way.

On the day:

6:45AM – Set racks in oven. One on the top tier for roasting potatoes and parsnips. The second far enough down to allow the turkey to fit in the oven.

Remember that the temperature in the oven will vary. The upper third of the oven will be approximately 1 gas mark higher than the temperature you have set, the lower third will be about 1 gas mark lower. The middle area will be the temperature you have set. If you need to set your turkey in the lower third of the oven in order for it to fit, be sure to heat the oven 1 gas mark higher. (Gas mark 7/425F/220C)

Preheat the oven, prepare the turkey and place the stuffing into the neck and body cavities.

7:00AM – Turkey goes into the oven.

10:00AM – Process bread for bread sauce and leave sit beside the cooker to dry.

12:30PM – Prepare milk infusion for bread sauce. Bring it just up to boil, then remove from the heat, cover, and keep near the stove until needed.

Parboil the potatoes and parsnips. Once parboiled, drain and either shake the pan or run the tines of a fork over the sides of the potatoes to rough up the edges. Leave to air dry.

Place the Christmas pudding into the double boiler for cooking. Be sure to check the water level every 30 minutes to make sure it doesn’t boil dry. Add more boiling water as needed.

1:10PM – place baking tray with fat into the oven to heat up for roasting potatoes and parsnips.

1:15PM – Carefully place the potatoes and parsnips into the fat, baste, and place in top of oven. Add the sausages to the roasting tin with the turkey, remove the foil from the turkey so the skin can brown, and baste.

1:30PM – Cook the bacon rolls under the grill. Turn halfway through. They will take about 10 minutes total. Place in a casserole in the bottom of the oven once cooked.

1:40PM – Turn and baste potatoes and parsnips.

Put the vegetables on to cook.

Remove the turkey from the oven, check for doneness. Remove to a serving platter, cover with foil, and take to the table. Be sure to keep it out of reach of any 4 legged friends. Transfer the sausages to a casserole and keep in the bottom of the oven. Drain the fat and stock from the pan for gravy. I prefer to drain it into a heatproof measuring jug.

1:45PM – Finish up the bread sauce and make the gravy.

1:50PM – Place serving dishes into hot water to warm up.

1:55PM – Remove the serving dishes from hot water, dry, and dish up all the foods to be served.

2:00PM – Call everyone in for dinner.

When you are ready for the Christmas Pudding, remove it from the double boiler. Place on a serving plate. Heat brandy in a metal ladle until it nears flashpoint, then light afire. Pour over the Christmas Pudding and bring to the table. Serve a generous spoonful of pudding with lashings of brandy butter.

Above all else, remember the most important thing about Christmas isn’t the food, it’s spending time with family and friends. It is far better that you have a relatively stress-free day than it is that you serve a perfect dinner. If that means getting foods that have been pre-cooked for you and heating them up on the day or even taking the whole clan to a local restaurant for Christmas Dinner, then do it.

Serves 4-6

Ingredients:
350g (12oz) Fresh Chestnuts
700g (1½lb) Brussels Sprouts, trimmed
25g (1oz) Butter
Salt and Pepper

Method:

1. Pre-heat oven to 200°C; 400°F: Gas 6.
2. Trim the stems of the sprouts and deeply score with a cross.
3. Using the point of a sharp knife, make a small cut on the flat side of each chestnut.
4. Bake their skins for 20 minutes.
5. Allow to cool slightly, then peel removing both the outer and inner shells. (Steps 3,4, and 5 can be done the day before)
6. Place the Brussels sprouts in boiling water and cook for 8-10 minutes, until just tender (or longer if preferred).
7. Drain.
8. Return to the saucepan, with the chestnuts and butter, over a high heat, toss until the butter is melted, season to taste.

Serve immediately.

Gravy

Separate all but a small amount of the stock from the fat. Add water if necessary to bring it up to 2 cups.

Pour or strain (depending on whether you want bits in the gravy) the stock into a saucepan. Bring it up to heat just under a boil.

All of my recipes linked to above can be found on these pages:

Roast chicken/turkey dinner
Recipes for:
Roasting poultry
Parsley, lemon, and thyme stuffing
Nut stuffing
Bacon rolls
Bread sauce

Roasted Vegetables

Traditional British Puddings
Recipes for :
Christmas Pudding
Brandy Butter

Further dessert ideas:

Mont Blanc
Apple Desserts
Sticky Chocolate Pudding

NanLT is a home cook with over 2 decades experience cooking for her family. Over the years she has developed a wide range of recipes for family eating. At Cooking with NanLT she provides recipes, hints, and tips for other home cooks.