My concise Christmas menu makes cooking for a crowd easy – appealing, even! …
Christmas cooking might be my favourite kind of cooking. By that, I don’t mean the traditional flavours or the endless rich meals – it’s more that I love having the time off to cook whatever I like for family and friends, with time to do it. I’ll happily spend an entire day making a trifle from scratch: the genoise sponge, the raspberry jelly, the perfectly whipped cream and toasted almonds. Or I’ll buy a big rib of beef from my butcher for New Year’s Eve and cook it slowly at 55°C until it’s blush pink in the middle, then sear it until deeply golden and serve it with a tangy Béarnaise, crispy potatoes and a pile of perfectly blanched green beans. The best part is I’ll have leftovers for sandwiches to take on a walk the next day.
What I’ve learned from years of cooking for people is that it’s best to keep it simple – especially at Christmas, whether you are hosting on the day itself or the days surrounding it. Everyone’s likely been grazing all day anyway: the big breakfast, a few crisps with a drink, a mince pie or two (or three). The main event doesn’t need to be a twelve-dish spread. A few really good dishes are far better than a dozen average ones.
For the last few years, on the weekend before Christmas, I’ve been making gravlax (cured salmon). It’s the easiest thing to make and the best thing to have in the fridge for Christmas week. It’s one of those recipes that, once you’ve made it once, you’ll never buy it again – plus, it’ll save you a small fortune. Once it’s cured and feels firm to the touch after two to four days in the fridge, you can slice it into wafer-thin pink ribbons to layer on a platter with lemon wedges and blinis for a canapé, or pile it on top of bagels with cream cheese for a late breakfast.
At around 1.30pm on Christmas Day, I like to make a platter of thinly sliced soda bread, each piece liberally spread with salted butter, then topped with slices of gravlax, capers, chopped dill and a squeeze of lemon juice to finish. It’s light and fresh before a heavy meal to come, and paired with a clementine martini, it’s the perfect pre-dinner canapé, in my opinion.
A few hours later, you’ll be leaning back in your chair thinking you couldn’t possibly fit another thing in – but we all know that once dessert hits the table, it’s hard to say no. In the days leading up to Christmas, I recommend you make my hazelnut brown sugar pavlova so that when the time comes, all you need to do is whip some cream and ripple through a few heaped tablespoons of marmalade to pile on top, followed by your fruit of choice and a generous dusting of icing sugar at the table.
Another alternative dessert, if you want to move away from the classic Christmas pudding or cake, is a clafoutis – a classic French pudding that sits somewhere between a baked custard and a pancake. Made with almond flour, cream and eggs, it’s baked until puffed, golden and just set in the middle. The batter takes less than five minutes to pull together and can sit until you’re ready to bake. I pop mine in the oven as people are finishing their turkey and last serving of roast potatoes, so I can serve it straight from the oven with cold ice cream and soaked prunes or warmed mincemeat. The clafoutis isn’t too sweet, and you can add any fruit you like to the batter: plums, pears, apples, cherries, raspberries or figs.
In my first ever column for THE GLOSS Table newsletter, I wrote about sobremesa – a Spanish term that doesn’t have a direct English equivalent but perfectly captures Christmas to me: the time spent at the table after a meal, talking, drinking coffee or wine, and simply enjoying each other’s company. Literally, it means “over the table”. In Spain, la sobremesa is almost as important as the meal itself – that relaxed, unhurried stretch when nobody rushes to clear plates or check their phone. That, to me, is Christmas: nowhere to be but at the table, with family, friends – and of course, great food. Save my recipes below …
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