Foods that DO NOT belong on a Christmas Dinner...

[MaidenMotherCrone]

Obviously it’s all down to personal taste but some things are just wrong...

Mushy peas fgs, noooooooo

What foods would never have a place on your plate?

I thought we were ultra traditional with our Christmas dinner but we have mashed potatoes, Yorkshire puddings, parsnips and carrots. We are northern though

They should be put on a low simmer the night before for a 1.00pm lunch. Particularly important for sprouts

I take it this is for xmas 2019, as it's far too late to put the sprouts on a vigorous boil for this year?

All those saying you only have yorkshire puddings with beef are missing out. Yorkshire puddings go with any meat or even with no meat.

Me and DH are vegetarian and would never have a roast dinner without yorkies. Gravy though is yuk and just why would you have lovely crisp yorkies and roast potatoes then make them soggy with gravy?

Have recently moved north and can't believe people eat chips with gravy on! Again a food that should be crispy then made soggy. Disgusting

Our Xmas dinner will be:
Some sort of steak for dh and a mushroom wellington thing for me (the dc will have a bit of both)
Yorkshire puddings
Gravy
Stuffing (possibly. I love it!)
Roast spuds, carrots, parsnips and sprouts (though I'm thinking of making roast sprout soup for a starter instead)
Steamed field veg (incl peas, sweetcorn, cauliflower and carrots)
Mint sauce
Pickled onion (homemade)

Things that do NOT belong on a roast dinner are:
Anything that already has its own sauce (e.g. spaghetti hoops (who has that?!) or cauliflower cheese)
Fish
Beans
Mushy peas (they're the food of the devil anyway so definitely don't belong on a roast meal!)

For me it's Yorkshire puddings. Unfortunately DH disagrees so I refuse to partake but he is bribing up my DC's to think this abomination is normal 😂

In terms of veg I would serve mushy peas, garden peas or tweet corn. Usually it's winter veg only.

Butter beans

I have no idea why my family add these to a Xmas dinner

I'm quite flexible and don't mind any one food in particular, but my mum's idea of christmas dinner is to make about 17 different vegetables, all specially served in the best china, which means by the time you're allowed to get started, it's all freezing. Things like sweetcorn, peas, broccoli, courgettes, cabbage, it's just daft. I'm happy with turkey and gravy, roasties, sprouts and parsnips.

Also I hate having a starter with Christmas dinner. I like the main course and pudding and I don't want to fill myself up. Hate it when someone insists on making/having a starter and then you feel rude if you don't want it.

Also agree with fish. Countries where they have carp for Christmas dinner - bleugh.

I hate having floury boiled potatoes put on my plate when I only want fluffy crispy roasties.

Oh yes my mum insists on doing roast potatoes AND horrible floury boiled potatoes and you have to have some of each

Luckily I no longer go to hers by agreement. Still shudder at the thought of it all though!

My in laws used to do the your kids first. They also never did starters for xmas (my family always did). As I refuse to eat Yorkies as part of my xmas meal I was sick of having to sit and wait for them to finish their 'starter' while I waited so one year I just carried on in the kitchen while they are finishing the dinner. I came to sit down and they had waited for me 😡 I was starving and still had to wait for them.

I now insist on a starter even though mil says it's too much food 😂

Spaghetti hoops. Which is what dd1 had as a side dish last year. She doesn't like any aspect of a roast dinner except the meat and as it was Christmas I decided for once to take a day off from nagging about veg and give the people what they want 🤷🏽‍♀️.

Mashed (gravy and butter) and roasted (red currant jelly butter) potatoes. Sweet corn. Broccoli with ginger and garlic. Brussels with Tamari. Due to recent bereavement this Christmas dinner is all up in the air. Think we may end up having big bowls of pasta or similar as currently can’t even imagine being Christmassy (no young children to keep up appearances for). Roast potatoes have been mentioned though so can see a very odd meal occurring. !

Other people's Christmas dinners fascinate me.

My dmil likes to put out every type of vegetable she can think of - mushy peas, sweetcorn, boiled potatoes, mashed, roasts, leeks, carrots, parsnips, sprouts, mashed swede and parsnip, marrow fat peas, roast shallots, green breans, brocoli, cauliflower... Happily, it's a serve yourself affair so everyone can ignore the bits they don't like.

Also does Yorkshire and pigs in blanket.

But no cranberry sauce and they hadn't even heard of bread sauce!

Growing up mum was not an adventurous cook, so it was roast potatoes, swede and parsnip mash, peas and carrots with every single roast.

“My mum has to have tinned peach halves with cranberry sauce in - on her plate dangerously near the gravy.”
That sounds as if it has leapt straight out of a 1970s Family Circle magazine. tinned peach halves? Very 1970s cookery colour scheme that.

HeronLanyon, sorry to hear about your bereavement. I hope Christmas isn't too difficult for you all. I have a friend who lost her mum very recently and I know Christmas is going to be pretty grim there this year, as they all loved Christmas.

I don't have a four-oven Aga but I do have the good fortune to have two ovens, which is a huge help at Christmas. I cook the turkey in the big oven, at a medium temperature for most of its time, all wrapped in foil to keep it moist. Then I turn the temp up, take the turkey out, take off the foil from the top so the breast is exposed, baste it, put it back to brown. Check it's cooked, remove from oven, cover loosely with the foil to keep it warm, let it rest. This isn't just convenient while I finish cooking other things, it makes the turkey better by allowing the juices to soak back into the flesh. Far easier to carve after it's rested a while.

Meanwhile, the potatoes, parsnips and sausages go into the oven at the highest temp for about 30 mins. The carrots probably go in beforehand as they take a long time (45 mins minimum). Could do carrots in advance and re-heat, they're very forgiving. While that's happening (channelling St Delia here!), I make the gravy, heat the plates and serving dishes in the small oven and boil the sprouts with the peas steaming on top.

That's the kind of detail I love. Families with a long tradition of peach halves, butter beans, mushy peas, mint sauce with turkey, fried onions and mushrooms on the side, spaghetti hoops, and a kid who is even now plotting his own dynastic tradition of adding baked beans on the side, stemming back to the Christmas when his mum said he couldn't have baked beans instead of sprouts!

I've never had bread sauce.

I wash my Christmas meal with fizzy wine instead.

Mashed potatoes! You've already got roast potatoes so why add mashed? The previous posters saying about putting vinegar on a roast dinner reminded me of my ex BIL. I remembers the first time I went to Sunday dinner at my fiancé's (now exH) house,his younger brother smothered his roast chicken dinner in tomato sauce. I was .

Have recently moved north and can't believe people eat chips with gravy on! Again a food that should be crispy then made soggy. Disgusting

With the mash potatoes too, I assume there is something genetic in the north and wanting wet sloppy food?

For those of you who have roasted carrots, can you roast them ahead and then do a quick reheat? I love the idea of them but cannot see how I could fit them in the oven along with the roast potatoes, roast parsnips, stuffing and chipolatas.

Cook meat first, cover it and let it rest when the oven is cooking or reheating other food.

We have mash and roast potatoes. Obviously we eat half the amount of mash and roasts we would eat with a single portion of either. I don’t understand why people find that hard to fathom.

I object to the mixed potato thing, because I ONLY want 3 or 4 roast potatoes max.

I don't like floury potatoes or mash. So I hate it when I am told that I have to have boiled potatoes because there aren't enough roast potatoes. My argument is that most people have more roast potatoes than me anyway and they have boiled potatoes on top.

I am happy for them to do that. But why do have to pollute my tiny portion of roasts with boiled potatoes just because they have a huge appetite.

I wouldn’t have boiled potatoes with a Christmas dinner.

I like a few slices of nice bread after my dinner to soak up the gravy left on the plate. Just to add to the carbs.