Christmas food successes and failures

[SinkGirl]

I thought it would be a nice idea to have a thread where people share recipes / products that worked well and those that didn’t so we all know for next year. Here’s mine:

Successes:
Nigella’s perfect roast potatoes (I make these every year and they are always perfect, although I do parboil them for a bit longer, 8 mins once the water has boiled rather than 4) - the semolina makes them

This Yorkshire recipe - they came out perfectly www.delish.com/uk/cooking/recipes/a29557764/how-to-make-yorkshire-puddings/

M&S Porchetta joint - takes a bit of extra prep with salting the rind but worth it, it was lovely

Bluetooth meat thermometer with two probes - saved my meat as if I’d followed the instructions everything would have been overcooked

Mary Berry’s easy chocolate brownie recipe - so easy, made on Christmas Eve, kids had it heated up for pudding with ice cream. Now I get to eat the rest :D
thehappyfoodie.co.uk/recipes/chocolate-brownies

Failures:
M&S lamb shoulder - even using a meat thermometer so it was cooked to medium it was not great. And it was pretty tiny.

M&S garnish pack - pigs in blankets all unravelled and stuffing balls didn’t cook anywhere near as quickly as they should

How about you? Any good tips or things to avoid next year?

Waitrose mag recepie for sprouts with pancetta and pinenuts was delicious! My sprout hating brother had seconds!

Basically gently fry pancetta till crisp, remove from the pan leaving the fat, fry finely sliced red onion until soft, remove. Fry shredded sprouts in butter until soft and beginning to colour, add a splash of red wine vinegar and some honey then stir the onions and pancetta back in along with some toasted pine nuts - was so good I’m having it for dinner this week!

I've always used half a lemon before but this year I tried Jamie Oliver's penchant for shoving a clementine in the turkey cavity. My gravy was the best ever.

Have just been to M&S and bought some foot-long pigs in blankets in the sale. They are in the oven now and smell great.

Success - rather than mashing the potatoes at the last minute, I mashed them early on and then put the dish in the oven for an hour before dinner was served. They had a nice texture and it was much easier than trying to do them alongside the gravy. They also stayed hot for ages (used an oven to table dish).

Another fan of Delia's foil tent method here - I've been using it for years and it works brilliantly.

Well there was only me and I didn't have the money for anything fancy so a cheese pie with Tesco's roasted veg (down in price hoorah!). It was very nice - potatoes, broccoli, beans and courgettes all roasted on a tray. No pudding.sweet at all. So nothing bad.

Forgot about the stuffing balls and the pigs in blankets in the small oven, the ended up like pieces of coal and twigs!

Good housekeeping recommended Iceland turkey crown, tasteless indescribable meat, never again, back to the local butcher next year. But have loads left so dont want to waste it so covering it with anything I can find to give it some flavour and just made more stuffing

Gordon Ramsay's Beef Wellington was delicious - I just follow the steps, although this year I made the mushroom mixture a couple of days early. We have it every year for Christmas, with traditional Christmas trimmings, including Delia's roasties. They never fail to delight.

Also made my own sausage rolls and mince pies, using BBC recipes, and they tasted great. We live in the US, so cannot find English style sausage rolls. Used my Mom's method for cranberry sauce with a little ginger, cooked in orange juice! And made my grandma's biscuits and they are disappearing so quickly.

Hosting a traditional Boxing Day today for friends. Should be fun.

A young person made the grand statement yesterday "I am doing dessert!" which was xmas pud already cooked but the custard part was his responsibility and he skipped off to the kitchen.

Shortly he returned with a bowl of yellow liquid and sitting in the middle was a lump of what looked like rubber with knobbly bits on. We all laughed but he had followed the microwave version of custard and it had gone horribly wrong.

Yours truly showed him how to do it on the hob and we got a smooth helping of custard within a few minutes.

Success - bread sauce for the first time ever. Everyone loved it. Tempted to make some more today to go with leftovers.

BrokenWing I'd be really annoyed about that beef Wellington - actually I'd complain. It looks rubbish tbh.

We had a Kelly bronze turkey from Booth's (we're in the North) which was lovely and juicy - I roasted it as suggested, upside-down until the last half-hour or so, then turned it over to brown. The suggested cooking time was spot-on, too.

Unfortunately their pre-prepared veg box for 8, which sounded like a great idea, wasn't so brilliant. Not-very-nice sprouts (jettisoned them before the day and bought fresh instead); not quite enough roast potatoes for 7 of us. The red cabbage and beetroot was lovely, however.

Most stuff was a fail tbh. We're all sick and no one wanted anything so i've stuck loads in the freezer.

Home made Quiche was good as was the White Russian pannacotta from good housekeeping mag. I tried to make a smoked fish terrine but it collapsed so I blended it all up together to make pate and it's lush. Waitrose pigs in blankets did quite well.

Aldi Xmas tree tortilla chips were a miss and my Yule log was meh. Linda McCartney veggie roast thing was one of the worst things I've ever eaten.

Next year I am not going to bother I think. Dh and the kids really don't care much and dm and I end up eating for the sake of it.

The good food magazine ham with marmalade and star anise was a success- so much so that DM has asked me to do it for her birthday buffet on the 29th.
Also nigella's sprouts with Marsala and pancetta were good.
No real disasters.

Misses: Aldi turkey crown (not my idea) came out much too dry. Iceland honey-roast parsnips were okay but not as nice as the maple ones I normally do.

Hits: Delia’s rich chocolate mousse (recipe doubled as her portions are always mean); sticky gingerbread from Nigella Christmas.

hit the main dinner all of it turned out right due probably to brand new double gas cooker so I had room to separate all the trays

miss the wild boar pate from aldis my own fault I didn't look at the date, bought it on sunday and it went out of date on the 23rd and it had gone well off, luckily I had bought some mushroom pate with a longer date so we had that instead

Have just been to M&S and bought some foot-long pigs in blankets in the sale.

Oh. My. God.

We bought a free range, super local, super happy goose but when it arrived it was tiny! We really struggled to get any meat off it, literally had a mouthful each.

However the gammon was amazing and Aldi outdoor reared pigs in blankets were the best I've ever had.

www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/chocolate-orange-tini-trifle

Not a failure but wasn't great!! Too sloppy & just ended up as a big bowl of custard.

Asda pannetone which I bought for breakfast was awful, very doughy. A work colleague gave everyone in the team a mini pannetone from Sainsburys on xmas eve and this was much nicer. I'll be buying from there next year!

Another success this year was parboiling the potatoes and rolling them in melted goose fat the day before so they just needed to go in the oven at the right time yesterday, they were super crispy and one less thing to do on the day.

This cranberry & orange sauce is delicious and so easy www.onceuponachef.com/recipes/fresh-cranberry-orange-sauce.html

Carrots roasted in garlic butter and beef fat roast potatoes

Cooked the turkey crown in my Instant Pot - quick and easy and everyone said it was delicious! I'm veggie, so took their word for it. A big hit was the new kitchen with two ovens! Room for stuffing, veg, roasties and my veggie alternative. Also pressure cooked red cabbage for lunch and a small piece of gammon for the evening.

No fails this year, so very happy.

I cooked a joint of beef....it was so tough. It's currently in the fridge but I cant be sure it hasn't left the house to start a fight in a pub...yes, it's that tough!

Best dessert. Everyone impressed & good quality chocolate.
www.lidl.co.uk/en/p/desserts/deluxe-dark-chocolate-salted-caramel-cottage/p26949

The M &S Rodney reindeer cheesecake was superb , even dh who is not a cheesecake eater thought so . Dsis also made mince pies using a Paul Hollywood recipe and they were brilliant . The white bomb thing from Sainsbury was definitely better looking than tasting .