Your best Christmas Dinner tips?!

[Tillypea]

First timer for making Christmas dinner this year!

Please share your best tips?! How do you make a Christmas dinner that bit more special than a normal Sunday Roast? Without making lots of extra work Christmas day? We have two young DC so would prefer not to be stuck in the kitchen all day.

Hoping to make it as stress free as possible too.. Am I asking for too much ha?!

Not asking too much but have a look through the Christmas topic. I have several threads on precisely this topic saved to my watch list.

You'll also find people there who are happy to chat about Christmas.

Do everything the day before, preparing veg (ready to make on the day).
Turkey can be cooked the day before too.

Decide on a few things you really like rather than making loads and loads of different things.

Make what you can in advance.

Don’t bother with a starter.

Don't order from M&S! I've been let down three times by them recently - once for our last year's Christmas roast (I was offered four steaks instead!!), once a £250 order of finger food for a funeral wake (complete no show) and a birthday cake to order which didn't make it to the store on time. Won't order again from them ever.

Thats annoying, was going to try M&S this year!

I don't like to cook the turkey the day before, but I do let it rest for two hours after cooking. Everything else has loads of oven room for those two hours, which is dead handy.

Make your stuffing and dessert in advance and stick them in the freezer. I sometimes do potato gratin that way as well.

You can parboil and roast your spuds the day before, then roast them again on the day. They'll be beautifully crispy.

Peel and chop your other veg the day before and leave it in water.

Basically, on the day I just put things in the oven at the right time. Everything else has been done in advance. And I have a written schedule on the worktop so I know exactly what needs to go in when.

Have your serving dishes chosen and ready in advance, the last thing you need in the flurry on things being ready is to have to think about dishes.

@Houseplantmad
@LivingDeadGirlUK eek, I've ordered from M&S this year, not everything but a few items, so, hopefully all ok and I'm collecting too, if it goes pear shaped I won't be too stuck.

OP, I do what a pp said, prep the night before, prawn cocktail then fridge it, chop all veg and put in plastic bags with water then put to one side in a bowl. On the day I par boil my potatoes and parnsips, drain, shake and when cooked in goose fat they crisp up on the outside and fluffy inside. Different to Sunday Roast, I do Cauliflower cheese, Dauphinoise potatoes, sprouts, nice stuffing, home made york puds. And a couple of really nice desserts.

Make sure you have a timings list and then you're able to work out what needs to go in when, and everything should be ready at the right time.

The turkey can come out and rest for quite a while, gives plenty of tome to free up the oven for everything else.

I try to prep veg the night before (peeling pots, parsnips, prepping sprouts etc), and then leave them in a covered bowl of cold water overnight.

If doing eg cauliflower cheese, I prep the evening before (we usually have a baked ham and mac & cheese the night before, so I'm making the cheese sauce anyway).

I buy prepared chipolatas and often stuffing too.

Pudding usually made by my mum, but I'd make that in advance too if needed.

I find as long as I've got my timings, the last hour before eating is a flurry of activity, but for the rest of the morning, it's fine with the odd bit of popping stuff in the oven here and there. And make sure you delegate!! Don't do all the cooking, and all the washing up, and laying the table, and choosing the wine, and...you get the gist. Make sure everyone is doing something to help.

In our house we have no set timetable. Christmas.dinner will be ready when it's ready. One year we were eating at 1. Another year 3ish. That really helps to relieve some pressure. Also for me it's all about the sides so make it a bit different to a typical Sunday lunch. So husband makes Nigella gingerbread stuffing the day before (yum) and we roast carrots and parsnips in mayple syrup. And sprouts with loads of bacon n garlic and some Christmas Chutney from a place in the lakes. YUM enough sides for it to be a bit special. Oh and last of all. We cook everything in foil trays. I want minimal washing up on Xmas day.

First timer here too - first time just the 4 of us, assuming no Covid Christmas miracle anyway .

My plan is to:

• not sweat the small stuff. It's just one meal after all
• involve all of us in planning it so I can make sure that I make all the things that are important to us (so smoked salmon & prawn starter with horseradish cream for me, pigs in blankets for the other 3) are there, and none of the things that actually we don't care about (for e.g. we're probably all ok with just having a big chicken as long as stuffing makes an appearance).

We don't have a lot of space - single oven and not a very big freezer - so it's going to have to be scaled back from my mum's usual extravaganza anyway.

I've never made a Christmas cake or a Christmas pudding but I want to give it a try. I think they have to be done around now don't they?

Don't make everything from scratch, the time it takes isn't usually worth it when you consider the difference in taste between whatever recipe you are using and the nice Waitrose/ M&S/ Aldi pre-prepared version.

So I buy in posh mince pies, pigs in blankets, stuffing, Yorkshire puds (doesn't really belong at Xmas dinner but DC are obsessed), a chocolaty pud for the kids (DP and I prefer cheese) and some veg side dishes ready to put in the oven.

There are some things that we will probably have on Xmas day that are defo better home made and pretty quick to make like my shoulder of lamb and gravy, roast potatoes and parsnips, French style peas.....

I don't want to spend too long in the kitchen on Xmas day when I could be lying on the sofa eating selection boxes!

Make what you can in advance, eg, red cabbage can be made in bulk and frozen in smaller portions to eat through the year.

For the day itself, work out when you want to eat and work backwards, ie, eating at 3pm, veg on to boil at 2.50, parsnips into the oven 2.30 etc.

When working out your timings, also work out what tray/pan you'll be cooking them in, and make sure you can fit all the trays in the oven at once/have enough hobs. If you've decided 3 things will all be cooked in the middle sized sauce pan, factor in washing it up, otherwise you come to use and find its dirty which throws all my timings etc.

Get someone else to do it. Failing that, remember it's just a fancy roast. Start cooking the veg AFTER you take the Turkey out. It keeps hot for ages.

Aldi frozen roast potatoes save loads of time, also their frozen honeyed parnsips. I always get a big M&S pork and chestnut stuffing in a tray. Nice with the turkey butties later on! Carrot and swede prepared in morning, likewise sprouts. Ready made pigs in blankets. I've learnt not to waste money on a big turkey cos it just gets wasted. Trifle made day before.

Cook the meat the day before and then you can just time everything to the roasties on the day. I roast the carrots and parsnips too. Oh and if you're having swede do it in the mircrowave, never bother chopping one again! I also buy premade turkey gravy as I always worry that'll ruin the dinner if I make one that's shite.

You can prep and pre-cook most of it so you’re not stuck in the kitchen all day. I always do the dessert on Christmas Eve and usually prep the veggies and roasties too.

Decoration, presentation, decoration.

Present anything beautifully and it will look good and taste better.
Atmosphere and candles... Sparkles...

Less is more.

Snazzy sprouts are a fraud.

@malhurst

Less is more.

Snazzy sprouts are a fraud.

Yes! Totally agree. There seems to be a pressure to pimp all the veg to within an inch of it’s life.

Write out all your timings beforehand. Warm all the dishes (in the microwave if you're short on oven space) so you can keep all the food hot while you do the last-min bits (gravy, sauces etc).

Cook the turkey in the morning and let rest. It'll stay warm, but even if not the gravy gives the illusion of hotness!

Unpack desserts onto serving stands and cover ready for afters.

We prep the veg on xmas eve with Christmas tunes on. We also set the table on xmas eve (but we don't have a fancy Christmas breakfast like lots of people do!).

The Jamie Oliver gravy is insanely good. It takes time to make but you can make it a few weeks in advance and freeze it. It's so Christmassy! I always get compliments on it.

Don't over complicate it. Simple starter ,. Don't stress about it. If it isn't ready in time just top everyone's glass up. No one actually cares as long as they eat. Noone remembers if you forgot the stuffing but they remember a bloody good laugh

A kettle of boiling water is a fast way of warming serving dishes.

Make gravey a couple of days before hand.

On the day, store extra piping hot in a flask so that you have it to hand.

Take as many short cuts as you can!

Agree with others about timings - make a list of what needs to be put in the oven and when.

Cook turkey and let it rest - put other bits in the oven whilst it's resting for an hour or 2.

Prepare everything you can in advance - freeze stuffing. I sometimes make a small cauliflower cheese which can also be frozen.

I don't do starters and desserts are usually made by my sister and brought to us so I don't need to factor that in very often but when I do, I choose a few "easy" items - cheese board, frozen gateaux, etc - the main event in our house is always the actual Christmas dinner.

What makes it more special than a Sunday roast for me is pigs in blankets - and sprouts!

Roast stuff on foil trays.