do you have christmas dinner displayed on the table help yourself style ?

[littlepaddypaws]

i wonder about this when i see this onads or in shows when all the food is on the table and dishes are handed round to god knows how many people. doesn't the food get cold ? do people rush to put it in the microwave ?
when i plate up a normal dinner, if it's cooling it has a quick blast inthe microwave, however roast is very full on.
so what do you do ? cold food or get in the queue and heat it up ?

We have a hostess trolley, a large one with four glass dishes on top and two big shelves and doors. We inherited it from my mum 26 years ago and it is brilliant. It stores all our ‘good’ china as well as keeping everything warm. It lives in the utility room so it is not intrusive.

My mum also had some silver plated things with lids and legs that fit the glass dishes and can go straight onto the table without needing mats. It is indispensable when we have a lot of people to feed.

Can’t think why they are such objects of derision.

hot gravy warms everything up

normal everyday dinners i plate up as theres only two of us christmas day i do it buffet style as everyone knows how much they can eat

I have never known anyone plate up Christmas dinner, I didn't know people did this. There's usually so many different parts of a Christmas dinner and everyone likes different things best, I'd be really disappointed if I had to have a set amount of different bits rather than lots of my favourite bits and less of other bits (like the meat). Usually everybody's plates end up looking completely different, in terms of quantity and contents.

Don’t you know it’s terribly working class to plate food up on the kitchen? I don’t do it. Anymore. Because now I’m aspiring to be better than my origins. 😂

We always serve ourselves. Just had 17 for roast (Thanksgiving!) and it was fine. All ready to go at once so nothing gets cold.

Some on MN will tell you that it's "rude" for someone to plate your food for you but we just never had the room for a big table, there was just enough room for us to squeeze in with our plates never mind adding serving dishes full of food.

Help yourself here. Plating up is fine when its just dh and I but I don't know how hungry everyone is for Christmas lunch. This thread is making seriously nostalgic over mum's old 1070s hostess trolley.

On the table to help yourself. I give the serving dishes a blast in the microwave before serving so they’re hot.

I only do this on special occasions though, the rest of the time I just plate up.

I plate up and serve, but leave some on the counter if anyone wants more. You get what you get & dont get upset in this house

I also want a hostess trolley now! Trolley envy

When it's just the three of us for Christmas Dinner then I put it into serving dishes and we help ourselves. Easier to put any leftovers like sauces into the fridge not bacon-wrapped sausages as none left over as well to bring out for the buffet tea.

But thinking back to when I've done dinners for extended family, I think we may have plated it all up then with extras on the table due to lack of space. When it is extended family, you end up using garden tables as well! Haven't done that for years now though.

We plate up in the kitchen like you. Can’t be arsed with all the extra washing up. Plus it’s only immediate family so there’s no one to offend by plating up for them.

If we had non family guests we’d probably use serving bowls I guess.

In the centre of the table. It is a bit of a military operation getting it all out in hot dishes to the table at the last minute when there are so many dishes though. What I always find odd is those uncared turkeys in the middle of the table of trimmings in magazines. That has to be carved separately!
Extended family bought a hostess trolley for the big family meal.

Christmas dinner is always serve yourself here... to be honest we don’t tend to plate up any meals. It going cold has never been an issue... surely it takes more than a couple of minutes of serving yourself food for it to go cold?
I’ve never put food in the microwave after cooking/serving it, never needed to.

@Taddda, you'd still have to put the trays in the oven, but Cook does a lot of prepared Christmas dishes. M&S you can order stuff too, all ready in foil trays.

The Turkey is carved at the table with pigs in blankets, stuffing etc added are requested by the carver. The plates are all hot. The veg, is all in hot serving dishes on the table and passed round as each person gets their turkey. Always served up ladies first from old to young, which is great for me as I'm one of the oldest!!

When ExP & lived together it was a military operation of everyone queueing up in the kitchen to say how many slices of meat they wanted, whilst I nipped in & out to the dining room with the straight out of the oven bowls of veg, stuffing, sauces, Yorkshires etc to lay them on the table so everyone could then help themselves. And then finally the gravy. I started the rule after the horror of having Christmas dinner with his family and everything being plated up so I ended up with a mound of sprouts, and a teaspoon of red cabbage, topped by a dribble of gravy. And creamed leeks [green]

I plate up Christmas dinner the same as every other meal in our house is plated up in the kitchen. Unfortunately our table just isn't big enough to have everything on the table to help ourselves. If I did it like that there wouldn't be space for our plates or drinks, and certainly not for crackers or anything extra.

No, ours is plated, extra gravy is help yourself but that’s it.

I hate my food being plated for me. PurplePuffinPicker a piled up plate overflowing with gravy is not appealing to me at all. I prefer to help myself to the amount I want and then help myself to seconds - I don't like huge quantities of food all at once, even on Xmas day - I'll enjoy it all far more if I can select my own portion sizes and choose where to pour my own gravy, thank you.

DW is in charge of the dinner and she plates up, but there's no rationing involved because she piles it so high no-one could possibly complain about not getting a good share. Then smothered with piping hot gravy until the whole lot is nearly pouring off the edge of the plate

I wouldn’t like this at all! I have a weird thing where if there’s too much food on my plate I feel daunted and can’t eat anything. I prefer lots and lots of small portions, that all add up to a huge amount of food but not all in one go .
I like to control what’s on my plate.

I also have never met anyone who plates Xmas dinner. I can't imagine deciding how much every one wants, and the joy is put it all out and people help themselves and keep picking after till they are full.

I really wouldn't wish my dinner plated up, by the time you'd asked everyone how much of everything they want it would take ages. It's very quick to put it on serving platters/bowls in the middle and as some people are serving themselves potatoes, someone else is serving themselves veg. Much quicker.

It really does take awhile for food to go cold, it doesn't happen any quicker in a warm bowl than if it's laying on a plate as everything else is plated up,

No room in table for serving dishes. I serve up kids first and get them eating, then the grownups help themselves from the side/oven/hob. No need for serving dishes, saves on pots, it's really not that complicated but we eat in a kitchen diner which makes things easy

I do a mixture of both, partly to save space at the table, and partly because I cook portion sizes for most things (× no. of guests) as I don't want there to be lots of leftovers.

That means I portion out the meat and the roasties, so that everyone gets a fair share. Everything else goes onto the table for people to help themselves to.

For example, I dish out 4 roasties and a portion of meat each first (checking preferences, obviously) then all veggies/extras/leftovers,etc, are put out onto the table for guests to help themselves to, if they so wish.

Serving and cooking wise, I work on 5-6 roasties per person, 150-200g meat per person, 3-4 portions of various veggies pp, 50g stuffing pp, 2 pigs in blankets pp, 2-3 Yorkshire puds each and roughly 200ml pp for gravy.

It seems to work well, and apart from the meat, which is planned to last a few days, we're not left with lots of other leftovers, which is great.

It depends who's eating with us. We have family members with allergies and different dietary requirements so if they are with us I dish up to avoid cross contamination. At other times I put the food in serving dishes.