To ask if there are other WOMEN who can't produce a Xmas dinner

[JudyShakes]

Every year on MN there are threads started by women saying that are fed up of doing Christmas dinner, or they don't feel well enough this year etc. And posters will pipe up "get DH/DP to do it!"

DH does the Christmas and most other cooking here. Am I the only FEMALE who would really struggle to produce a Xmas meal that was special enough to deserve the name?

I can cook and bake but I virtually never cook a roast dinner. I have probably done it twice if you exclude those pre-prepared chicken crowns ready stuffed in a foil tray.

It is a faff for just two especially as we both like different parts of a roast dinner.

Not sure what we will have if we can't visit family as usual. Not sure we will bother with a roast dinner.

I can't do a roast. My dh does Xmas dinner.
But as I buy all the presents, write all the cards, wrap all the presents, buy all the food, make the cake, do everything else, seems a fair swap
To me!

@scrappydappydoooooo

If xmas isn't special and doesn't deserve special food, why does it matter at all?

But it's not fucking special. It's just a glorified roast dinner and here in 2020, having had roast dinners as a constant throughout my 42 years on earth, I fail to see what the fuck is 'special' about it. It's boring. I mean it's fine, but it's a tonne of faff for some mediocre flavours and textures. Compared to tandoori cooked meats, a good curry, a flavoursome Mexican dish (even tex-mex/cali-mex, tbh), hoisin duck or a good lasagna, it has fuck all 'special' about it. Even the best roast in the world doesn't taste any better than a decent shepherds pie or good stew.

And no, I can't enjoy my child's joy at Santa's bounty any other day of the year. But I could have a boring roast dinner for breakfast lunch and tea 365/6 days a year if I felt so inclined. Nothing about bog-standard with extra faff roast dinner makes Christmas special.

This!! Soooo much about Xmas dinner is bland bland bland.

In fact I'd be happy with just pigs in blankets, a jar of cranberry sauce and a spoon, and spiritus sautéed with chestnuts and pancetta (try it it's amazing) and bollocks to the rest.

I can produce a full Christmas dinner no problem.

However a simple soft boiled egg is beyond me, they are either raw or bullets

Fuck it, Christmas Day should be a day to eat just whatever the fuck you like.
A massive fry up for lunch. Or egg on toast. Or whatever is your favourite meal. If KFC was open, I'd rather go there as a treat. I don't like roast dinners at all, and in fact, if I lived alone I'd just have beans on toast.

You're not the only one OP, my DP does the majority of cooking as I'm just not that good at it, but we are both luckily off the hook at Christmas as we always go to family (covid pending this year)

DH does Christmas dinner in our house. I would be happy to do it but he would probably be unappreciative and complain about this and that so I don't bother. It's just a glorified roast and I can never get why my mother used to make such a big deal out of it. We stopped going to my parents for Christmas years ago as couldn't stand the fussing.

I think if I see the phrase ‘it’s just a glorified roast’ once more on the same thread my eyes might bleed .

Cancel the cheque.

@GlummyMcGlummerson

I don't get the trauma that apparently comes with cooking Xmas dinner. It's a Sunday roast, with pigs in blankets. Chill out.

I really don't have time for Xmas mummy/daddy martyrs - the ones who (when no one asked them to) wake up at the arse crack of dawn to put the turkey on, make 14 different kinds of veg, flap all day about the timings, moan that no one is helping, practically give themselves a stroke over the whole thing to cook way too much and spend too little time with their family. My mum was like this,my memories of Christmas were her barely seeing us because she was stressing out in the kitchen and when she did see us she was moody and snappy.

People like this always over-do it which leads to a massive fucking waste of food too, we should all know better.

Yep, my Christmas as a child was like this. I have no idea what all the fussing and flapping by my mother was about.

I have a couple of relatives who struggle to cook, and their OHs do most of the cooking.

My late mum could put a dinner together, but it wouldn't be great. Dad (and now me) did/do all the cooking.

I'm teaching my DC to cook, and DS did get an 8 in his GCSE for Food Tech, so I am confident in their abilities to feed themselves.

@WorraLiberty

Also as a young child, I could never understand why my mum was so snappy, grumpy and irritable on Christmas day over the sake of a dinner that most kids would happily do without.

In fact, one look at my mum's stressed face and most of the adults would've happily done without it too.

It's just food at the end of the day and I don't know why some people would rather ruin their own Christmas (and sometimes everyone else's), than just scale it right down. Especially after all the stress and expense of the Christmas shopping/wrapping etc that some people start in Summer.

Just chill out and stop trying to be Nigella if it causes that much of a headache.

Totally agree @WorraLiberty - my mum is a trained chef and really put pressure on herself (no one else did) to produce something amazing - she did about 3,485 types of fish for Xmas Eve dinner and then the traditional (with a million added extras) on Xmas day.

She would spend the best part of 3 days in the kitchen like some mad woman, going overboard and telling us all how ungrateful we were. When actually rather than snappy Annie, we'd have preferred cheese on toast and a mother who played the board games we got for Xmas. But she was in the kitchen from breakfast until evening on both days. I mean I see what she was trying to do, give us a wonderful dinner (and it was bloody tasty) but at the cost of actually enjoying herself, it wasn't worth it. She'd also spend the next week declaring "I've just spent 2 days in the kitchen" in response to any request or question.

This lasted into adulthood when we ALL loudly began to say "don't bother mum we'd be happy with something simple, or nothing at all, or someone else can cook". But she insisted and went OTT every single year. In fact when I first had Xmas dinner at my (now ex) MIL's - who took a very chilled out approach to Xmas dinner, which while it wasn't restaurant standard like mum's was perfectly lovely - I asked exH "why is she so calm? I don't get it? Is she on drugs?"

Funnily enough even though she is a trained chef she was only worked as a chef for a grand total of 3 months, Before we were born. Because "Cooking all that food, the timings, the demands, was too stressful and going to work was making me ill." If only she'd reminded herself of this on Christmas!

I’ll be honest, I really don’t understand anyone who can’t cook. Not being able to bake I get, because things are so precise and you need a decent oven, but cooking general food is not a challenging thing. You follow a recipe if you’re unsure and then it’s done. I understand if you have disabilities that prevent you from being able to cook, but I don’t buy “I can’t cook”. As for things like meat being dry, just get a meat thermometer. Set alarms on your phone, write a schedule, there’s nothing at all difficult about any of it but it requires effort.

I understand not being arsed to cook, but not being able to?

I can’t think of any other basic task that people say they just can’t do so they don’t have to do it.

@Saz432

I’ll be honest, I really don’t understand anyone who can’t cook. Not being able to bake I get, because things are so precise and you need a decent oven, but cooking general food is not a challenging thing. You follow a recipe if you’re unsure and then it’s done. I understand if you have disabilities that prevent you from being able to cook, but I don’t buy “I can’t cook”. As for things like meat being dry, just get a meat thermometer. Set alarms on your phone, write a schedule, there’s nothing at all difficult about any of it but it requires effort.

I understand not being arsed to cook, but not being able to?

I can’t think of any other basic task that people say they just can’t do so they don’t have to do it.

I don’t get people who can’t bake... it’s exactly because it’s so precise that it’s easy. No need to think about it, just put the exact amount of the ingredient in that the recipe asks for.

It has become my husband’s job in our family. He moans that he’ll have to do it and I tell him I’ll do it. Then he says no because I’d create more washing up by using every pan etc (which I don’t think is true). In reality I think he prefers to do it because it means he can escape from the chaos of three kids on Christmas morning and doesn’t get stuck putting stickers on toys etc, which actually I quite like doing so I’m not bothered if he insists on doing the dinner - though I wish he wouldn’t moan about it when actually it’s his choice and I’m perfectly happy to swap roles!

I can cook, I just don’t enjoy it. DH does enjoy it, so he does it.

I wouldn't have a clue.

I'm 53 and have never cooked a roast dinner of any sort.

Why do people say ‘oh it’s easy, blah blah blah’. I’m sure there may be other things some people find easy that you don’t.

It may well be a ‘glorified roast’ but I don’t do those either. I COULD but I’m not very good at them. I cook a lot but I’m more of a one pot type dish or things which don’t require bringing together too much.

So I’ll make home made curries etc, pasta dishes, casseroles, risotto, grilled salmon with cabbage and bacon etc with no problem but I don’t do roasts. I would do a roast/Christmas dinner it if I had to but I’d likely be stressed, make a complete mess, and something would be over cooked or not cooked enough.

DH on the other hand used to be a chef so doesn’t get stress, doesn’t make a mess and is great at bringing everything together.

So obviously he does the roasts and Christmas dinner. I do enjoy making things like home made stuffing and cranberry sauce to go with it, whereas DH would buy those in

I'm 47 and have never done it, although have hosted most Christmases in my adult life.
At various points my mother, ex-husband and now brother have done the cooking. I'm a brilliant sous-chef, topper-up of chefs' drinks and loader and unloader of the dishwasher, though. I happily buy and clear up Christmas lunch every year on the condition that I never have to cook the damn thing!

I could if I had to, but I wouldn't enjoy it, and would insist on other people joining in so I wasn't doing it all.

Dp loves doing Sunday roasts and Christmas dinners: he enjoys the fuss about getting it all ready on time, making piles of washing up and getting praised afterwards (though pretends not to need this - but we all know it's part of the deal). Can you sense my lack of enthusiasm?

I love doing it, I'm good at it and cooking is my favourite thing in the whole world.

On the flip side, I think it's monstrously unfair to expect someone who doesn't love cooking to spend their Christmas producing quite a complicated meal. If I didn't love it and view it as a hobby then I absolutely would not do it. You wouldn't expect someone to do four hours of cleaning alone on Christmas day!

@NiceLegsShameAboutTheFace is that because you don't like eating them?

I can't even do a roast - I leave it to DH, luckily he enjoys it

Then make something else and stop being so weirdly angry about a dinner you don't want.

I don't make it. My mother does. She gets stressed out about it, spends hours and hours on it, I feel compelled to help her. Because what kind of asshole would rock up at their house and spend hours playing games with their kid while their mother is working away in the kitchen. And in the end I end up somewhat under pressure to eat more boring food than I want to eat. I just hate it.

@GlummyMcGlummerson, I think your mum was my ex MIL

Christmas dinner is just a roast - something I grew up with and learnt to cook at a young age. It's only stressful if cooking a roast isn't something you are us doing and some families seem to go totally OTT