To want to eat my Xmas dinner while it is hot?

[XmasSprouts]

So today we had Christmas with some family we don’t normally see for Christmas.
They gave us cold plates and all the trimming were put on the table and we were told to serve ourselves. No sign of the turkey. Then they cleared the table to make way for the turkey. It was brought out like Simba in the lion king, I think we were supposed to gasp in delight.
Then it was slowly carved at the table whilst our food went cold. By the time I got my first bite everything was stone cold.
I really prioritise having everything hot when I host. Hot plates, warmed serving dishes and meat carved before serving everything else. Gravy put in jugs last so it is piping hot.
So AIBU to want my Christmas dinner to be hot?

ps this is tongue in cheek as I am grateful not to cook today and know not everybody has the experience to present a good meal for a large group.

There’s only 3 of us and I still struggle to keep things warm. I usually blast everything in the microwave for 30 secs when everything is on the plate, then piping hot gravy warms it all up properly. I heat my plates in the microwave just before as well.

I was thinking about this today. I always heat the plates for hot food as it stays hot much longer. I do it by putting them on a saucepan of boiling water. It only takes half a minute or so and is well worth it.

Because they're a lot cooler than the food I'm serving, especially if it's the dead of winter as I don't have radiators in my kitchen cupboards.

We used to have this at the in laws apart from they'd cook the turkey in November then keep it sliced and frozen until it needed heating up on Christmas Day. Everything was put into serving containers and would be cold by the time you'd served yourself then waited until everyone was ready to eat. Plus, they'd spend time talking about the food and admiring it etc. reminiscing about past Christmas dinners as well. I hate rituals surrounding food.

I have 2 heated buffet servers and they are game changers. 1 has 3 large containers and the other 2 larg and 2 smaller ones. In large containers I have roast potatoes, Yorkshire puddings and pigs in blankets with sausage meat stuffing. In second server I have carrots and sprouts in smaller dishes, carrots and mashed potatoes in larger containers. I put apple sauce, cranberry sauce in little pots red cabbage in a bowl and carved turkey crown and roasted leg of pork on a meat serving platter. Like you I leave gravy until everything else is on table before putting into 2 jugs for pouring.

Do you not eat in restaurants that heat plates?

All I can rhink of is how much washing up, we serve from cooking pots to plate then table, why the need for all this extra effort? No wonder why people seem to complain how tired they are at Christmas

It was years before I wrapped my head around my PILs’ way of serving big meals (Thanksgiving for them). There would be half a dozen or more dishes of cooked food, a bird, jugs of gravy, all on the table with fancy place settings etc. Then MIL would come and sit in the living room and chat for 10-20 minutes, about nothing major. Then FIL would go around asking who wanted red/white/water and sort that out. Then eventually everyone would sit down and plates/dishes would have to be passed around so everyone got what they wanted/needed. There would be a solid 45 minutes of the food sitting on the table after coming out of the oven! Everything would be room temp at best. So, so yuck. I’ve since learned she would just be so exhausted from the prep that she wanted a sit down and a breather before the next round of effort of eating! I now put my plate in the microwave (or most recently just not eat much as the microwave just invited too many comments…).

I would have asked for my plate to be put in the microwave to get hot.

I prefer my guests to help themselves and to have hot food. I never complain about additional work and there's no more washing up than if I'd put food into serving dishes.

Rubbish. It's clearly a personal preference, judging by this thread. My mum's family were working class and always heated plates for hot meals. My mum even heats soup bowls!

Just waiting to take off, had 8 nights in a lovely villa in the Canaries. Bliss!
Don't want to come home.

Bollocks. It’s clearly some middle class neurosis about the “acceptable” way to serve food.
No good restaurant serves food too hot to taste either.

I completely agree.

I just wanted to add that when hosting for many people, even when you plate up as quickly as you can, it can be hard to have all the plates hot enough too keep the meat warm whilst everyone serves themselves sides, etc. Especially when using posh china plates which cool quicker. The best solution I have found is using microwaveable silicone plate warmers. They get the centre of the plate really hot, but the edges cool enough to hold, and you can put them under the plates at the table and it keeps them warm for the whole meal.

Betterkook Microwave Silicone Plate Warmers 4 Pack - Warms Plates in The Microwave in Minutes Keeps Food Warm Stops Plates Cracking : Amazon.co.uk: Home & Kitchen share.google/C6PTkxVqyHC9MUm39

Me too! And a plate warmer from Amazon - just plugs in

Nobody said restaurants serve food at boiling point. They serve hot food on warm plates.

Not sure what, if any, point you were trying to make.

Despite a minor disaster with DS being stranded cos his bike broke, DP mounted a valiant rescue and got him home, but that messed up all the timings. I still managed to serve it all 30 mins late with nothing burnt, and the food was reasonably hot when I got it all onto the table.

DSD, moments before I began to tuck in, said "let's pull the crackers!" - with a face like thunder, after slaving away at dinner for hours and by a minor miracle keeping it all edible and hot - I announced that I was eating it, now, while it's hot and everything else can wait.

On that basis, YANBU.

Hostess trolley !

You can microwave most plates, 30 seconds is fine for a stack missing the point.

Yanbu OP, the hard bit about any large meal is having everything cooked at the same time, any fool can make 10 things one at a time.

But unless you want to do it yourself you will just have to mutter to yourself about it.

As soon as everyone has a full plate, before starting eating, is exactly when I would expect to pull crackers. Your DSD was just doing the normal thing.

Well ...when do you pull crackers if not then?

Worst CHristmas meal I ever had was at the inlaws about 20 years ago. MIL is not a cook and flaps in the kitchen, as does FIL who interferes and offers his opinion even though the height of his culinary achievement is toast. So she decided it would be a genius plan to cook the turkey on Christmas Eve to avoid the stress.

Christmas morning they start boiling carrots and broccoli at 9am for a 1pm lunch. Making Bisto gravy so thick you could cut it into slices. Then turkey removed from fridge, served cold, with mushy veg, greasy potatoes and a slice of Bisto. Blurgh. 🤑

Sounds like a good idea. If I had to cook a sit down meal for a crowd, I'd look into these. It's not about having food boiling hot, as others have said. It's about having it hot enough (not mouth-burningly hot) rather than tepid or cool or cold, with the fat starting to congeal. I don't need heated plates to achieve this if I'm serving up lasagne and salad, or cottage pie and one or two vegetables, or a couple of curries and rice. I do if I'm serving up a Christmas dinner with umpteen elements all designed to be served hot.

Thanks for this, I've just put them in my Amazon Basket, and might even give some to my sister next Christmas. Not that she needs them, she just shoves the empty plates in the microwave for a minute or two.
Fine in her own house, but I'm very precious about MY plates.

After the nice hot goose, but before the Christmas pudding.