to not be particularly happy about cooking Christmas dinner for 18 people on Christmas day?

[luckymummy74]

That would be 8 adults and 10 kids aged between 1 and 16 yrs of age. It will involve 3 highchairs ( I have one).

Also, 4 veggies (not that I'm anti-veggie, on the contrary, I eat a lot of veggie food) but 2 eat fish and 2 don't, so I will have to cook 3 separate meals in total.

A lot of the kids are quite fussy too.....

I don't really have room in my house for this many people.

DH thinks I'm being unreasonable that I'm not very enthusiastic about this.....

Any thoughts, or tips to how to get thru the day?!!!

my mum is doing xmas fr 13 - 8 grown ups, 3 kids and a baby - including 2 vegans and 1 vegetarian

i have persuaded her to let us help so:

1 sis (vegan) is sorting vegan/veggie meat alternative
1 sis sorting potatoes
we are doing pudding

mum will do meat and other veg

only fair in effprt as well as cost

dont do frozen veg - it tastes vile!

2 years ago I had 18 for Xmas day, and 12 for boxing day. I was pregnant and had a toddler.

I can remember hardly any of it!

One tip is to buy tukey breast fillets and turkey legs from the butcher (rather than ordering a whole bird) It is laods cheaper that way, and you can get the butcher to stuff and tie them like fillets (and bone the legs). It saves loads of room in the oven, to make way for other stuff.

waitrose frozen parsnips are ok as are frozen peas. Just carrots and brussels left and you can do them in huge sausepans the night before. You can buy pigs in blankets and stuffing whatnots.

What about beef wellington so your christmas dinner is different from previous years? Maybe you can get a similar looking veg option?

Please let us know next year how it went?

i wouldn't do carrots,broccoli,green beans or anything that you can't do in advance!

red cabbage
peas with garlic and creme fraiche
can be reheated

don't know about brussel sprouts as never made them. my mum parboils them, chops finely, then stir fries at the very last minute (as we are serving up) with bacon and pine nuts and creme fraiche. yum yum

i think Jamie has a good recipe for carrots with thyme and some white wine which you bake in the over in a tin foil parcel. i am sure that would keep quite warm well?

Faced with this problem I personally would hand it over to my partner to arrange.

If money is no object do this

Roast potato tip from Good Housekeeping a couple of years ago - ahead of time parboil potatoes, cool, freeze and then cook on the big day. Important point is to tip the frozen potatoes directly into the hot oil.

what is parboiling? Is it like part-boiling but without the 't'?

I was lucky one summer I had something else to do in the morning and made a date with my family for Sunday lunch(can't remember all the details) My house is bigger than brother's flat and everyone was coming over to us, 10 people plus a couple of kids. Mum gave the keys to my brother, he cooked dinner at my house. I returned from morning event with only one job to do that was set out the table. Get everyone else working and go for a walk.

just booked my christmas ocado delivery, available now

DON'T LEAVE IT TOO LATE!!

Have only read a few messages so someone may have already suggested this.

Get someone else to cook the turkey and you do all the trimmings.

Get the veggie family to bring a veggie dish.

We did this for a few years - my mum cooked the turkey and we took it in the car to my sister's who did everything else. We were 10 mins drive away, so it had time to 'rest'.

My mum found this very easy after spending over a decade cooking for 25+ people at their house!

You could have the excuse that you don't have enough room to do it all yourself.