Christmas Dinner Starter

[SugarHut]

Well hello.

What is everybody doing for starters for their Christmas dinner? I've had everyone at mine for the last 8 years, and have frankly run out of ideas.

What is everyone else doing? And absolutely fine with buying pre bought ones if anyone can suggest a nice one? Bought the Waitrose mini hebridean crabs for last year, they were delish, and would highly recommend if anyone else is stuck :)

Also, I'm doing goose, not turkey, not that it makes a great deal of difference to selecting a starter.

TIA

Mum always makes smoked mackerel pate & melba toast
There would be a family rebellion if she didn't

Doing a stack thing with prawns, crab, avacado and smoked salmon.

Got to practice it on Xmas eve though as I have a strong image in my head of how I want it but never made it before

We've never have a starter at Xmas dinner feels cheated

I usually do canopies rather than a sit down starter. Goat cheese and caramalised onion mini tartlets and smoked salmon and blinis type thing.

Oooh, I like the idea of canapés....although due to illness there will only be 5 adults plus DS 5 (who'll eat anything) and we will be sat at the table. Is there some kind of sharing "platter" thing I can compile that's very light?? Any ideas what to put in it?

n.b. Mother is terribly "posh" and precious over food, Christmas in particular... if I present anything "breaded prawn ring" style, she will play up.

Take a camembert and a pack of puff pastry.
Roll the said puff pastry, put some cranberry sauce in the middle, plonk the camembert on top of the cranberry, gather the puff pastry in a parcel, pop in the oven till the pastry is nice and brown.

French onion soup? V easy, b cheap, v tasty, v light! Did it one year and worked really well. Good luck!

Going for ham hock and piccalilli terrine, plonked alongside greek salad, and vair thin parmesan crisp toast. All in a line of poncey small portions on a piece of slate.

I did a massive seafood platter last year in the middle of the table with lots of kid friendly cucumber and tomatoes which was a great success- had prawns, lobster tails, smoked trout and salmon, lidl lobster etc all laid out with dollops of sauce so people could help themselves with lemon and salad. This year seafood loving ds has chosen the lidl scallops which cook from frozen apparently and a prawn ring with smoked salmon! Dd is having smooth Brussels pate and cucumber!

I'm doing a prawn and grapefruit cocktail, having just spotted the recipe on MN. It had better be good!

im doing scallops and chorizo pan fried in garlic butter on a bed of salad with some bread from the coop to soak up the sauce.

This is going to be my first xmas abd im cooking for 13 people.

We are having a long slate platter filled with parma ham, chorizo, tempura prawns, scallops, roasted tomatoes, roasted peppers, pate, breads, oils etc.

Served with lots of fizz!!!

We are having Ham hock and Wensleydale terrine. I made it last night.

With homemade piccalilli ( made last month.) maybe with some warm ciabatta, but don't want to fill up too much.

We don't do starters here (hostess usually too merry!) I have bought some canapés and plan send DC's around the room with these pre dinner!!

Baking some camembert and having with breadsticks/cucumber/carrot in a change from the fish based stuff we've had in the past. Wishing we'd done fish now though - smoked salmon terrine, mackerel pate, seafood platter etc etc. Always something simple.

We're having Nigella's Parma ham bundles (has figs and goats cheese) and her crab crostini (chilli crab on tortilla chips). Canapés always seem less formal than proper starters.

We're having gravlax with blinis and dill sauce. MAde the gravlax yesterday, will make the blinis when the chickens lay another chuffing egg!

We're having smoked salmon and prawns with horseradish cream and leaves in a lime vinegarette

Wishing I was doing canapes now (but not sure I can face a trip to the supermarket to pick up ingredients).

Belatedly realised that none of the kids will eat the starter I've planned.

Oh, what the heck, they can play with their presents while the adults scoff.

Got to Waitrose, and they had a huge fresh seafood platter that someone had ordered and phoned to cancel. Selling off for £20!!! What a result!! Huzzah!!