I think soup used to be a thing, my mother in law always made home made soup, like lentil and ham as a starter on Xmas day with bread to go with it.
As I was not used to such a thing for Xmas dinner, and for me, soup and bread is really filling, I found eating it before a roast dinner just too much. It really bags you up. She’d do normal size bowls too. People were just so stuffed at the end of it all. As they would be hungry when they sat down and fill up on soup, then plough their way through the main course.
When we had our first Xmas my husband suggested it, and I was like I just can’t do that, it’s so much food and not very special, and tried many different things, from goats cheese salad to garlic mushrooms on thinly cut bruschetta, and we eventually landed on canapés about three hours before hand a few years ago and have stuck with this ever since. He’d now not consider a bowl of soup and slices of buttered bread before crimbo dinner.
Markies canapés and champagne/Prosecco feels like a real treat, it’s not something you normally have, unlike a bowl of lentil soup and a slice of bread, and everyone always loves it.