Christmas Eve - What to cook!

[Jblue]

So my DD is 3 this year and my DS will be 9 months old, so I really want to put in a Christmas eve tradition.

We have Christmas eve boxes, which contain new Christmas pyjamas for the 4 of us, yummy Munchies and a Teddy for the little one, as we qo sit down and watch a Christmas movie before laying out milk and cookies and reading the night before Christmas.

However I'm stuck on what to cook for dinner!
I want it to be a yearly thing, where we eat around 4pm.

What does everyone else cook or does anyone have really nice ideas?

We always have a takeaway on Christmas eve but I think kids would enjoy any kind of picky things that they dont normally have or served in a different way, such as frozen pizzas on paper plates sat near the Christmas tree. That would become the tradition more than what is being eaten perhaps.

My DDs are 4 and 2 and our tradition is that DH and I have a seafood dinner with champagne after the DC have gone to bed, usually scallops and chips with aioli. It's a lovely way to have some quiet, grown up time before the chaos of Christmas day.

If you're wanting to eat with them however I'd probably go for either a chip shop takeaway, eaten out of the paper sat under the Christmas tree or party food which is an easy thing to stick in the oven and just have a selection of nibbles.....we do that on New Year's Eve it's always party food for dinner and we can just graze on it until midnight if we're still peckish.

DH and I have always had a party food tea on Christmas Eve, usually after SIL's christingle service.

My DM always cooked a gammon joint and served it with coleslaw, pickles, cheese, crackers, warm crusty bread rolls and either new potatoes or roasties.

Dp makes pizza on christmas eve here.

We don't cook on christmas eve, or generate washing up if we can help it! We'll stick a pizza in the oven for the kids, and DH and I will get a loaf of nice bread and have some pates and cheeses, along with my homemade chutneys from the summer, and there's a chunk of membrillo in the fridge that will make an appearance. Then macarons afterwards, always. Hot chocolate before the kids go to bed, then the dishwasher goes straight on and gets emptied before I go to bed. Waking up to an empty dishwasher on Christmas morning is vital to me. And then the first thing to go in it is Santa's messy mince pie plate and milk glass. He never bothers putting them in himself, the lazy fecker.

You really don't need to make traditions, they just happen, and each year will most likely evolve with young kids.
Just do what seems to suit this year and take it from there.

Slow cooked ham, stotties (northern thing! Just buns), peas pudding and picky bits :)

We have gammon/cooked ham, potato dauphinoise, red cabbage and crusty rolls.

We just have buffet food from M&S plus something healthy with it like tomatoes and salad

We’ve always had a takeaway pizza on Christmas Eve, when we were little a takeaway was such a rare treat it was definitely not usual. I think it was only due to the fridge / freezer being full and oven being used to prepare things in advance that we did it. It’s something that we have continued with our own kids. We go to the crib service and collect the pizza on the way home.

I always find that Christmas Eve is frantically busy no matter how well I prepare (and I am a very organised type!), so I just want Christmas Eve dinner to be easy. This year, we're buying a pie from a local business (they are honestly the best pies I've ever tasted, so will feel like a treat!), which we'll have with some oven chips.

@Jblue
I remember every Christmas eve dinner was a big pot of homemade soup with spuds always looked forward to it but then I love home made soup lol. Was an easy dinner for my mum with having to sort everything else out, then a few sweets that night watching Christmas movie.

I always cook a glazed gammon and we have that with chips and crusty bread.

I want to do Chinese takeaway at some point. As soon as they reopen I think

You hoped-for tradition sounds lovely!

I usually do something seafoody Christmas eve then always do gammon, cauli cheese and cranberry sauce for Boxing day.

Christmas I tend to chop and change between goose, chicken or beef depending on what We feel like.

@MustBeDueSomeBetterFeet

We have gammon/cooked ham, potato dauphinoise, red cabbage and crusty rolls.

We have exactly this! Are you me and me you?

Any leftover gammon & red cabbage goes on the plate alongside the turkey a la carvery and is very popular

Its all about the chippy tea and a nice bottle of red on Christmas Eve in our house. When they were younger we used to go to carols at the church attached to their primary school, then call in at the chippy on the way home.

I always make Swedish meatballs on Christmas Eve

Hot glazed gammon rolls with pickles, chutneys and salad!

For years we had fish pie, but recently changed to meatball lasagne, easier than other lasagne but time consuming making tiny (hazelnut sized) meatballs. This year DS1 has said he'll cook.

It's takeaway for us has been for about 10 years as we all go to my parents,well just dad now,but we started getting takeaway because mam was in a care home but came home for a few days over Christmas & she loved fish& chips so it was a lovely treat, unfortunately mam passed away a few weeks ago but I will still do it with my boys & talk about granny ♥️

Jamie Oliver jerk ham which we have with egg and chips. Cold cuts eaten over next few days.

I usually make a little buffet with nibbles and champagne.

Fish suppers.

In recent years we’ve not had a traditional Christmas Eve meal, but had a variety of easy simple meals, quiche, pizza etc.
But as a child, we always had sliced boiled ham, potato salad, Russian salad, sliced tomatoes & beetroot, pickles. Easy and quick to put together, but still tasty, and a contrast to Christmas Day food.

I’m amazed and a bit sad that Father Christmas gets cookies & milk these days. Years ago he used to get mince pies and sherry. I usually had to help him out with the sherry of course!

I have no christmas tradition but all of us like garlic bread and sausages so I might do

Cocktail sausages
Or
Sausage rolls (might make these)
Spring rolls
Salad
Garlic bread

In nice festive dishes