Cook Christmas Dinner

[AlltheFs]

I won’t bore you with the why, but rather than do Xmas dinner from scratch this year (DH is excellent at it) we are contemplating ordering it all from Cook.

6 adults and 1 child. We’d get the one for 8 people.

My worry is that the portions will be too small as the adults are big eaters.

Any comments on the portions? Or any other tips?

Any reason why you don't just prep in advance?

That wasn’t the question! We usually do. This year we don’t want to.

We had ours delivered last week - I got the turkey/duck thing. I can't remember how many it serves (10 maybe?) but I reckon it would easily do 16. If you're worried, could you bulk out with some additional sides or stuffings? Can just be shop bought.

Why don't you order a meal from them now as a test run, then you'll see how much food you get per person and whether you need to order extra.....

That’s interesting- we wouldn’t have that one as a couple won’t eat duck but the crown is meant to do 8. But I don’t know if it is 8 greedy buggers or 8 sparrows. We’d definitely need more potatoes and pigs so I’d buy extra and add broccoli for DD.

DH says just order it and see what it looks like. We have a lot of emergency dinners from Cook and always enjoy it. So what’s the worst that can happen?

I’m a notorious over caterer though - thought of running out makes me anxious!

We have a meal at least once a week as it’s what our farm shop sells but it’s nothing like Christmas dinner to judge. For example their lasagna is fine for 2 as portions go but that doesn’t really tell me how much turkey you get.

Cook are one of the only retailers that are genuine about portion size, i always order too much thinking it's like the ones you get at the supermarket. The portions have got slightly smaller in the past year but not by a huge amount. I used to work there as a 16-year-old and always thought it was great food.

We had it last year and found there was enough food. We added cauliflower cheese and bread sauce plus an extra pack of pigs in blankets, and ate most bit but quite all of what we had. Some big eaters in our house as well and we had 8 adults and 2 (young) children eating the meal for 8 x

edited to say: argh sorry that was aimed at the PP who asked why they weren’t preparing it in advance.

Any reason why you couldn’t read the OP?

Id over rather than under order - like for ten or even 12 in your case. One of the reasons I don't like going out for Xmas is not having any leftovers!
Also note they don't provide cranberry sauce nor bread sauce!

I order one for a pre christmas dinner in the week leading up to Xmas every year and there is plenty of food per portion. I also add bread sauce, cauliflower cheese and braised red cabbage. Plus a pudding. Cook is much better when serving their bigger portion sizes imo.

What I mean by bigger portion sizes is that a dinner for 8 or 12 tends to equal much more food pp than a dinner for 4.

@AlltheFs they have a video on their Christmas dinner for 8 page showing them unpacking it to fit in the freezer so you can sort of see the size of the turkey and the veg. Quite frankly them fitting it into one freezer draw is like real life tetris but at least you can see it.

You'll be fine, I've done it lots. Big eaters here. Just buy in extra roast potatoes, just in case! If not needed they can stay in the freezer. Merry (unstressed) Christmas 🎄🎅

I've had the dinner for 8 a few times. We're big eaters and it's a big helping. We have had 4 or 5 for Xmas dinner, fed us two meals then leftovers too. I love it but am doing my own this year

Waitrose entertaining is amazing.

We bought it last year, there was plenty with leftovers. Husband and adult son big eaters as well. The Turkey was so nice I bought another in their sale after Christmas and we had it for a family meal later in the year.

Not sure where you are OP but Booths is another option. I have stuck to Cook as I know what I am getting and I can buy ahead as my dates don't always work with product availability, but this year's offering (the ultimate one looks amazing) is very tempting.

Booths

Alas nowhere near a Booths (we are in rural Rutland). Does look good though.

Our local farm shop sells Cook plus we have the Stamford store nearby so that is practical for us.

The turkey crown is huge. We had it for 7 people last year & we only used about half of it. By the time you've got roasties, pigs in blankets etc there isn't a huge amount of room on the plate.

I did this a couple of years ago and didn’t think the food was very nice. I am a big fan of Cook meals generally so was surprised. I think there were too many competing flavours going on as all of the side dishes had a twist (eg carrots but with honey and clementine) and together it did not taste good.

i think their portion sizes are fine but not overly generous.

I agree about the competing flavours btw but you could easily buy a bag of chopped carrots if you want it to be completely fuss free & roast them. We roast all our veg in Christmas day, it saves a load of hassle & pans.

We have had the Cook meal before and I’ve just ordered it again for this year. It has easily fed 8 including 3 teenage boys. I made more gravy just because we are greedy and added sage and onion stuffing and bread sauce. It’s so easy and tastes good. Some
years I prepare all from scratch, some I don’t. It depends on what’s going on in the rest of my life!