Alternative dinners

[StressedWM]

Hi
Really struggling to workout what to have for Christmas dinner this year.
Every year we see the in-laws Christmas eve, home Christmas day and my parents boxing day. I've eaten 3 Christmas dinners every year for the past 15 years!
And they're always the same!!!
This year my DD 14 asked for an alternative to which DS and DH agreed.
However, no-one can agree what the alternative should be.
We live rural so ordering in or going out is not an option (only local place is £90 a head and it's turkey dinner 😣)
So I'm looking for some inspiration.
So far my friend and colleagues have suggested curry, but we eat that a lot so doesn't feel special enough for Christmas.
Needs to be easy prep as I'm working right up to the 23rd.

Any help appreciated
Thanks 😊

I’d do a cooked breakfast, then a buffet for lunch/dinner.

Pizza, homemade. You can do the dough, get your toppings. All join in and have fun making them.

Lasagne with salad and garlic bread.

What do your kids like to eat? We sometimes do an open platter kind of thing with nice breads, cheese, charcuterie, little roast veg in tubs (the kind you find in M&S) olives, ham, houmus etc. if you buy extra nice versions of all of those things it could feel like a treat?

Really nice steak? Easy to prep/cook and you could make/buy some fancy sauce to add to specialness.

Dauphinois potatoes woukd go well, are delicious, and (for me at least!) not an everyday option.

There are lots of old threads on this that might inspire you. We have raclette and a Christmas ham on Christmas Eve, turkey on Christmas Day, roast beef on Bioxing Day rather than multiple Christmas dinners with different people.

A buffet? What is your favourite food, what would you like? What would you serve at a dinner party? Steak and chips? Bouef bourguignon and gratin dauphinoise? Chinese food, a mezze, tapas? Seafood? I guess what makes it a special meal is lots of courses and sides.

I think I'm going to do a big Biriani with salads . It's a bit different from our regular curries and can jazz it up with toasted almonds etc. also goes in oven so once prepped you can sit down and have a sherry

If it was me, as it's for Christmas day and you don't have to cook a roast dinner (which takes me aaaaages), I would accommodate everybody's first choice as much as feasibly possible. If DP wanted steak and the DCs wanted Pizza, I'd do it, and I'd do my own first choice too 😊

I'd also do a bunch of overpriced party food as I love it!

Another option would be to look at ordering or collecting a takeaway on Christmas eve, and storing it till the next day. Pizza, Chinese and Indian all keep really well and will be fine the day after.

On Christmas Eve I’m doing beef Wellington with dauphinoise potatoes, carrots and peas. I’ve got the Wellington on order from Waitrose.

On Boxing Day I’m doing a Moroccan inspired lamb tagine.

Steak, really good chips and salad?

There is some very nice food in the Christmas food to order range in all the supermarkets. If it’s too late to order (which it might be) you could still have a look for some inspiration.

We're going different this year and having burgers.
Aberdeen Angus burgers. Brioche rolls. Skin on fries. Sweet potato fries. Pigs in blankets. Then a choice of cheeses, sauces and other bits to go in the burgers. I'm going brie and cranberry sauce and stuffing on mine, DH will probably go for stilton, kids will undoubtedly have plastic cheese and ketchup.

We're having a huge picky cheese and cold meats board this year on Christmas Day. 3 of the dc are working on Christmas Day (hospitality and farming) so we will have the roast on Boxing Day instead.

Planning loads of different cheeses, continental meats, pate, chutneys, pickled veg, crackers, focaccia, salad etc.

I actually really like the idea of curries, just pick something a bit different to your usual to make it feel more special. Go all out on the sides, pakoras, bhajis, roti or nann, popodoms, onion salad, mango chutney, raita etc.
Or a Thai or Malaysian curry.

I think I'd be tempted to go for something fishy, just because it would be different to the roast dinners. Sea bass or tuna steaks maybe.

Thanks everyone,
It's difficult as I really want to do a sit down but I know full well everyone else would love a buffet, I might have to eat mine at the table 😝
Fish sounds like a great idea to me though 🥰

Tartiflette, fairly easy and very delicious. And feels like a real treat. It is what we will being having on Christmas day.