The Nigel Slater Christmas Chronicles Readalong 2024 Part 3

[RainbowZebraWarrior]

Welcome to thread three.

The Christmas Chronicles is the story of Nigel Slater’s love for winter. Taking you from 1 November all the way to early February, The Christmas Chronicles covers everything from Bonfire Night, Christmas and New Year to Epiphany. Throughout the season, Nigel offers over 100 recipes to see you through the build-up, the celebrations and the aftermath.

Anyone who hasn't yet joined in, there's still a big chunk of the book to go as you can see from the description above. It's in diary form with an entry most days and is easy to dip in and out of.

Anyway, welcome friends new and old. Pull a cosy chair closer the the fire, light a candle, pour a glass of something warming and settle in.

I had a bit of a smile reading Nigel this morning. I love to read but it's been getting harder to carve out the time. Yesterday I decided my only resolution for 2025 will be to find 30 minutes each day to read. Turns out that's VN. 😂
Sorry to read that there's so much lurgy about. 2024 is having a final fling! Get well soon.

Sending healing thoughts to all those suffering from lurgies and health issues.

@RainbowZebraWarrior Iceland is fab. If you go whale watching, try and book a trip from Husavik. The chance of seeing blue whales is quite high from there .

@dazzlingdeborahrose I really like your resolution. I might adopt that for myself!

Running in quickly to say Nigel Slater Simple Suppers (seems to be Christmas) on BBC1 now.

@LillianGish hope you get home safely without too many delays
@RainbowZebraWarrior sorry about your DD, there are a lot of bugs about at the moment dd2 started on Christmas Day and sounded awful when I spoke to her yesterday.

Hope everyone is OK this evening. Thanks for the well wishes.

DD has the worst headache she's ever had, she says, but a Covid test was negative (last one in a pack of 5 that I only bought from Sainsbury's a few months ago) Tbh, she's rubbish at doing them due to sensory issues. I've totally lost my sense of taste and smell and am now feeling utterly rubbish, so I'm thinking we both have it. Hoping for a good night's sleep and both of us feeling a bit better in the morning.

I didn't realise you were without both tortie cats now, Bimbles. Do you remember when I was there for a meet-up and sleeping downstairs, and so engorged (DS2, that must have been) I told you I was almost minded to offer them some milk?? 😂

It must have been hard for you and your family without your dad. Hugs.

I SO wish it were colder (but hey, we're all saving on our heating bills!). It's been nothing but grey dank foggy gloom for about a week now.

Home safe and sound with only a short delay for some cosy present opening around a rather dessicated tree (not sure it’s going to make it to 12th night this year!) Sorry to hear you and DD are feeling so poorly @RainbowZebraWarrior - let’s hope an early night does the trick. I’m with Nigel in enjoying these calmer days after the main event. We are quite chilled here planning to catch up with some Christmas TV (NVN!) - DS is of course immediately going out to a bar with friends.

Sorry I sort of absconded. I'm still reading CC on and off, he's such a comfort. Nobody got me his latest for Christmas so I will be an adult and get it for myself. Though I might stalk the charity shops for a while as people often get rid of new cook books pretty fast!

I'm full of cheese and cold (is ANYONE not afflicted at the moment?) but enjoying a rest and my new footstool, which my wonderful mum got for me and which has basically transformed my favoured sofa into a recliner.

Heretically, I'm not cooking from CC tonight - I feel the need for pulses and fibre and I'm making (approximately, can't be arsed to pry the relevant book off the shelf) Nigella's South Beach Black Bean soup using the ham-in-coke stock. It's always sweet as anything, so I'm compensating with lots of lime juice from a browning lime I found at the bottom of the fridge.

So sorry to hear you and your DD are ill @RainbowZebraWarrior - best wishes for a quick recovery.

@dazzlingdeborahrose I love your New Year's resolution to read for 30 minutes each day. I'm also going to take that on board.

@RainbowZebraWarrior yuk so sorry you’re both down. Friends who’ve had this haven’t tested positive for a few days. Whatever it is, Hope you can both rest up. Not fair that it’s hit over the festive season.

@GlomOfNit ah happy memories. We only have the ancient dog now. Dear last cat passed around 3 years ago aged 21. One of the very few of my many torties who went at her time (21). Much beloved. As Dylan T says, “time passes… time … passes”. I do find myself living too much in my memories at present. A lot of time on one’s hands and tiredness tends to lead to it, as well as having faced my mortality. But I’m lucky. I’ve had a bloody brilliant life and thanks to science I have a decent crack at more of it. I’m looking forward to getting back to more of what I love in the coming year onwards.

Threads like this have been and are wonderful.

GlomOfNit; Amazon has A Thousand Feasts on Kindle for 99p at present.

Morning, all. No chapter today. Hope everyone is doing OK.

All still in bed here, but feeling no worse. I have realised, however that I haven't enjoyed anything I've eaten since Christmas Day, so this has probably been hanging around since then. Christmas evening is when DD started to go downhill. I have a fridge full of cheese and none of it has been touched. I'm going to try and make some nutritional soup today as I cannot think of anything else I fancy. Yesterday, I had half a cheese scone.

@Bimblesalong your last post was so poignant. It is completely understandable that you'd reflect much more upon memories these past few months ❤️

Glad you're home safe @LillianGish I find myself wondering if the wrapped gift in the foreground is a tennis racquet? I am also mesmerised by your lovely colourful glass candle holder.

It looks like a padel racket, but it is in fact an omlette pan 🤣 @RainbowZebraWarrior. The candle holder is from a Berlin Christmas market. Glad you are feeling no worse - a bowl of comforting soup sounds like just the ticket. Having spent Christmas away, we are starting from scratch food wise. No leftovers, but nothing much else in the fridge either which is both a blessing and a curse.

I am woefully behind both on the thread and on the book but DH used it to test the turkey/cook the roasties. And I've made the quince mincemeat (or possibly quincemeat?).
It's not very jam like so we won't be putting it on toast. I shall have to make some pastry.

I’m going to come back to this @RainbowZebraWarrior as it really fascinates me -

agh I wrote the above DAYS ago! It didn’t post!!

I was just thinking of you. How are you doing as I know you said you'd been struggling? Hope you're OK x

Oh you’re so sweet.

We’re back home after 5 lovely days with our families. It really was just lovely.

I know it’s foolish but I’ve spent all the money I got as gifts on my Pilates classes. They keep me sane and it’s the only thing I do just for myself. DH redundancy drags on. Now moved to Jan 6th. It all feels very frightening but I just need to keep pushing on. I’ll curse not keeping that money for an emergency - c’est la vie.

I’m going to do some very sensible things before things get very tight. Car serviced, stock up the freezer and pantry which I ran down before Xmas. I’ve also got some days off in January so I’m going to really blitz the house and organise things so I know what we have and don’t have. I’m going to stock up on bits like engine oil and screen wash and all the boring things too.

we’ve done hard things before. Can do it again! It’s not the same as a bereavement etc. It’s just frightening.

I love this thread x

So sorry to hear you have DH's redundancy hanging over your head @AgathaMystery that is very scary indeed. For what it's worth, I think you've done the right thing spending your own gift money on pilates sessions. Now more than ever, you have to think of your own wellbeing.

Lovely to hear from you too @drspouse and loving 'quincemeat' I still have last years mincemeat in the fridge. Just not fancying it at all.

DD and I also made a gingerbread house (from a mix - but I will get a pre baked kit next time).
The box did not say "if you are a frazzled mum who's had both kids home for a week make sure you put both bags of the mix in the bowl" so some of it has too much syrup and butter in".

We will ice it tomorrow and we are also going to see a good friend to play board games.

30 December

Christmas stamps and bubble and squeak

Tidying up, I find a pile of cardless envelopes destined for the recycling, and it dawns on me that I received very few cards with Christmas stamps on this year. A Christmas card without a Christmas stamp is like a birthday cake without a candle.

Solidarity to all those battling winter bugs, I hope you (we!) all get better soon.

I’m wondering if anyone can shed light on my pudding situation - tried Nigel’s recipe for my first ever homemade Christmas pudding this year but I’m a bit disappointed, to be honest. It’s got quite a bitter taste and though I don’t mind a bit of bitterness it’s quite noticeable and not that nice. I’ve got loads left and another untouched that I was going to keep for Easter so I’m a bit fed up that I don’t really love it.

Does anyone know what I may have done wrong? I cooked it in the slow cooker overnight and reheated it the same way but for a shorter time. Could I have overcooked it?

Could you pop a photo on? Bitterness would / could indicate some sort of burning or overcooking. The colour of the pudding would probably give the best indication of that.

Regards 'rescuing' it. I could only suggest crumbling into shortbread mixture whereby the taste would be diluted as such and sweetened from the sugar in the shortbread. This is one of my favourite things to do with leftover Christmas pudding. It also works with other biscuit mixtures like cookies. Alternatively, you could soak the other pudding in a sweet liquer like Amareto then wrap in foil and store it in the hope that it sweetens and mellows.

Typo

@StrungWithSilverBellsAndFlowers this is an interesting Q&A on Nigella's Web page. Similar issue (as in the person slow cooked overnight, but in an aga) although this one appeared visibly burned on the outside. It could be that the fats all dissolve when they are cooked for too long.

They recommend making Nigellas pudding bon bons.

www.nigella.com/ask/burnt-christmas-pudding

Here it is Rainbow, thanks for replying and for the suggestion about shortbread which sounds delicious.

As you can see it hasn’t stopped us eating it, smothered with custard and brandy butter!

I can’t see signs of it actually having burnt 🤔