The Nigel Slater Christmas Chronicles Readalong 2025

[RainbowZebraWarrior]

Hello all, it's that time of year again!

For anyone who has not already had the pleasure, the annual Nigel Slater Christmas Chronicles read along is a real time annual MN tradition.

The Christmas Chronicles (Notes, stories and 100 essential recipes for midwinter) book begins on 1st November, however there are 25 pages of Introduction. That's why I start the thread one now; to allow time to prepare and fully appreciate Nigel in All His Splendour come 1st November.

Some regulars to the thread already have the book. For anyone new, it's a challenge to see of you can pick up a bargain. Vinted has come up trumps in the past, as has ebay. A rare and precious charity shop find is always a bonus. Don't forget, you can also listen along to Nigel's dulcet tones via Audible.

I shall post daily and we can share our thoughts and feelings on the days recipes, sentiments and indeed Dear Nigel himself. Observations of nature and the seasons are also very welcome.

So welcome to old friends and new, and don't forget that reading by candle light is particularly enjoyable. Cire Trudon may be one of Nige's candles of choice, but it's somewhat pricey. We don't discriminate against other less expensive brands - even if they are NVN (Not Very Nigel)

Pull up a chair, light a candle, grab a cosy blanket and join in!

Love this!

Happy Nigel Day. Read the intro and today's entry. I'm always tickled by "Fat, alcohol-soaked little fruits, each one pissed as a newt..".

Dug out the bottle of Laurus nobilis oil I bought last year and it is now scenting the house. Feeling very mellow.

@HornungTheHelpful

Cooking in one session

"cheese dumplings, pastry, pumpkin pie filling and maple cream"

is rather Nigel I think even if you used a mixer. 😁😉

Still without kitchen here. Provisional delivery date 20th November

I have a single hob thing, little air fryer, microwave and a slow cooker which sounds great but they are sharing one double socket, have short cables and are squished togther. 😬🤨🙄

@HornungTheHelpful

Cooking in one session

"cheese dumplings, pastry, pumpkin pie filling and maple cream"

is rather Nigel I think even if you used a mixer. 😁😉

Still without kitchen here. Provisional delivery date 20th November

I have a single hob thing, little air fryer, microwave and a slow cooker which sounds great but they are sharing one double socket, have short cables and are squished togther. 😬🤨🙄

Sorry for double post/moan

Ooh it is time

I made some flapjacks ( NVN -Not Very Nigel) they were from a recipe on MN with condensed milk, butter, syrup, porridge oats ,
DD and DH (who doesn;t eat sweet things) rave over them.
And no , not a sunflower seed or dried cranberry in sight !

Happy/Blessed All Saints Day.

The children have been such hard work, the last couple of days. 1 week is an odd period of time for them to have off - not long enough to get into any real sort of a routine.

We have been to the local city farm, although it was a grey day, my littlest manages to charm one of the volunteers into explaining to him exactly how they press the apples and get the juice out.

We've also had several Hallowe'en events for the children. So much sugar!

Early morning swimming lessons today meant that we did get to see some sunshine.

Last night, I was lucky enough to see Merlin Sheldrake speak (British Mycologyst - he was spellbinding). Am now inspired to look into fermenting.

Have cooked the blackberries and apples.for bramble jelly.

Merlin Sheldrake - what a fabulous name!

I also can't believe we are here already, but happy to be here, and having had the first chance to.catch up the thread.

So many beautiful pictures and descriptions, and lovely to read.

@LatteLady Your Mothers basins made me smile. Quite possibly
heritage inked. (or that of her friends) It, and variations of it, are entirely normal in some cultures and continue to this day.
Separate bowls, buckets, basins, and nowadays trugs too, (we move with the times) with separate functions and what translates as 'pollution' rules, are kept here too. If accidentally misused, they're down graded to 'lower' function.

@WeMeetInFairIthilien Infuriatingly too busy to actually catch most of it, (just a worker) but that has to be the Fane book tour. He just did a talk/show at Barbican in London, and Simon Mc Burney (Théâtre de Complicité) turned up as lighting director.

@KittyRannaldini His brother created the soundtrack - the equally legendary and fabulously named Cosmo Sheldrake, who at one point was learning with even more legendary Bobby McFerrin. (Don't worry be Happy - voice as beat box)

Aside from the names, they're quite a family. Dad's a biologist and parapsychologist, who came up with the contested hypothesis of morphic resonance, and Mum's a Mongolian overtone singer and voice coach. They quite probably move in Nigel adjacent, if not the same, circles.
But they also used to move in mushroom scavenging circles too, near a piece of land I was connected to. Rhizomes and all that.🙂

Edited to correct inked into linked 😊

Good morning all.

There's no CC entry today so it's a catch up day for anyone who didn't read or listen yesterday. That would be me. I did listen to the first few paragraphs but then had to go to my craft fair. I'm going to catch up this evening as it's another busy day here and we are off to Tynemouth Market as usual this morning.

Good morning! I'll be catching up with CC later. We're going home today so that's a four hour journey to Glasgow and then four hours and two trains back to where we live. So far it's not raining.
Hope everyone has a lovely day.

@EphemeraleEudemonia that's amazing- I'll read up about them.

I'd love to use Bay Laurel, but it's toxic to dogs; and I have a spaniel.

@Fillybuster i was the other fruiting fig tree person and would love a link to your recipes! I made some things with green figs last year that were very much not worth the effort. Basically green figs bottled in syrup or honey that didn’t taste of anything much. Herbal honey, if anything.

I love to eat them ripe and haven’t ever had an excess. Yet.

I spent some of yesterday reminding myself of crochet stitches and making samplers labelled with the US and UK terms to remind myself what I’m aiming for. The stitches are so easy, it’s the remembering the name that’s hard!

Such lovely stories and photographs people are sharing, and a good tinfoil tip for tunneling candles.

I had a deliberately tunnelling candle once. The outside was decorated with orange slices, leaves and herbs. As the candle burnt down in the middle, the shell became even more beautiful. I ended up with a tea light nestled in it for a while.

Good morning, enjoy the market @RainbowZebraWarrior .

Quiet day planned here, I started reading A Thousand Feasts earlier which is beautifully descriptive again isn’t it. I’ve got five books on the go at the minute, dotted about the house, something to read wherever I am 😅.

My weekly bake will be a fruit cake today, I use the NT’s tea soaked fruit cake recipe which I can recommend.

My new candle fragrances have arrived an are not quite what I had hoped for on first smell, never mind, I’ll see how they smell in wax.

lol sounds like Soupdragons flapjack - may be NVN but there is an outcry in my house if it's not in the tin at all times!! Even my parents now look for it when they come around!

Ooh! I wasn’t thinking at the time, but adding pumpkin seeds to my porridge is probably V. Nigel! Though it’s Asda instant microwave oats so maybe not

I love how Nigel observes and appreciates the seasons. I think I need to take more time to reflect on this daily.

This morning the hills are hidden by a slow moving mist.

Morning all. I've got fig envy - absolutely love them, and there's a tree in a park near me (there's a section that's planted up with all edible things - apple trees, gooseberries, currants) but I've never seen the figs ripen.

As there's no CC for today, I'm listening to this podcast episode with Nigel from this time last year instead: https://open.spotify.com/episode/5aFidgxIz3igor40sBBSGU?si=oouHCFWsSU2aGWD-Aeh54g

I totally agree with this. I started the year by recording one moment of joy in my diary each day (inspired by A Thousand Feasts) and it's surprising how many of them have related to nature / the weather / seasonal observations.

I'm not sure if anyone else does this, but I narrate my day in my head, almost as if I were preparing to write it down as a book or diary entry. That also tends to revolve around the weather and seasons. I also repeat aloud phrases like "Summer starts with elderflowers and ends with elderberries" when I see something that prompts this. Mind you, I have AuDHD so my mind is never still or silent for a second. There's A Thousand Thoughts going on in there at all times.

That's a shame you're disappointed by your fragrance oils @AGreenWitch I'm waiting for a Nikura delivery from their £2 Tuesday deal earlier this werk. I stocked up on my usual favourite essential oils, but also went rogue and bought some fragrance oils seeing as they were on offer. Baccarat Rouge and Black Opium among others. No doubt I won't like them, but hopefully my mother will appreciate an opium inspired candle. (Assuming they actually smell anything like they are meant to. I've not much idea about these things as I've worn the same Ralph Lauren perfume for 25 years)

I had a very much NVN delivery yesterday. An enormous, pink Sugared Raspberry candle. Much as I love smoky, mysterious scents, I also embrace the sweeter side occasionally. It reminds me of Snow Angel by Lush.

A quite Nigel day yesterday - yoga, reading on the sofa with a blanket, handwashing some cashmere and merino sweaters and a creamy sausage and mushroom pasta dish with crushed fennel seeds for dinner.

Today is a lot of driving as going from the Midlands to Wiltshire to help my MIL move the last of her things from the family home into her new flat before the house sale goes through this month. Will channel Nigel and enjoy the drive through the cotswolds, apprecting the autumnal colours.

Just helping DS plot a route round the Christmas lights in London for his Japanese housemate's trip to London next month which feels a VN activity. We are hosting her for Christmas too as she can't afford to go home and I can't allow anyone's child to be alone at Christmas in a foreign land. I wonder what she will make of a British Christmas?

That’s lovely @petitpasta . We also have a home that welcomes DC’s friends far away from home. It is such a lovely thing to be able to do. I have two young adult children but often cook for 6+. Both at unis fairly close to home so coming home for the weekend with friends in tow happens a lot.

@EphemeraleEudemonia and @KittyRannaldini

Yes, it was quite an experience! The music was beautiful, and the talk was directed by audience answers to questions.

The first question was "Order or Chaos?" (89% Chaos)

The second question was 'Have you or anyone you know eaten psychedelic mushrooms in the last year?"

48% said yes

Good morning all
a damp one here after a blustery night but the rain stayed off long enough for the fireworks which were surprisingly great for a school field affair.
DD1 and I are off to Derbyshire today where we will take lunch with my sister before going to a church service in the village I grew up in held every year this weekend to remember villagers who have died. We will light a candle for my Dad who we lost a few months ago. I haven’t been back much, it still feels a bit painful but it feels the right thing to do.

on the way I had the inspired thought that to get there we must drive through a town with a Homesense so we are gong to cheer ourselves up with a stop there on the way!

@RainbowZebraWarrior I wondered if you had any advice about the candle I added the wicks to. It is burning well but leaving a sooty residue in the wax. This is after I’d blotted up loads when the wax was liquid after the last burn. It hasn’t done this before.

Morning all. I am catching up with Nigel this morning via Audible as I potter around the house. We are all at home today so I will light the fire and the candles later. I love autumnal dusk when the air is developing its nip and the sky is that amazing kaleidescope of orange and I can go around the house rhythmically drawing the curtains and opening the bedroom doors so the heat from the log burner warms the whole house. Autumn and winter are my favourite months.
I have never cooked any of Nigel's CC recipes before and am strangely excited. I wonder if my advancing years have given me the confidence to just go for it and sod what the family like. I am now trying to source lardo, but as I live in a very rural county I may struggle. There is a deli in our county town but I am not going there until the 14th?