Is your Christmas changing this year?

[AlwaysPrettyOnTheInside]

I just had a thread earlier about our traditional Christmas food, a ham, beef or lamb for Xmas day and beef for NYD. Thinking about it further though, if things carry on as they are, I'm not sure whether three joints of meat are going to be feasible.

We get full monies worth, no waste, but the cost upfront might be prohibitive.

I will start to put a little bit away from next payday, we haven't been able to so far as just been living month to month, and just haven't even thought about Christmas yet.

We live off fuck all the rest of the time, I don't really want a tight Christmas 😐

There's only two of us, and we've been scaling down the amount we buy the last few years anyway, and have ended up eating the big Xmas Dinner in parts across 3 days as we havent felt like eating it as one big meal, but to cut costs I'm thinking:

I could buy slices of ham for Xmas eve, and just do ham, bread, piccalilli, cheese etc for that meal instead of the ham in the fridge for as long as it lasts.

Prawns can be bought individually by weight, for prawn cocktail starters.

Beef can be cut in half and frozen and split between the two meals, Christmas and nyd.

Any other genius cost cutting ideas?

I would go with your ham idea. Tesco or Morrisons frozen prawns are fine and you could defrost half of the bag for the starters and save the other half for New Year or another day. Use less expensive food to fill up the plates and your stomachs so plenty of vegetables, potatoes of whatever kind you prefer and Yorkshires perhaps so the beef would go further. I shop at Tesco once a month with top ups from Aldi, save my Tesco vouchers for Christmas and save my bank rewards towards my Christmas turkey and beef. The beef is always halved or cut into thirds with a piece for Boxing Day buffet and a piece for NYD. We keep thinking about going away for Christmas in the tent and just having a simple meal of bread, meat, cheeses and bits and bobs which I would be happy with instead of the main Christmas meal. There is a lot of pressure to have the perfect Christmas Dinner when perhaps something more simple would do and which you could be happy with. Do what ever you can afford and make it a nice day rather than stressing about what you feel you should have and worrying about the cost.

I’d buy a gammon ham. Cook it and have it hot, then slice the rest for nice ham.

This is what we normally do, on xmas eve. They were 18e last year. I can easily see them hitting 22e or even 25e this year. Hence why I'm thinking of buying in slices for one meal, the usual Xmas eve meal.

Tbh my dh isnt fussed about trad Xmas Dinner, and neither am I really, except for the pigs in blankets, yorkies, stuffing balls and roast potatoes. Maybe we'll just do dinner with pigs instead. The last couple of years we haven't bothered with all the veg, just done a massive tray of potatoes 🤰

That sounds absolutely fine op and very tasty.
I always cook xmas dinner, its always just the 4 of us. I'm fantasising about the xmas dinner i seen advertised in a lovely restaurant at the coast, about 30 minutes drive away. I love this place, we have been once for dinner. I'd absolutely love to have xmas dinner there but it would be almost 300 quid and there's no way we could do that.
But I'll dream about it from now till xmas.....

We could go out, its not too expensive here, but I'd have to go with a completely different cuisine. I've toyed with the idea the last few years but not sure I want to give up Xmas Dinner completely.

we have had turkey every year but this year I’m doing a chicken and a ham. The turkey was £65 last year and really not worth it!

We had chicken last year! It's just me and my ds!

Wow, 65 is mad. We never had turkey growing up, no one liked it, we always had chicken.

Now we eat chicken a lot so I prefer to get something different for Christmas day.

We won’t be changing anything, for several reasons.

We have had a horrible year, DS wrote off his car, he finished with his girlfriend of ten months and she started bombarding me with texts, even got her family in on it, it was all very Eastenders and so not our family, needless to say she wasn’t. TG

I quite frankly live for Christmas and also from Christmas to Christmas, I have since the age of 30 had heart disease and have also had cancer treatment three times at 30, at 51 and just when I was getting over that at 55. I appear to be well these days in a diminished sort of way, and for now that is good enough for me.

This is not a pity me post, but a plea to say, please please have the very best Christmas you can afford, but agree with others re filling the plate up with the add ons.

When we were broke we bought a cheap chicken and I mean cheap from JS and some turkey legs and spent all weekend making a decent old fashioned gravy and then froze it, none of your Jamie Oliver bollox, just good old fashioned gravy, again buy bread weeks in advance whizz it and make outstanding stuffing. Sage and Onion is de riguer in this house.These are the things that will elevate your dish.

One other Christmas trick, buy gut rot red wine, put it in the slow cooker with the relevant spices and the house will smell divine of Christmas Day. Well it works for me.

Enjoy it people, life is short.

Absolutely. I'm glad you're doing well now.

If I put 50e away each payday (and not have to spend it on something that crops up) until Christmas, thats 150 before getting to December's pay, so it hopefully won't come to these measures. I just want to be prepared with a plan if every month ends up like this one.

Yeah, we have chicken every Sunday too as it is! But I make it special with the extras as others say on the post for example the pigs in blankets and greater range of veg. Prawns etc to start and we have Apple juices, j20s etc anyway we never really like turkey!

I used to make a cake with Ds and decorate it with all Christmas items last year stopped this and just bought a 12-pound Christmas Colin caterpillar cake and served with single cream as it was cheaper than all the ingriediants and time cooking believe it or not.

I also worked six days a week in the lead-up to Xmas so had no time to do the above. I worked the additional day to clear some debt before going into the new year.

I’m a single parent and my ex doesn’t pay a penny of child maintenance, I’m worried sick about Christmas. We are already living as pared-back as I can get it. We’ll do one present from each of us and I’ll do a family present too - last year’s Velvetiser has been a godsend we use it each morning for hot milk (this year I think a ooocirn maker maybe). But we don’t have any living relatives so that’ll be it.

Food wise, it’s going to just be a plate of trimmings, and some sparkling apple juice. One festive meal, some chocolates and a gingerbread house the children will make, and that’s it.

I could cry.

We had chicken last year. Turkeys were £60 and corn fed organic chickens were about £12. No contest.

Look out for gammon hams earlier in the season on special offer and then freeze one until you need it. A small one is better value than buying ready sliced good quality ham.

Chicken is definitely a good idea. But if you have had a lot of this already then I understand wanting something different.

In a restaurant roast you only get three slices of beef and the rest is made up with veg, potatoes and yorkie so you shouldn’t need a huge portion.

We had a spread last time of breads, salamis and cheese etc and crisps and nuts and fruit but laid out more special for everyone to pick from.

Good luck with everything. Do you have any loyalty points you could save up and use?

If I could send you something to help I would 🫂

This is what I hate about modern Christmas, the commercialism and the pressure to buy and have.

Its just bollocks isn't it. Col, the pressure, the excessiveness, I particularly detest those people that post pictures of piles of 300 presents per child, and you know it's just all tat for tats sake as well.

Can you make it special by doing things, making paper chains and stuff? Christmas films and hot chocolate, walks around outside to see lights. I appreciate you'll be cold when you get in and that can cause issues with heating costs. Those are the bits that are the best anyway, those sorts of things are what I've got memories of, I couldn't tell you what presents I got, ever.

From January put away 10/15e and if your partner does the same you’ll have more next Christmas.

I save the Tesco points which helps.

We also bake Christmas even which is cheaper.

You can have any food you like and I do hate the massive joints, so wasteful. It might be cheaper to buy now and stick up your freezer - I clear a draw just for Christmas dinner.

I buy a large gammon then cut up into 3 or 4 joints. Cook one and put the rest in the freezer to cook and eat over a couple of months. Small joint is usually enough for a meal and leftover ham for sandwiches or other meals.
Use the stock for a cheap veggie soup with lentils and split peas etc. it works out cheaper per kilo that way.
I save up for Christmas with a card most weeks I only add £1 or £2. But by Christmas it pays for the meat joint. We usually have lamb. I bought it a couple of months ago when on offer.
The rest of the meal is lots of roasted potatoes, carrots, Brussels etc usually on offer at Christmas. I just buy frozen prawns for starters now.

If you want turkey, I would get a frozen crown.
Defrost, brine and roast.
Brining is key for moisture and flavour.
A medium one should suffice for 5/6 adults and leftovers for pie or curry in boxing day. Or sliced thinly for sandwiches.

How big do you need this for 2? I’d get one of these-plenty of gammon!

After last Christmas Day I said this year I'm having a rest from doing it all, the cost, the cooking, the clearing up, the people staying for days and days. it's always me doing everything, but my dads been so Ill this year with cancer, just had a major op, and im just hoping they are back living near us by Christmas, instead of the 500 mile round trip from me to them I've done pretty much weekly, I've been with my parents and away from my home for nearly 4 weeks at the moment, so all I want for Christmas is my family together round the table having dinner, sod presents, sod everything, just food, games a massive glass of wine and to laugh.

As @Shinyandnew1 says that style of gammon joint is lovely in the slow cooker.

It's also worth considering turkey legs. You can often get them really cheap (probably as so many people are buying crowns!)

There's also nothing wrong with frozen.

Bulk up with the cheaper parts like carrots and parsnips.

Aldi do some very cheap frozen desserts @EnchantedCastle . To be honest my kids assess the quality of a meal by the pudding regardless of how much you spend!

We also bought a colour in your own table cloth and table mats from home bargains for under a pound. The kids spent hours colouring them and were very proud of their table, even if it wasn't insta ready!

Have a little look at Thrifty Lesley. She has a whole website of frugal meals, and also week long meal plans for £15-20 for the whole week. If you search for her, and meal plans, it brings up her webpage.

She also has a section of week long Christmas meal plans. The link below I costed up last year, and it came to less than £35, so perhaps £40 this year?

https://thriftylesley.com/christmas-week-food/

There are other options, including just the Christmas lunch, and a vegetarian Christmas week.

About once a month, I will do one of her meal plan weeks and put the difference between the cost, and the normal cost of a week's shopping, into a separate account.

You do need to be able to spend some time cooking, but her recipes are lovely.

I buy a gammon joint most Sundays and it's around £5 from Lidl and it's fab, slow cooked then honey and mustard.

After years of cooking Xmas dinner for my tribe. Last year my eldest DS left home and bought his own house. He wanted to cook the Xmas dinner and so invited me up. It was wonderful I could relax and just for once wasn't always dashing off to the kitchen to baste or put potatoes in or something. This year my youngest son has moved to his own home. He's now suggesting he cooks Xmas dinner for us all this year. I'm so happy I could cry. I can lie in and have scrambled eggs for breakfast and go to his house around 11 am with my Foster son. My eldest is coming down from Yorkshire with his girlfriend the night before but staying with his brother overnight. I'll pay for the turkey and other Xmas food but the joy of not having to cook is better than any present. For my part I'll cook the Xmas Eve gammon joint with mash and 3 vegetables from my garden I'll have frozen.