Ok I am resurrecting Christmas menu for uber food ponces discussion. Purchasers of Tesco mince pies and Bacardi Breezers need not apply.

[moondog]

I need details of Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and NYE food and drink.

[midnightexpress]

Ooh look Slubs, you can berate Nigella in person over her pomegranate fetish - webchat with Nige

[AgentProvocateur]

ppeatfruit, yes, living in Glasgow, poncetastic food capital of the world - not!

I'm not really a pudding fan, and the only trifle I've ever had is my mum's. She doesn't like jelly, so maybe that's why. Personally, I'd omit the sponge and just have cream, custard, jelly and fruit.

[Slubberdegullion]

Well I never, Nigella is coming. Do I ask about the pomegranate issues or take her to task on the travesty that is The Girdlebuster Pie? [ponders]

Re trifle, I reckon if you are going to make such a audaciously vulgar looking pudding why not go all out and shove in a layer of jelly. Gives an extra level of mouthfeel.

[moondog]

OMG Ali, that meal sounds like a bad sitcome.
I would have been devastated.

Well impressed at your dh Pers, doing home made pork pies but lol at the mental Teutonic breakfast. Frankly, there is always room for poto salad in my mind.

Trifle has to be like this:

Sponge soaked in sherry.
Jelly made from tinned raspberries and theri juice and gelatine (tinned better than fresh here) with walnuts.
Real custard
Cream
Flaked almonds

We had one Christmas in the Pacific where we started with oysters we had colelcted ourselves from mangrove swamps (many happy outings doing this in our little speedboat) and then fresh crabs.

I cried all the way through it, but was, in mitigation ,7.

[midnightexpress]

AP, I'm in Glasgow too; I feel your pain (see my notes on QP 'farmers'' market above).

Oysters hand-plucked from Pacific mangrove swamps is getting pretty poncetastic, I must say.

[bigTillyMincepie]

moondog I am liking your trifle recipe, but not the walnuts

[moondog]

Isn't it just ME?
I have appallled myself.

Tilly, why?
Walnuts are bloody fantastic things.

[Alibabaandthe80nappies]

Walnuts are lovely, but I am some way from being convinced they are good in trifle. Aren't they a bit, dry?

Apart from that the trifle sounds perfect, v.similar to what I do.
Once upon a time when I was a teenager, Mum left me in charge of finishing the trifle. I spread the cream, and then piped the left over cream into a kind of cartwheel pattern and filled in the gaps between the 'spokes' with left over squished up jelly.
I thought it looked fabulous and I was so proud of myself. Mum's face was like this

I had forgotten that until this thread.

[moondog]

Of cpurse not!
They are soaked in the mix they are in, but still nutty.
Good contrast to all that soft mushy stuff going on.

[Slubberdegullion]

I am also unsure re inclusion of walnuts. A mouthfeel too far imo.

[Slubberdegullion]

Hahahahaha at cream and jelly spokes sounds PRITTY . Your pride is still coming through in waves from all those years back.

[midnightexpress]

Walnuts good, in trifle bad. But then I don't like lumps of stuff in stuff (eg ice cream with bits in - Ben & Jerry, I'm looking at you)

A few toasted almonds and a jammy drizzle thing on top for me. Or hunners and thoosans if you're going the retro/jelly route. Or possibly those jelly diamonds.

[Slubberdegullion]

Grated milk chocolate here. I am not proud.

[AbsofCroissant]

Shakshuka recipe (Abs', with MIL's poncefication at end)

1 x red pepper
1 x green pepper
1 x large onion
garlic to taste
All of the above must be diced
1/4 t spoon cumin seeds
1/4 t spoon coriander seeds
dried chili to taste (or Nandos peri peri sauce )
1 x tin chopped tomatoes (you could probably use fresh, and skin etc., them, but chopped is fine).

Heat the spices in a dry pan until their aroma is released, set aside.
cook the peppers and onion in olive over a medium/low heat until soft. Add in the chopped tomatoes and spices, then cook over a medium heat for about ten minutes.
You can either then use this as a salad (hot or cold) called Matbucha OR, you can then crack in eggs, carefully moving some of the tomato sauce over it so that the cook all over. It normally takes about 5-10 minutes for soft poached eggs. I've also had it with aubergine and feta in it. NICE

MIL's poncification - she chargrills the peppers, then chops and peels them before adding in.

[bigTillyMincepie]

Walnuts are for cakes, in small bits, of course. Slubber is right about the mouthfeel. nothing in a trifle should be hard

[moondog]

Bit like a piperade.
Very nice.

Jammy drizle on a trifle?
Jelly diamonds.

No way Jose!

[bagpuss]

I've been reading trifle recipes all afternoon! Nigella has a good one for a traditional trifle but it is orange infused and has a caramel drizzle on top. I'm not sure about walnuts in trifle although I can imagine them, I'm not convinced I'd really like them.

I am considering home made croissants for breakfast now. I am also proposing that dh ditches the Yorkshire puds from the main course and we add another veg in instead. Moondog, how do you do the mashed carrot/parsnip/nutmeg combo? I've never been one for mashed veg but I love parsnips and dh doesn't like cooking them much so this might be a good compromise.

[Get0rf]

My daughter made a beautiful trifle, homemade sponge, homemade vanilla custard which she sweated over, beautiful raspberries and lots of cream. She then RUINED it by covering the top with those horrible little silver balls. I could have cried.

[Slubberdegullion]

hard mouth-feel Getorf. They have a weird texture at the best of times but would ruin a perfectly lovely trifle. There's a lot of dragee overindulgence about these days I'm not surprised you were upset.

[ilovemydogandMrObama]

having either:

turkey
cranberry/orange relish
carrot/spring onion mash
button brussel sprouts with chestnuts

or

beef wellington
green beans
horseradish mash

starter:

either

seared scallops
thai chilli sauce
creme fraiche

or potted crab

[Get0rf]

I was upset slubber. There is no need to Essex-up a perfectly good trifle. Bloody teenagers.

DD does the baking in this house, I haven't the skill, and she is normally very good until it comes to the decoration. She is like Eddie from Ab Fab. I watch her decorate a cake and it is like when she was 3 and colouring in, and I had to sit on my hands to stop myself from snatching the crayons out of her tiny hands because she was going outside the lines.

DD is currently obsessed with jewish food, so on NYE she is planning to cook gefilte fish with chrain, and sufganiyot (some kind of doughnut). I am being very encouraging (slightly dreading it).

[moondog]

I've never had gefilte fish.
Wish someone would cook it for me.

[Persephoney]

Slubberdegullion - I am nowhere near organised enough to have a link to a recipe, or even in fact to have written anything down. I preheat a pan over a hot heat, add clarified butter (doesn't burn like normo-butter) and cook the chicken livers hard and fast - aiming for very dark outside and still pinkish in the middle. Remove from pan to food processor, lower heat, sweat a finely chopped onion, add to food processor. Deglaze pan with brandy. Add more than you think you need. Pour into food processor. Soak and drain some porcini mushrooms and add to the processor. Add more melted butter, mace, mustard powder, and thyme and/or garlic if you like. Pulse until very smooth, add more butter as necessary. Taste and season - I add lots of salt and a fair amount of pepper. Put into ramekins/serving dish and cover the open surface with more clarified butter if you're planning on keeping it for a bit.

[Get0rf]

DD was originally going to make it out of a can - she got my aunt to buy a can of it from the jewish foods area of her local supermarket, but we took one look at it and thought we couldn't bear to open it and find out what it smelled like.

So she is using the Nigella recipe which is not much different from fishcake, really. Probably less authentic but doesn't require boiling a can of odd looking fish for an hour and a half.

We don't know any jewish people to ask how it's done, but it doesn't really matter if it is inauthentic, we won't know!

I have made chrain loads of times - it is absolultely brilliant with cold meats and pickles, and also with smoked fish (it's just beetroot mixed with horseradish and lemon)

[Get0rf]

persephoney do you sieve your pate mixture after you have blended it? Whenever I have made it I have, because I read a recipe somewhere which said that if you didn't the mixture could have a grainy/gritty texture. Hence why I don't make pate very often, the sieving thing is a job too far imo.