Seventies Christmas

[Doone22]

I'm so into doing a seventies Christmas this year. Cheese and pineapple hedgehog obviously, prawn cocktails, advocaat. What would be on your seventies Christmas menu?

We had prawns in the 70's! Prawn cocktail, orange juice or melon were the starters of choice!!! Defo babycham, port and lemon. A bag of nuts with nutcrackers. Orange and lemon slices.

Prawn cocktail was served in Berni Inns though. Was well posh

I think prawns came in a tin didnt they?

Ham decorated with pineapple rings and cocktail cherries.
After eights
Black Forest Gateau
A bag of mixed whole nuts
The dates with a camel on the box

A tin of Ye Olde Oak Ham
Snowballs
chocolate Liqueurs
pantomime or circus on tv

The big difference was We had dinner early and then a huge tea, always at my grandparents house.
Roast ham, pickles, red cabbage, piccalilli, home made bread ( how did she find time for that?)
We always had a trifle. Cake, jelly, custard and cream. My grandmother also made meringues and filled with cream. Grandad used to buy a bottle of Barsac (sweet wine) , port and sherry.

Otherwise we had pretty much all the same as now, turkey several stuffings, roast potatoes, lots of different veg.

Egg mayonnaise for the starter obviously.

A proper snowball to drink before Christmas dinner, a glass of Black Tower with dinner. Probably served in a set of glasses you'd collected from the petrol station. Although I was brought up in a pub so we had lots of glasses None liked Christmas pudding so we had a Birds trifle and an apple and blackberry crumble with Birds custard.

Dad flicking through the Radio Times and the TV Times. The TV Times was a bit common but it was in colour.

Another vote for Babycham ( the little drink with a big kick).

Those big cans of Courages Jackpot Seven or Watneys Party Seven bitter were a big hit with my dad and grandads.
The other enduring memory of Christmas was the menfolk smoking cigars at the dining table while cracking nuts.

Blue Peter pomander (an orange with cloves stuck in it dried in the airing cupboard) to go with the Blue Peter advent crown.

An advent calendar that only had pictures apart from the chocolate for Christmas Eve.

Sherry trifle
Snowballs
Turkish delight in an octagonal box full of confectioners sugar
A selection box
Walnuts and an orange in your pillowcase / stocking (still do that for my kids)
Plastic decorations welded into the hard spiky icing on the Christmas cake
A marzipan Father Christmas made from the leftover marzipan when the cake was iced and allowed to be consumed over several days - “you can eat his hat today”
One of those 7 pint party kegs on the kitchen counter for the beer
A big gammon to have with the cold turkey for Boxing Day sandwiches with lots of pickles.

Vol eu vents with prawn cocktail in them. Proper paper chains, made while drinking sherry (always a winner when we were growing up) getting ropier was they went.
After eights, a Terrys chocolate orange or two, dodgy Christmas crackers and silly games. Charades is always fun, the balloon game and so on and so forth.
Morecambe & Wise on TV - I am sure you can stream it from somewhere - and Slade.

Don't forget a fruit flan ! Buy the sponge flan case ready made ( can you still get them? ) arrange tinned mandarins prettily inside the base, one lonely cherry in the middle and cover with quick jel , serve with tinned cream or evaporated milk. Sounds terrible, but we loved this as kids. I can't remember the last time I had one of those, probably in the 70's 😂

I'm coming too and I want vol-au-vents. A large plateful 😋

The Morecambe and Wise Christmas show is your definitive 70s tv programme to playing on the telly in the background 🤓🎄

Marzipan fruits, babycham, those chocolate selection packs in the shape of a stocking, the foil decorations...

What is that metallic and red ribbon frill around the christmas cake called? And i loved the cake toppers, even the "Merry christmas" one that was always in the same font is so nostalgic.

Chocolate smoker's set for the kids....

The Andrew Preview sketch on a loop, interspersed with the Shirley Bassey sketch.

Remember to make the house REALLY cold - double glazing and central heating were not ubiquitous then
and no remote controls on the TV (that only had 3 channels one which had the Queen and another had the Sound of Music)

Now I really want 1970s tea on Christmas Eve:
pineapple and cheese on sticks
mushroom vol au vents
tiny silver skin pickled onions
a salad of iceberg, cucumber, spring onions, radish, tomatoes and salad cream
white cobs
cucumber and onion slices in vinegar
cold sliced meats
pork pie
sausage rolls
trifle
brandy snaps filled with cream
Yule log
after eights
Neopolitan chocolates (we used to call them Near a Politician)
port and lemonade
Babycham
sherry

Make sure all the men bugger off to the pub while you and any other adult females stay at home and cook it.

New Berry fruits with soft centres
marzipan fruits
Glacé fruits

Cigarettes

And remember no microwave, small oven, no double oven luxury

Eye level grill (the creme de la creme of grills in my view).

Trifle!
or Black Forest gateau

Campbell condensed chicken or mushroom soup was often used as the sauce. Not watered down obviously.

Jelly made in a rabbit shaped mould ( red on chopped green jelly for grass) with Dream Topping! 😂