what’s on my Christmas menu?

I’ve had a few questions about what we will eat for Christmas Day. We’ve got a busy couple of days planned especially as I’m hosting Christmas lunch, a few visitors staying over Christmas and ‘pudding and presents’ as we’re calling it on Boxing Day with more family.

Now Christmas lunch for as long as I can remember and with the exception of when we lived in England or I have been with retro daddy’s family, is a cold lunch affair. I usually do the old chips, dip, crackers, carrot sticks, cashews (surely everyone does cashews at Christmas and you need to buy an extra bag because you eat one bag before the cashews actually make it out of the kitchen). There is also french champagne (must be french), beer, soft drinks, non alcoholic wine and that’s the drinks sorted.

If you like a little hot starter then I really love these artichoke tartlets. You make a little case out of bread and a mixture of marinated artichokes and mayo inside, baked in the oven and voila. Recipe here.

Seafood, ham, chicken or turkey is always on the menu. And we’re all about tradition here because for as long as I can remember grandma betty brings the ham because her friend Iris was married to the butcher so we’re still getting our ham that way.

My dad organises the seafood and that used to be the job he did with my mum and he’s still doing it. I miss going to the shops early with my mum or running into them down at the mall. Now I do my Christmas Eve 6am shop at Balgowlah Stocklands because you park underneath, pop up the escalator and you have everything there including fresh seafood, flowers, butcher and supermarket. It’s fabulous and less crowded than going to a bigger shopping centre.

Ok now I shine at the vegetables and salads. That’s probably because for quite a few Christmases in my life I was vegetarian so didn’t do the ham or seafood. One of my all time combos is pumpkin, feta and spinach. This salad is a winner……recipe here.

I also love good old potato salad. I love it warm, gherkins are delicious added and so is sliced egg. I don’t make my own mayo as I’m usually pregnant at Christmas but I buy a good mayo and use generously. Another great salad is warm potatoes, mustard and olive oil which is also delicious.

Beans, avocado, cherry tomatoes and a simple dressing of olive oil, mustard, vinegar, dash of sugar, seasoned with salt and pepper. Simple and festive. Just boil the beans in boiling water then rinse in cold water to keep them green.

If my aunty kim is coming over then I leave the Changs noodle salad to her. She is known for that salad and it always get demolished. We love you kim and we love your noodle salad. Aunty Deb also does a delicious noodle salad too and is also known for her homemade pudding. Dessert. Let’s talk dessert.

Now each year I do something a bit different for dessert. I’ve done frozen puddings, trifle one year, pavlova a few times and this year I’m going all out with a homemade frozen pudding that I’m already getting excited about. A lovely reader even helped me track down the book that the pudding was in. It’s a Women’s Weekly recipe……Frozen Chocolate Fruit Cake Pudding. Did you get that? It’s a frozen pudding and you make the ice cream from scratch and it is worth all of the effort. You can find a copy of the recipe here online and it comes from The Australian Women’s Weekly Christmas Cooking book first published in 2004 and now available as a 2013 reprint. I picked mine up at Big W.

and then after all of that I do the tray of the goodies – fruit cake, fruit mince pies, rum balls, shortbread, handmade chocolates and rocky road. 

Last year this was my favourite fruit cake, a pineapple fruit cake and considering that I haven’t even thought about fruit cake yet or soaking my fruit I think this will be on the menu again this year. Recipe here.

How is your Christmas menu looking? Trying anything new? I’m too embarrassed to show you the pile of Christmas magazines full of recipes that won’t even get a look in this year as I’m still trying to get to the end of school and preschool…………………….