Twelve days ‘ till Christmas Day 7



Entertaining with leftovers

With guests turning up between Christmas and New Year the temptation is to go out and buy more food while you still have mountains of leftovers to get rid of.

Here are a few suggestions for feeding your guests well without adding to your food mountain.

1.       A warming bowl of soup always goes down well – add left over vegetables to stock made from the turkey carcase and blitz with blender or in a food processor, heat (but don’t boil), season and serve.

·         Winter vegetable (carrots & parsnips)

·         Broccoli & stilton

2.       Festive canapés

·         Turkey meat balls made with chopped turkey, stuffing, cranberry jelly & gravy.

·         Mini bubble & squeak cakes. Add beaten egg & plain flour to mashed potatoes & chopped sprouts. Roll into small balls & fry until golden.

·         Stilton & toasted walnut balls

3.       Turn left over bread sauce into a savoury bread pudding by adding beaten egg and slowly cooking in the oven. Chill, slice into squares, and serve with toppings like smoked salmon or brie & cranberry sauce.

4.       Coronation Turkey – use turkey, cream, mayonnaise & curry powder, then add sweetness with chutney and dried fruit, sprinkle with chopped almonds to serve.

5.       Keep some puff pastry in the freezer to turn a variety of leftovers into mini-pies, tartlets & twists.

6.       Chop & mix turkey & roast potatoes as a basis for croquettes.

7.       Core apples and stuff with left over mincemeat and crushed nuts. Bake and serve with cream.

8.       Pannettone makes delicious bread & butter pudding.

9.       Turn leftover Christmas cake or pudding into a trifle. 

If you are stuck for inspiration checkout http://www.supercook.com/ and simply put in the ingredients you have for inspiration.



Twelve Days 'till Christmas Day 6

Time to go through the herbs & spices.

Not so much to make sure you have what you need, so much as to remind yourself of what you do have so that you don’t make the just in case purchase and buy a fifth jar of cloves or cinnamon sticks.

 Here is an inspirational video from Michael McIntyre

The good news is, spices do not spoil. The bad news is, they lose their strength. A lot of cookbook writers tell you to purge your cupboards and drawers once an herb or spice is about 6 months old, but the spice companies are not so reckless. They tell you to keep and use the spices as long as they appear to have flavour.

Stored in an airtight container, in a cool, dry place, spices retain their potency longer than you'd think — as long as 4 years for whole spices, 2 to 3 years for ground spices, and 1 to 3 years for leafy herbs, depending on the herb. Whole peppercorns, nutmegs and cinnamon sticks hold on to their flavour for ages. Particularly potent whole spices, such as cloves, cumin, and cardamom will also last for a long, long time.

Herbs lose their flavour faster than spices. Dried herbs that have no colour and little or no smell when crumbled in the palm of your hand are probably too old for practical use. Yet even if they don't look all that green anymore, but still have some oomph when crumbled in your hand, use them freely.

For ground spices, shake the jar, let it settle, and give a sniff. If there's essentially no smell, it should be thrown out. If the spices have a bit of fragrance left but are not as potent as you remember or think they should be, just use more in the recipe. Then you'll run out sooner and have a reason to start fresh with a new batch.



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Unexpected Guests

Christmas often means unexpected guests and the temptation is buy too much food, just in case. Great if your extra  guests turn up but a potential for food waste if they do not.

Instead, why not stock up with a few long life store cupboard extras that will stretch a meal if required.

1.       Add a soup course, this will mean that the mains will go further.

2.       Stock up on cake mix. These can be prepared quickly and either served as snacks or as a warm dessert with ice cream, straight out of the oven. It’s also a great distraction for keeping kids occupied to give the adults a bit of peace.

3.       Make up some dried stuffing & mix into mashed potatoes to bulk them up.

4.       Chop vegetables as crudités and serve with a simple dip like mayonnaise & ketchup (Marie Rose).

5.       Turn a tin of tomatoes into a quick salsa with chopped onions & herbs to serve with crisps or bread sticks.

6.       Keep some part baked bread as a stand by.

7.       Add a salad using tinned beans or pasta.

8.       If people are still hungry at the end of the meal serve cheese & biscuits

9.       Make red wine go further by adding orange juice, sugar & spices to make mulled wine.

10.   White wine can form the basis of a fruit punch.



Twelve Days 'till Christmas Day 4

Buy ahead

Buy ahead and make the most of bargains. Also make sure that items don’t run out before you get there. This avoids last minute dashes from shop to shop on Christmas Eve.

Retailers get very competitive running up to Christmas and will often have special offers to persuade you to shop with them. As always, a bargain is not a bargain if it ends up in the bin.

As you run down your freezer fill the space with Christmas fare.

Where possible buy ready frozen items, the supplier will have done a much better job than your domestic freezer and the quality will be better when it defrosts.

Check the use by dates. Don’t be afraid to take from the back of the shelf to get an extra couple of days if it means you are more likely to use it rather than bin it. Also, Christmas starts so early each year that some festive specials will actually go out of date before the big day. Supermarkets get them on the shelves to get the products into your mind ahead of time.

Supermarkets have to manage a huge spike in demand at Christmas & do so by freezing some stock to build up reserves. This will be clearly, if subtly, labelled, generally ‘this product may have been previously frozen and defrosted under controlled conditions, can be refrozen.’ It is safe but there will be a difference in quality in a lot of products.



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Make a list and stick to it,

…… always sound advice & never more so.

The easiest way to do this is to shop online.

Book early so that you get the delivery slot that you want.

Avoid the crowds and queues at the tills.

Compare prices on line and make the most of discounts, especially if you are a first time user.

Set a budget & stick to it.

One delivery van uses less fuel than a dozen or more individual cars, especially in heavy traffic.

Have someone else carry all your heavy items to your door.

The one draw back is when something gets substituted. I would go for a 23rd Dec delivery, just in case something vital doesn’t arrive.



Twelve Days 'till Christmas Day 2

Plan ahead but don’t be a slave to tradition.

If your family hates brussel sprouts & Christmas Pudding and the Christmas Cake gets fed to the birds after it sets rock solid in its tin – don’t do it.

Plan a meal that your family will enjoy. There are plenty of ways to give family favourites a festive touch.



How about Christmas pizza? Topped with turkey, Brie, chipolatas & stuffing.

Make your own festive burgers including cranberries and Camembert cheese.

Mince pie ice cream is now widely available for a lighter dessert.

Here is a recipe for Chocolate Chestnut Cupcakes, fashionable & seasonal.

Also, do you need all the trimmings? Do you really want to feel bloated, uncomfortable, guilty, overworked; with a kitchen looking like a disaster area on Christmas afternoon? Rein back your plans and give yourself an easier ride.

Keep it simple, give your family & friends a meal to remember for all the good reasons, and enjoy Christmas yourself.

Twelve Days 'till Christmas Day1

Christmas is coming, time to empty the freezer

Christmas can be a nightmare for the cook in the family. There is the pressure to produce a feast, unexpected guests and then a mountain of leftovers.  After  Christmas an average 230,000 tons of food worth around £275 million is thrown away in Britain.

In the weeks leading up to the big day start to run first the freezer and then the fridge down to a bare minimum. When it comes to Christmas food the one thing you are bound to be short of is storage space.

As you make room fill it up with freezer blocks and bag up ice cubes. This will give you extra cool storage on the day and keep the freezer running efficiently.

The cooler weather at this time of year is ideal for soups and stews which are great for using up frozen leftovers. Hopefully you won’t find anything lingering at the bottom from Christmas last year.



Global Warming Warning

With food waste contributing directly to global warming the issue is becoming a two edged sword.

Species are becoming smaller as warmer and drier conditions affect early development and growth, according to Singapore-based scientists writing in the journal Nature Climate Change.

The scientists say average temperatures could rise by as much as 7C (45F) by 2100 but research showed that for every degree Celsius of warming, plants of various types shrank by up to 17 per cent and fish by up to 22 per cent.

The trend could make the Earth’s growing human population harder to feed and may lead to extinctions as ecosystems are thrown off kilter.

Smaller fish and crustaceans could affect the nearly one billion people who get their main sources of protein from the sea, warned the researchers.

And feeding the billions of additional people expected on the planet by 2050 will become increasingly difficult as crop plants are unable to grow as large in drier climates, they wrote.

The consequences of species getting smaller were ‘not yet fully understood but could be far-reaching for biodiversity and humans alike’.