The one-tin Xmas lunch ... to beat the washing up
Don’t make a meal of feeding all the family — just try this ingenious trick, sprouts, stuffing and all
THERE’S one trimming of the Christmas feast that we’d all very happily do without — the washing up. A traditional festive dinner takes the phrase ‘multiple-pan meal’ to the extreme. There are the roasting tins for everything from the turkey to pigs in blankets, plus all those saucepans to handle the various vegetables, not to mention the bread sauce, and the gravy.
And then, of course, there’s the crockery and all that glassware.
Late in the day, satiated with food and drink, the last thing we need is the clean-up of the year.
Which is why this year might be the time to take inspiration from cookery writer Rukmini Iyer. Her 2017 book, The Roasting Tin, pioneered the concept of the modern ‘onedish dinner’.
It’s ridiculously simple: pack all the ingredients for one meal into a single large roasting pan or baking dish, pop it into the oven and, once cooked, take it straight to the table, making serving dishes redundant, too.
Three years on, and having published three more books on the same theme, she has sold a phenomenal half a million copies. Turns out, people really hate washing up.
The books include recipes from all over the world, with dishes containing every imaginable ingredient.
You might want to try her chermoula-roasted tuna with peppers, chickpeas and raisins, or attempt ‘festival’ lamb with spiced roast potatoes, peas and mint raita.
Yet, while flicking through her latest book, The Roasting Tin Around The World, the thought came to me that I could apply the concept to a Christmas dinner.
But could a turkey cook alongside all its traditional accompaniments, from potatoes and sprouts to stuffing and parsnips?
As a turkey customarily needs longer in the oven than any of the side dishes, the onepan method would certainly be a challenge.
If I was going to pull it off, the timing would have to be calculated to the minute.
Whole turkeys also release a large quantity of juices and fat while cooking. These would surely swamp the other ingredients in the pan, leaving them sodden and greasy. So that’s another issue to contend with.
There’s also the problem of space — fitting the sheer number of elements that comprise a Christmas dinner into one pan would take some doing. And that’s when my thoughts turned to removing the part of the bird that takes up all that space: its backbone and lower carcass.
Then for the calculations. A medium- sized 2.5kg turkey crown (serving six to eight people) roasts to perfection at a moderate temperature in one- and- a- half hours, the same time that it takes to get potatoes perfectly crisp.
And if the pork, chestnut and fruit stuffing is formed into larger-than-normal balls, they will take a similar length of time.
That leaves the carrots, parsnips, pigs in blankets and of course, the Brussels sprouts. I estimated the root vegetables would benefit from the full cooking time with the turkey, stuffing and potatoes, while everything else could be added nearer the end.
This wasn’t an entirely novel idea — in some of her recipes, Iyer adds the slow-to- cook ingredients first and the quick-cooking items later, but she certainly hasn’t given instructions for something quite so ambitious.
So, one- and- a- half hours later, when my Christmas dinner emerged from the oven en masse, I was rather nervous.
But, to my relief, it was perfectly cooked and — I must say — looked quite beautiful.
Yet even more appealing was the prospect of what lay beyond the dinner: less time at the sink and a longer spell spent with me slumped happily on the sofa.
And here’s how you can do it too . . .