7 DAYS FOOD & DRINK Cheffy Christmas
Need a little help in the kitchen on December 25? ELLA WALKER asks our favourite celebrity chefs to serve up their top tips for cooking the biggest meal of the year
WHO better to ask advice from on the art of dishing up the best Christmas dinner, than celebrity chefs Antonio Carluccio, Donal Skehan, Michael Caines, Marcus Wareing, Gizzie Erskine, Rick Stein and The Hairy Bikers?
The foodies reveal their top Christmas kitchen shortcuts, and share their favourite bits of the big day too...
GOBBLE, GOBBLE
THE Hairy Bikers – aka Dave Myers and Simon ‘Si’ King (right) – are all about turkey and goose at Christmas time.
“I love me turkey, I love the whole ritual around it, it’s once a year, and it’s special,” says Dave, left.
“When I was a kid, we always had a turkey. It was probably really cheap, but it was great. We had a sense of occasion, with giblet gravy. Now, of course, you get these wonderful turkeys – you pay for them, but by God, they’re good!”
“There was one year that me and my middle son James, we went, ‘Right, we want a change!’ So we cooked the turkey and we cooked goose! It t was great,” remembers Si.
WHOLE HOG
DONAL SKEHAN is not such a turkey lover...
“My go-to Christmas ham recipe is plum and star anise. It’s absolutely gorgeous, you bake it and it gives you this really rich, glossy ruby red colour on the outside and it looks spectacular on the table.
“When it comes to turkey, I’ve stopped doing the really big roast, because most of our family don’t love turkey, so if I cook the big turkey, there are always leftovers.”
If you must have turkey, he says, get a big breast, stuff it and roll it: “Take your turkey breast, butterfly it open so it’s open like a book, take your stuffing – I do a lovely one with cranberries and orange zest – stuff it in, roll it and when you’ve gotot it in shape, tie with butcher’ser’s string.
“Once you have yourur nice rolled turkey breast,east, it’s ready to go in the oven.
“Baste it with orangege juice and maple syrupup – it’s spectacular.”
THE ITALIAN WAY Y
PRONE to overboiling your Brussels sprouts? Antonio Carluccio has a few ideas for luxuriant Christmas cabbage dishes in his repertoire, but first Antonio Carluccio and Marcus Wareing up, a Brussels sprouts gratin.
“I’ve cooked them beforehand and then covered them with bechamel and a little bit of nutmeg, and baked in the oven again, which is very nice.”
Alternatively, there’s his cabbage Christmas starter which you make ahead of the big day.
“You cook the cabbage soft and you put it on the side. Then you take some stale bread and you put it in the oven to biscuit it, to really make it dry.
“Then you grate some Parmesan and cut little chunks of Fontina cheese or Taleggio, melted cheese. Then you prepare stock on the side. Make the assembly in a container.
“You put a layer of the cabbage, a little bit of bread, Parmesan and cheese and then anotheranothe layer, and on top you pour the hot stock, then let it go down.
“It makesma all the bread so soft inside and then, on top, you put fried, wonderful foaming b butter with a bit of garlic. It is wonderful.”
ULTIMATEULTI TIME SAVERSAV
MARCUSMA WAREING is a turkey man ( (“Always Christmas turkey – it never changes. I don’t want goose, I don’t want beef – I can have all of that all year round”) but he tends to work on Christmas day, so lunch is left to his wife Jane (“I just come in at the end, finish it off and take the glory”).
He recommends a few shortcuts so lunch is on the table as quickly as possible: “If you don’t want to cook a turkey for four to eight hours, depending on the size, take the legs off and cook them separately. You could even slow cook them the day before. Asking your butcher to break it down for you makes it a lot easier.”
And the piece de resistance? “Paxo stuffing – I love it. It reminds me of home.”
DEAD GOOD DINNER
GIZZI ERSKINE’S top Christmas dinner twist is to “add a bit of ginger to my bread sauce. So it has all the classic ingredients, loads of nutmeg, a bit of clove and then loads of powdered ginger for a more gingerbread flavour. It’s so delicious. It takes it to a different level. It’s not gingery, it’s warming!”
Christmas lunch is her absolute favourite meal of the year. “You know people say, ‘What’s your death row dinner?’ Mine is always Christmas lunch.
“I absolutely love turkey and the trimmings. It’s the dream for me; turkey, bread sauce, all the jazz, then I’m completely happy.
MUM’S CHRISTMAS PUD
“I ALWAYS look forward to making my (late) mum’s recipe for Christmas pudding,” says Michael Caines.
“We always used to make it in October – we used to steam it – and then let it marinate and rest until Christmas.”
What’s his secret to the perfect pud? “I use proper unpasteurised beef suet and some breadcrumbs, a bit of milk, bit of egg and then of course the fruit itself, and a little bit of booze,” he explains.
“Fresh breadcrumbs, as opposed to dry breadcrumbs, just give a little bit more moisture to the Christmas pudding itself. If you get beef suet from the butcher that’s not been rendered, I think it’s a better flavour than the packet.”p
PLAN AHEAD
RICK STEIN, right, will be cooking for about 25 people with his son Jack this Christmas.
“I think it will be goose; we’ll probably get some fresh langoustines in and have a starter of that, and then goose.
“If you’re having a dinner party, aim to finish all the cooking and be washed up at least an hour before your guests are due. Then you’ll just be finishing and you’ve probably got 15 minutes more cooking to do when they arrive.
“Finish early, prep early and if you’ve got a lot of people coming, make sure you’ve got cold dishes and don’t leave anything to the last minute, because people are talking to you when they arrive.
“Don’t try cooking anything there and then, otherwise you’re just boring!”