DON’T WORRY ABOUT DISASTERS... FESTIVE MAGIC WILL ALWAYS WIN THE DAY

Immerse yourself in Rick Stein’s delightful memories of childhood Christmases (and a few that didn’t quite go to plan) – they’ll get you in the mood for his merrily mouthwatering recipes. By Lisa Sewards

Rick Stein knows all the tricks of the trade when it comes to stress-free Christmas Day cooking, but that doesn’t stop the wheels coming off in his own home… especially after a couple of festive pints in the pub. After his traditional brisk swim in the sea to shake off the excesses of Christmas Eve, Rick dons his quilted Barbour jacket, a scarf and woolly hat and heads off to The Cornish Arms for pre-lunch drinks.

‘The problem is I start off very well-organised and getting stuff prepared ahead of time and all that, but after I’ve hit the pub I need a bit of help,’ laughs Rick, one of the nation’s favourite TV chefs. ‘We always go intending to have one pint, but it’s always two in truth as it’s just the best atmosphere there. We have to build this into the planning because when you get out of the pub on Christmas Day you’ve got to seriously concentrate, everything seems just wonderful and you’re so relaxed. It’s just as well we don’t bother with a starter on Christmas Day, simply because we’re always late back from the pub.

‘Last Christmas, at my son Jack’s insistence, we plated everything in the kitchen. I wasn’t keen because I like a big display of veg in pretty dishes on the table, but it cut down on washing up and waste, and everyone said it was the best Christmas lunch ever. I suspect that’s because when you’re having a fabulous conversation, having to stop to fill your plate is a pain. Also, it’s a nice gesture to decide for people how much they need of everything, otherwise some take too little and others too much.’

Rick, 74, likens cooking on Christmas Day to cooking in a restaurant – a balance between expediency and perfection. ‘The one overriding rule at Christmas is, don’t be too purist about what you do, because nobody’s going to notice. When you get a plate full of food, are you really going to notice if they’re frozen Brussels sprouts or not? And Bird’s custard is just great with Christmas pudding.

‘So over Christmas, expediency is king. By the time everyone starts eating their Christmas lunch or dinner there’s probably an average of two glasses of something alcoholic in their system, so the little dimming of the flavours caused by cooking the food earlier will not be noticed. But you thrashing around in the kitchen, swearing and telling people to get out in colourful terms, definitely will be. I always remember my mother being incredibly stressed and bad-tempered over the turkey and saying, “Oh, do get out of the way.” But what’s so extraordinary is that it doesn’t matter how big the disaster in the kitchen may be, it’s very rare that it spoils things because everybody is so ultimately under the spell of the magic.’

That’s certainly how it ended for Rick when he spent Christmas in Sydney one year with the family of his Australian wife Sas. ‘Occasionally family troubles happen – we had a really bad one once in Sydney, where we spend Christmas every other year. Their tradition is to have roast turkey, roast beef and ham all together, so it’s absurdly stressful,’ says Rick, who’s been married twice – first to Jill Newstead, with whom he had three children before separating in 2002, and now to Sas, who has two children of her own.

‘There’s too much of everything and everybody brings something, so there’s so much food. It can get a bit out of hand, simply because you’re trying to coordinate it all. And then you throw in a few family differences and things can go wrong on the day. One year, seven things went wrong, including Sas’s sister’s puppy eating some rat poison and Sas’s Uncle Michael, who’s also a chef and was feeling particularly competitive that day, arriving 45 minutes late with oysters and prawns. By that time everything was ready to go with my dishes, I just got so p***ed off.

‘Everyone was rowing, but what was so wonderful about it was that the spirit of festivity took over and it ended up with us all dancing. Obviously you get some terrible rows, but when they’re within a family that’s getting on with each other broadly speaking, it’s something that’s easily overcome.’

While Rick loves an Australian Christmas with sunshine and a dip in a warm sea, he prefers an English Christmas with cosy pubs, twinkling lights, shops full of Christmas fayre and a week or two of gastronomic indulgence. His home is in Padstow, the Cornish seaside town that’s become so synonymous with Rick since he set up The Seafood Restaurant on the harbourside in 1975 with his first wife that it’s nicknamed Padstein.

‘Sas and I were saying that we prefer Christmas in the UK because it’s the right time of year – not in the middle of summer. Christmas for me is really Christmas in England. The excitement starts with the turning

‘No one will know if you use frozen sprouts’

on of the Christmas lights around Padstow harbour, which is really special. Until recently there were lights in the harbour too. They used to have what looked like a glittering Loch Ness monster rising out of the inner harbour among the fishing boats, until health and safety sadly did away with it because it could have been lethal with the electricity. ‘There’s another wonderful local tradition of wassailing, where they sing to the apple trees as a fertility rite for next year’s crop, at Cotehele, the National Trust property on the River Tamar. When I took part we had real snow, a pantomime horse twice the height of anyone there, and a Green Man pouring cider on the tree roots.

‘Then there’s the Montol Festival in Penzance, where everyone dresses up like they do for the carnival in Venice, but if anything it’s more sinister, with big black beak masks and ominous-looking capes. It struck me how incredibly ancient and important to us all Christmas is.’ Rick credits his love of Christmas and all its traditions to his happy childhood memories. Although his father Eric, the managing director of a distillery company, suffered from bipolar disorder, his mother protected him and his four siblings from the worst of his depressive periods – and never more so than at Christmas. When Rick was 17, his father killed himself by jumping off a cliff close to the family home. After the tragedy, Rick spent a few years grafting his way around Australia and America, working on ships, railways and in an abattoir, on the run from the memory of his father’s death. But Christmas always marked a vital coming together for the family after their loss. ‘I was lucky my mother was a great fan of Christmas, so I think it’s really important that

Rick at his Christmas Day pub and (right) with Sas and her children Zach and Olivia