Sit back and take it easy...

It may be a Christmas like no other, but local produce can help ease the pressure in the kitchen says Martin Hesp

It’s going to be a very different kind of Christmas – we all know that – but household cooks will know it more than most. That vast annual feast – the one big meal which requires more time, money, love and attention than any other – is probably not going to be as grand or extensive this year. And there is a slight irony at play…

While the Government advises that we do the “right thing” – which means we home-cooks will be preparing a lot less food this Christmas – it is also a fact that the Covid pandemic has seen more Brits cooking at home than at any other time over the past 30 years.

A survey published this week revealed that, since the coronavirus pandemic began, UK householders have been spending up to 21 more hours each week preparing food. Almost two thirds (63%) of Brits are cooking meals from scratch on a more regular basis rather than purchasing ready meals or takeaways.

Of those who said they were doing more cooking now, four out of five spend at least an hour more each day preparing meals, whilst almost one fifth (18%) said they were cooking for two to three hours more each day. In many households that equates to an extra 14 to 21 hours each week.

The research was carried by the Stilton Cheese Makers Association (SCMA) in a timely push for some festive publicity. And why not? A good stilton is one of Britain’s greatest culinary treats and, for many of us, an essential part of Christmas.

From the perspective of the stilton fraternity (actually, from all of ours) the really good news is that two thirds of UK consumers say they’ve been “much more likely” to buy British in support of our farmers during the pandemic. More than half the respondents said they were more likely to buy British cheese instead of French or Italian. Indeed, nearly a quarter said they’d been consuming a lot more cheese since the pandemic started.

So blessed are the cheesemakers. My pal Greg Parsons at the Sharpham Dairy must be delighted by such news – and quite rightly – his cheeses are every bit as good, if not better than, a host of French products of the same ilk.

So, with Brexit about to hit, actively supporting our local cheesemakers and other producers this Christmas really does make an awful lot of sense.

Which, in a way, brings us to the core of this article’s theme. If we’re going to be doing a lot less actual cooking over the festive period because of the reduction in guests, why not really sit back, put your feet up, and allow this region’s producers take the strain?

To take cheese as one example, a Westcountry selection purchased from specialist retail outlets such as Devon’s Country Cheeses (or from award-winning all-round outlets like Dart’s Farm) can wonderfully bolster a Christmas table with hardly any effort on the part of the home-cook.

All you need do is add some top-of-the-range savoury biscuits or crackers and a selection of Westcountry produced chutneys or pickles from the likes of Waterhouse Fayre, where the team make a really good range (I can recommend the Exmoor Pondweed Chutney which is a lot nicer than it may sound). Or try Otter Vale (gluten-free preserves, savoury jellies, mustards and more, with no artificial colours, flavourings or preservatives), or look at the jars of wonder made by Ivybridge’s The Bay Tree, which produces more than 150 delicious products.

If a good cheese selection is a first class way of rounding off any meal, why not go the whole hog, so to speak, and buy in a range of locally-produced wonders for your entire Christmas feast?

I can think of no better way of starting Christmas dinner for a handful of people than turning to my old friends at Brown and Forrest, the small Somerset smokery established 38 years ago on The Levels. Jess and his team produce what many believe to be Britain’s finest smoked eel, alongside some of the nation’s best smoked salmon, as well as a whole range of other smoky foods including smoked chicken, duck, lamb and trout.

With the starter sorted, what about something simple but delicious for a main course?

My colleague at RAW, Harry Wild, says: “Why not simply chuck a round of pies in the oven for a delicious, hands-off Christmas dinner? Chunk of Devon are double winners of Britain’s Best Pasty, so they know their way around pastry. They have won numerous awards for their vegetarian and vegan pies, as well as their classic meat range. Perfect for everyone in the family. Available with nationwide delivery with free postage and packaging: chunkofdevon.co.uk.”

Another of my RAW colleagues likes the idea of a whopping great big all-Westcountry toad-in-the-hole. “I’ve just made one using Westaways sausages, Matthews Cotswold Flour and Trewithen Dairy whole milk – it was fun to make and it was delicious,” says Hanna China.

Because of the reduction in guest-numbers, the Hesp household is going for the classic Christmas dinner, but with a goose rather than the usual giant turkey.

I have desired a festive goose for decades but, as I normally feed 14 to 16 people on December 25, that option has always been beyond the scope of my standard domestic oven. You’d need two such ovens to cook a brace of geese (which is the amount of goose you’d need to feed a dozen-plus people) – but one appliance can just about cope with a monster-sized turkey.

So this year I am taking what I hope will be my one and only the opportunity to grab that Christmas goose. And I’ll be following that up with one of Trewit hen Dairy’s “topsy-turvy” trifles, with the jelly upside down on top of the custard. They are quick and simple to make, but you must make sure your custard is thick enough to set so that it can withstand the weight of the jelly on top (see recipe below). If you were taking the put-your-feet-up-Christmas theme all the way to its carpet-slipper extreme, I guess you could take advantage of one take-away feasting services on offer from several Westcountry establishments. Internet searches for ‘Christmas dinner delivered’ have apparently increased by 200 per cent in the past week – so this is certainly going to be a pandemic-induced feature this year… Plymouth’s Fig Tree at 36 will be providing three or four course Christmas dinners (£50 or £60 per head respectively), while The Salutation Inn, Topsham, is offering a “Christmas Day at Home Kit (£70 per diner for four very impressive looking courses), as is Twenty Seven, Kingsbridge (course courses £60 pp). These offerings come with optional extras, like cheeseboards and selected wines and there are other establishments operating such services this year.

So, yes… it’s all going to be very different to every other Christmas those of us fortunate enough to have homes, families and friends have ever known. But – maybe foolishly, or optimistically, or with some accuracy – I am treating it as a one-off. The good times – the party-times – will return. This year, however, why not let the cook in your household sit back and take it easy…

Festive topsy turvy trifles