Michel Roux
Chef-owner at Chez Roux and former chef-patron at Le Gavroche restaurant
Fairly just a few years in the past, we have been about to have a Christmas lunch with Dad, Mum and household. The turkey – an actual magnificence – had been taken out of the oven and was resting on the kitchen desk, so it was time to get pleasure from a glass or two of bub, because the outdated man used to say. All of us gathered in the lounge across the hearth as he popped the champagne. However then, out of the nook of my eye, what did I see? Our pricey labrador operating down the garden with the turkey in its mouth.
All of us gasped in horror at first. However then we needed to snigger. The canine had already consumed half the bloody turkey and was not going to surrender the remainder. We ended up having the trimmings. To be truthful, the outdated man had overprepared, as he often did. It was an exquisite event, and in some respects the canine’s intervention made it much more memorable.
Sally Abé
Government chef at The Pem, London, and creator of A Girl’s Place Is within the Kitchen
After I was at uni in Sheffield, I labored in a cocktail bar. The week earlier than Christmas, I invited many of the crew over for a Christmas roast. My place was actually tiny and there have been 10 of us squeezed in with not sufficient chairs. I made a decision to make a great deal of meals however hadn’t thought-about that the extra you set within the oven, the longer every thing takes to cook dinner.
So I had two chickens roasting together with potatoes and Yorkshire puddings, and it was simply taking without end. I used to be hiding within the kitchen with a gin and tonic. After about three hours, I noticed a few my company nip out and are available again with baggage of KFC.
We did get there ultimately, however a lunch that was purported to occur at 3pm was extra like 8pm, and the Yorkshire puddings went out the window. That was a little bit of a dent to the ego.
Frances Atkins
Chef and co-owner of Paradise Cafe at Daleside Nurseries, Yorkshire
5 or 6 years in the past, once we had the Yorke Arms [in Ramsgill, Yorkshire], we’d simply completed a really busy Christmas Day lunch on the restaurant and I needed to ship one other lunch to one of many cottages up the hill.
The hill was just about reverse the eating room the place our company have been having espresso. We loaded up my 4×4 with the stuffed turkey, bread sauce, devils on horseback, lobster cocktails, Christmas pudding – the works.
I jumped within the automotive and began up the hill. Midway up I realised one thing was fallacious. The tailgate had been left open and the meals had slipped out, turkey and all. There was a path of all of it the best way down. The company within the eating room have been shouting and screaming. All people got here to assist choose it up, however clearly you may’t serve meals that’s been everywhere in the messy highway with sheep poo and goodness is aware of what else.
Fortuitously, we have been capable of serve the following day’s menu so the individuals within the cottage have been none the wiser, however for the remainder of Christmas we have been taking part in catch-up. It triggered a number of merriment. It was the free leisure, if you happen to like – very Fawlty Towers.
Matt Christmas
Head chef at Chez Bruce, London
My spouse used to run a pub in Dulwich, south London, and we lived within the flat upstairs. Chez Bruce was all the time closed at Christmas and the pub was open for lunch, so for a few years I’d cook dinner dinner for my spouse and her workers and we’d all sit right down to eat collectively after service.
One 12 months I used to be upstairs cooking on the little range in our flat. I had a kind of heavy Le Creuset roasting dishes to cook dinner the basis veg in. It was taking ages to return as much as temperature, so as a substitute of standing there watching it, I went and had a beer in the lounge with the canine.
Time went on and instantly all hell broke unfastened. The fireplace alarms went off and all these individuals having fun with their pretty, celebratory Christmas lunch needed to file exterior within the chilly. The foundation veg was what cooks would name “generously caramelised”. My spouse wasn’t finest happy both.
Stosie Madi
Chef and co-owner at the Parkers Arms, Lancashire
One 12 months we went out for drinks on Christmas Eve. I’d purchased a beautiful turkey and left it on the kitchen desk pondering that once we received again I’d get all of it sorted for the following day – we have been having 23 individuals over for lunch. So we went to the pub and had just a few drinks. After we received residence – just a little bit socially relaxed, let’s assume – I went into the kitchen and there was no turkey.
I used to be confused; I couldn’t see it anyplace. Ultimately I rotated and there it was, legs akimbo, wedged via the cat flap within the again door. It was fairly a shock as a result of we didn’t have a cat – the individuals who lived there earlier than us had put in the flap.
I managed to drag it out. It was broken a bit on the entrance, so I trimmed it, slathered it in butter and wrapped it in a large quantity of streaky bacon. The subsequent day I cooked it and nobody was any the wiser. I did have a great giggle whereas everyone was tucking in.
Massive Zuu
TV chef, musician and founding father of water model Drip
After I was 15 or 16, my mum let me cook dinner Christmas dinner at residence. Usually, in an African family, youngsters are seen and never heard and your mum cooks the meals, however as a result of I used to be so focused on cooking she let me give it a go.
I cooked the entire dinner on my own, to point out that I may do it. My gauge on the time was the extra deliciously brown it appeared, the higher. However I ended up drying out the chicken fully, till it was principally inedible. Mum was tremendous upset, as a result of turkeys usually are not low cost. We ended up having a Christmas dinner of sides, however fortunately I made a great mac and cheese in order that saved it. And my mum turned the dry turkey meat right into a soup the following day. From that 12 months on she all the time made two meats simply in case.
We’re Muslim, however we respect the Christmas custom right here in England. I really feel like coming from a multicultural, various society, it’s a must to be keen and open to have a good time these items, and Christmas is without doubt one of the largest celebrations of all.
Fin and Lorcan Spiteri
Co-owners of Caravel, London
Lorcan: Final Christmas we determined to get inventive and make Momofuku’s bao with braised pork.
Fin: We have been at our mum’s cottage in Warwickshire. The kitchen is of an period, let’s say, and the bao recipe is kind of particular and really technical.
L: It’s about three pages lengthy and makes use of all kinds of various flours, which we didn’t have. Fin was on drinks obligation and batch-made negronis. I believe we most likely had one thing foolish like 4 litres within the fridge, and that was getting sloshed round whereas this bao catastrophe was unfolding.
F: We didn’t have the appropriate steamers, so we had 14 completely different colanders on the hobs attempting to steam these buns, and so they have been simply not taking place. Clearly, we’d gone fallacious someplace.
L: I don’t even keep in mind if we ate something. The buns have been flat as pancakes. The entire home was filling up with steam. We have been getting steamed. I awoke the following day and there was unidentified vomit within the sink upstairs and steam stains all over the place.
F: And plenty of clumps of flour.
L: And a pile of unhealthy trying buns. We did have the braised pork the following day for breakfast although, which was good.
F: We’ve since executed bao once more, however we purchased frozen ones.
L: And stopped ingesting.
F: Yeah we haven’t drunk since then. By no means once more.
Lisa Goodwin-Allen
Government chef at Northcote, Lancashire
After I was youthful, my prolonged household would get collectively at our home at Christmas. We had two canines on the time, a collie and a golden retriever, each fairly energetic characters. Within the morning we’d enhance trestle tables within the conservatory and put out the starters, buffet-style. It was all of the retro stuff: prawns, smoked salmon, sausages, melon, forest fruits.
Everybody was within the kitchen having fun with drinks once we heard a crash. We rushed into the conservatory: one of many canines had jumped up, inflicting a desk leg to offer approach and the meals to slip down. They have been ending off the prawns, smoked salmon and sausages. We nonetheless had loads of meals, so no person went hungry – however the canines had an ideal Christmas, a extremely incredible day.
Olia Hercules
Chef and creator of Residence Meals
In 2021, the final time my mother and father came visiting for Christmas earlier than the Russian invasion of Ukraine, my mum determined she’d convey two home-reared geese together with her to London. She slaughtered them on the finish of autumn and froze them. Flying over, she put one into her personal suitcase and one into my dad’s. They arrived white-faced as a result of my dad’s suitcase had gone lacking.
We nonetheless had one duck however it wasn’t sufficient: we had 16 individuals coming for pre-Christmas celebrations and it was too late to order something from the butcher. For the following day and a half we waited anxiously for the suitcase, worrying that the duck would spoil.
It turned up simply earlier than Christmas. I keep in mind us operating out to the taxi, grabbing the suitcase from the motive force and discreetly sniffing it. We whipped it inside and opened it, and fortunately the duck was nonetheless rock arduous – it should have been sitting someplace very chilly.
That was a contented, blissful time. My mum cooked the meal completely – it was a scrumptious celebration of one in all her final geese.
Lee Tiernan
Chef proprietor at FKABAM, London
I used to be cooking for the entire household at our place in London, round 28 individuals. We purchased a brand new fridge to accommodate all of the meals and I put the meat in there in a single day. I made a decision to use my wood-fired oven within the backyard to cook dinner the veg.
I had undergone arm surgical procedure just a few days earlier and was on some very robust painkillers. The wood-fired oven had been dormant for a 12 months so it wouldn’t warmth up regardless of how a lot wooden I put in. I believed the turkey and the meat rib would save the day, however it turned out the brand new fridge had frozen the meat. After I probed the meat to see if it was executed, it had an inside studying of 3C.
There was a number of pleasant however not very useful interventions from the household. We have been cleared out of Kettle Chips and olives. I ended up whipping the legs off the turkey, a lot to everybody’s dismay as a result of individuals prefer it to be carved on the desk. It wasn’t my finest Christmas dinner. I needed Santa to return down the chimney and drag me off for a pint.
Karla Zazueta
Cookery trainer and creator of Norteña
My household’s Christmas custom within the north of Mexico is to have tamales – little parcels of dough full of shredded pork and beef – however about 12 years in the past we determined to roast a turkey. It was my sister’s thought. We’d by no means cooked turkey earlier than so we had no thought do it. The turkey was large. On the day, my sister took it out of the freezer with not sufficient time to defrost and bunged it within the oven.
All people was like, “Are you positive what you’re doing?” She insisted she did, however when dinnertime got here, the turkey was uncooked. The one bit that was form of cooked was the leg. My sister mentioned it was superb, however no person other than her and one different visitor tried it. Fortunately for us, my mum had ready a pozole stew in case one thing went fallacious. Since then we’ve caught to what we all know finest: tamales.
Jane Baxter
Chef and co-owner at Wild Artichokes, Devon
Going residence to Sunderland about 10 years in the past, I took some duck fats up with me for the roast potatoes. My mum wouldn’t let me do something within the kitchen; she was a great cook dinner however had her personal approach of doing issues. She was getting the potatoes prepared and I observed a horrible odor. She was melting what she thought was the duck fats on a tray on the stovetop. It turned out she’d taken a bath of hummus out of the fridge and was melting that as a substitute. Fortunately I caught it earlier than it went over the potatoes.
Si King
Bushy Biker and co-author of Our Household Favourites
4 years in the past, Dylan, my youngest son, and I made a decision to brine a turkey for Christmas. It was a extremely good turkey, a Kelly Bronze, and so they include incredible directions. We’re a kind of households who, once we get an Ikea mattress, simply throw the directions away and hope for the perfect, as a result of we’re overconfident in our personal skills.
Dylan goes, “Dad, are we going to observe these directions?” I went, “No, I understand how to brine a turkey.” I put it in for half-hour. Then we had a drink and fully forgot about it. Half a bottle of Bushmills later I mentioned, “Did you’re taking the turkey out of the brine?” And he was like, “No, you probably did, didn’t you?” It was in there for a great 10 hours.
Sincere to god, it was as dry as a hound’s tooth. I mentioned, “Dylan, do the trick with the gravy, paint it on, it’ll be superb.” It completely wasn’t. The ethical of the story is: take away whiskey from mentioned situation and all shall be properly. However the boys and I don’t get collectively fairly often, and once we do, there’s all the time an evening of overexcitement, which in the end means jigging about within the entrance room. And on this case, a really dry turkey.
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