For that Festive Spirit

[Raithe]

Just for the festive spirit.. and if you have 50 minutes or so to pay attention..

A christmas feast designed to put the festive mood and childhood memories back into you..

 

Heston Blumenthal's Perfect Christmas

 

 

The mandarin mousse was poached in nitrogen which, when eaten, streamed out of his guests' noses in two frosty jets. The mulled wine was hot on one side of the glass, cold on the other.

 

Reindeer milk ice cream.. gathered by sleigh from Siberia..

Even a meal made with gold, frankincense and myrrh..

Among a whole heap of strangeness..

[Morgoth]

Reindeer milk ice cream..

[Walsingham]

Frosty.

 

Jets.

[Raithe]

I have to admit.. the setup was just.. immensely appealing to my childish sense of christmas wonder.

 

But the mulled wine split into hot and cold.. so if you take a sip perfectly.. you have the left side of your mouth hot..and the right side cold.. That has me extremely curious how that trick worked..

[Walsingham]

Interestingly I've now established to my own satisfaction that I can get through both morning and afternoon on just five oatcakes, and three cups of coffee, without losing concentration or getting angry. Assuming I can keep this up I'd say my chances of losing weight are pretty high.

 

I've already dropped a belt notch in the last six weeks.

[Raithe]

On the flip side of that.. I really need to break the habit of having a pint of tea for breakfast, and just a mini-pork pie or similar type of snack for lunch... and then have one significant meal for dinner..

 

Maybe the christmas season will help jog my eating habits into a better place..

[Raithe]

And for the non-food related festive spirit..

 

[Walsingham]

Slightly let the side down by having three bowls of soup for dinner. But it was awesome soup.

 

Couple slices smoked bacon, a half hand sized chunk of beef shin, dried beans, a few lentils, one carrot, one potato, one onion lots of water. A little rosemary and thyme. Still have enough for tomorrow. Cost two quid, the lot.

[Monte Carlo]

I'm going on a diet.

 

In March.

[Walsingham]

From the excellent Old Foodie

 

Another opportunity to mock the enfeebled vegetarians:

 

It is Christmas in the year 1866. You are a gentleman farmer in England, who espouses vegetarianism, and wish to promote the philosophy amongst your neighbours. You advertise a dinner to be held on Christmas day, and 1000 locals turn up. You feed them:

 

 

[Raithe]

Actually already broken into the supply of Christmas Puddings... Although we're saving gran's home-made one for christmas day proper..

 

And it always amazes me that my friends in the states have never had a proper Christmas Pudding...

[Tigranes]

You people eat like kings. I stay away from Christmas stuff so I don'te ven know what half of those things are.

 

Today I baked a Christmas Cake for the gf. Actually, that's a lie. It's a plain chocolate cake with a penguin wearing santa hat, christmas tree & snow roofed house as decoration. Oh well.

[Walsingham]

Actually already broken into the supply of Christmas Puddings... Although we're saving gran's home-made one for christmas day proper..

 

And it always amazes me that my friends in the states have never had a proper Christmas Pudding...

 

I know. It's weird. My father and I were trying to buy ingredients, and it turns out that in the Land O Lardass you can't buy gokking suet. Although the odds of his wife letting use suet in the pudding were slim to none. I hate people who try to be healthy at Christmas. It's one gokking day, ye halfwits.

[Raithe]

Geez, making the christmas cake is an important family tradition.

 

Start the sultanas, raisins, cherries and other fruit soaking in brandy a few days before..

 

Sift flour, spices, salt all in together..

Whisk butter and sugar together in a seperate bowl till its really fluffy.. then add some beaten eggs to it a bit at a time..

Folding that mixture into the flour.. that whole squelchy goodness..

Then you get to add a splash of brandy and watch it all settle.. before the fruit, peel, chopped nuts and such get added..possibly a touch of treacle depending just how you like it..

 

If you cook it just right.. it's a really nice rich, moist fruit cake.. if you cook it too long it dries up..

(and personal family tradition is to use a hypodermic to inject brandy directly into the cake to help make up for any that's evaporated during the oven time...)

Usually we do that in mid october so we can seal it up in an airtight container..then early December break it out to put on the marzipan and a thin layer of icing...

[Tigranes]

Raithe, my cooking level is where I dump milk, sugar, eggs, butter and chocolate or some combination thereof and mix until it looks unrecognisable.

 

Sounds good though, it never looks hard when other people describe it.

[Walsingham]

Raithe, my cooking level is where I dump milk, sugar, eggs, butter and chocolate or some combination thereof and mix until it looks unrecognisable.

 

Sounds good though, it never looks hard when other people describe it.

 

You should cook my drunkards pudding. Mix equal quantities of sugar and suet with slightly more self raising flour. Add a small quantity of spice. Add warm water and mix to a batter. Place this mixture into a cake loaf tin, and bake in some sort of oven. Meanwhile, in a double boiler mix dark chocolate and milk chocolate and fresh cream, until it is all melty. Once the suet pudding is ready and crisp on top, remove from teh oven and pour a generous quantity of liquer or brandy over the hot surface, immediately topping with the chocolate sauce. Sprinkle finely chopped strawberries or other autumn fruits on the surface and serve.

[Raithe]

Or to life from tvtropes..

 

[Guard Dog]

For Christmas this year I'm grilling a red snapper fillet with a Florida lobster tail, roasted ear of corn, and a balsamic tomato salad. Plus I'm going to cut and smoke some country style spare ribs to make jerky treats for the dogs because, after all, they love christmas too! Then I'm going to load up the Ipod with Bob Marley & Jimmy Buffet songs, drink a lot of beer and yell at the coyotes when they come knock my grill over later.

[Malcador]

Fancy people. We're just having baked chicken here.

[Enoch]

I made a trio of fruitcakes last year, using a technique similar to what Raithe is talking about. I soaked the fruit in dark rum rather than brandy, added lots of citrus zest, used some hard cider as the primary liquid in the batter, and skipped all the marzipan/icing. And I did prepare them a few weeks in advance, and kept them moist by brushing with brandy twice a week.

Edited December 20, 2010 by Enoch