And now we go again...

themadvix

I’m a relatively recent convert to sours too and definitely only the fruity ones (which is annoying as we have a wild blendery near us that I’d like to support). Interesting about the difficulties of keeping them EH - I hadn’t considered that.

Ed, Mr MV wants to try the Iron Brew one, but I can’t think of anything worse! 😂

EssexHebridean

I'm not a fan of Irn Bru to start with so I suspect I'm with Vix on this one Ed - sorry! I DID however have the Vault City Chocolate Orange Crunch in a pub on Friday - V-E-R-Y expensive (as theirs often seem to be in pubs) but OH MY WORD - stunning! The best way I can describe it would be that it is what you would end up getting if a Crunchie bar, a Chocolate Orange and a packets of refreshers got together and did very naughty things...!  

So, my big news is that my Mum has asked if we would be happy to host Christmas this year, as she's finally ready to admit that she has started finding it all a bit much. It was no surprise, I knew it was starting to be a bit of a challenge but of course it had to be her call. Obviously the answer was that yes, that was absolutely fine as long as she was sure (she is!) and so that will be a bit of a change of arrangements for this year. 

Reading through all the Christmas posts on Greying's thread felt quite well timed - and obviously it's left me reflecting on the various things that we did - and in some cases still do. Decorating the tree with Christmas music playing was always a thing - and MrEH and I do now too. We do more in the way of decorating the house than Mum & Dad ever did- Christmas lights were less of a thing then anyway, not least because they are FAR cheaper to run now of course - and we don't go crazy and cover the outside or anything, but I do like to make an effort for the outside to look at least a bit Christmassy. We always used to go to my Aunt & Uncle's house for a christmas tea the weekend before the day itself - and that is a tradition that we've continued until this year with Mum coming to us - Mum says she's going to do that this year as we'll be doling the cooking for the 25th. Christmas day itself has always been on the quieter side than some folk do in terms of people - as a child it would be have been the three of us, plus my Nan, and then for a number of years my Aunt & Uncle for tea. Now it will be back to "the three of us" with me, MrEH and Mum of course - plus the dog! Turkey for dinner always - these days we buy a really good one so not only is it enjoyable for Christmas dinner but the leftovers are always eagerly anticipated as well. As for Boxing day, Mum & I adopted a policy of no cooking many years ago - and to this day we both refuse to do anything beyond shoving something in the oven to heat up. MrEH will head to the rugby club for the traditional boxing day match - usually scratch teams from whoever is there - and I will thoroughly enjoy a lunchtime sandwich of as many leftovers as I can cram between two slices of sourdough bread. 

In terms of newer traditions, MrEH entering the family added pigs in blankets and bread sauce to the Christmas table - we didn't have either of those when I was a child, I wouldn't be without them now! He also makes a huge Christmas cake each year which gets sufficiently fed with booze to ensure it will last pretty much indefinitely. We don't make a pudding but usually rely on whatever we find reduced to pennies after the previous christmas! I do sausage rolls with a new flavour combination popping up each year - although last year's bacon, brie and cranberry ones were pronounced favourites to become an annual bake! Currently debating about Chicken sausagemeat with sage and caramelised onions... 

lucielle

What time shall I arrive??  Sounds delish!
L

badmemory

I am so glad cooking dinner is much easier than it used to be.  Just pudding used to have to come with three versions of custard.  Well rum sauce actually, with custard made with sugar for the only half a stomach one who didn't touch alcohol and the non-sugar one for the diabetic.  Even better NO SPROUTS.  It was so easy back then but I think now I would be in serious panic mode.

EssexHebridean

Ahh badmemory MrEH's Mum does rum sauce with the Christmas pudding - which the family all refer to as rum custard which enrages her - it's SUCH a family joke! 

I would be lying if I said I wasn't a wee bit freaked out at the thought of having to get everything timed to be ready - but I'm sure it will be fine! 

badmemory

All I can say is make as much before as you possibly can & the dreaded cling film pushed down into custard stops it forming a skin & a cold starter.  When I was doing for 14 I used to do kipper pate, gazpacho soup & salad.  The kipper pate was a version of up yours to FIL who stayed in a London hotel during the week & thought he knew it all & why I rescued MIL from having to do dinner.

EssexHebridean

Haha there will be no Christmas day custard in my house! Also no starters - we've never done them and definitely not on Christmas day, much preferring to save the space for a damn good roast dinner! The thought of coking for 14 makes me go pale - kudos to you for that!

I'm a fan of cooking in advance - I will have a list of all the things that can be done ahead of time and that will include the potatoes being cooked to the "just enough" stage ready to throw into the hot fat 40 minutes out from serving up time. I also have a hunch I'm going to use serving bowls on the table and we can all help ourselves, although I'll have a proper think through of how easy that will be in practise. 

MSE Stuff:
- I have remembered that I had £15 cashback on M0n3ySooperm@rket and so have redeemed that into a voucher for Al's which will be saved for christmas food.
- Soup made on Saturday - same as last week, involving sausage, kale, and assorted other veggies with added macaroni for winter-ish bulk. Two portions for eating this evening, a further single portion stashed in the freezer. 
- Shopping got at the weekend between various places - a budget-ish week, although bolstered a little by the purchase of a dozen bagels from Brick Lane on Friday. 
- Used the U-Switch free electric hours on Saturday for most of the cooking of the soup, plus several loads of washing. I reckon it adds up to around 3kWh so if we get 75p back on that I'll be pleased enough. 
- needed to go to the World Foods shop yesterday, so had a rifle through their box of random very cheap stuff by the entrance. Found bottles of pepper sauce, and yellow curry sauce for 20p each - the pepper sauce has already been tried and is rather nice - sort of like a thicker version of tabasco but with more depth of flavour and less raw heat. 
- The annual seed inventory has been done, and a list made of the things we might want to think about buying - not actually all that much, handily enough

Non-MSE Stuff:
- Friday was an excellent but spendy day -although mostly the spendiness kicked in when we met at the pub, and then returned back there afterwards!  
- definitely NOT MSE was my padded jacket failing to survive its wash on Saturday - my fault I suspect too as the label DOES say don't wash with other items - and I was a fool and thought "ahh, it'll be OK". Spoiler alert - it's not.
- Replacement jacket tracked down and purchased via TCB in order to salvage at least SOME street-cred round here from the whole debacle! Hopefully it will fit, and the colour won't be brighter than it looks online as it's a sort of dark purple. 

Friday was ace - started out with a breakfast in one of the pubs that sounds like weather-cutlery using their "with a drink" deal for a breakfast muffin and several cups of tea. Hopped on the bus to get to that photo exhibition I'd been eyeing up, which was utterly brilliant - loved it! Cheerfully paid £5 for the brochure as it was such a good deal for a free exhibition. Walked through to Spitalfields via Brick lane - bought the aforementioned bagels and an eccles cake each. Lunch was Pizza a Portofoglio from Sud Italia in Spitalfields market - so good and only £5 still, I had expected inflation to have hit but fair play to them!  More bus use then - initially to Aldwych where I made use of my free hot drink from the octopods (and bought a bottle of water because I forgot to pick one up in the morning) and then a second one on to Kensington and a nice couple of hours at the Science Museum - another free exhibition - this one on the future of food - very thought provoking, and then the rest of the time in the medical galleries which are always fascinating. £3 donation there because I really wasn't there all that long. Back on the bus and through to Piccadilly where I opted to get off and walk the rest of the way to where I was meeting MrEH - this is where the pub came in - and finally a short walk through to the LT Museum at Covent garden for the Hidden London Hangout Live we had tickets for - excellent fun and lovely to meet the hilarious Alex Grundon afterwards too - what a nice chap! 

PennysIntoPounds

What a fab day out.

That's nice your mum felt like she could ask. Don't worry, as you say just prep what you can and write yourself a wee timings/order list if you think you'll be frazzled.
And get a couple of freezer pizzas in so in the very unlikely event it all goes wrong, at least you'll have a meal, you can chuck a sprig of holly on to make it festive 😁

EssexHebridean

Worse case scenario will be that we'll eat tea at lunchtime and have our christmas dinner in the evening - we will not be under-catered!  I'm mostly feeling quite confident about it - I've dealt with the last minute timing aspects for the last few years anyway so I just need to avoid over-thinking it I suspect.

amber03

Last Xmas our cooker broke just as I went to cook the Xmas dinner. Thankfully had cooked the turkey the night before. We have our static caravan parked on our drive so everything else had to be cooked on the small cooker in that. Hoping for a less eventful Xmas this year.