This Christmas, we’re going to have a “traditional” Christmas dinner. My husband loves Yorkshire pudding and I’m going to try roasted goose. Or geese, most likely. How many servings can you get off a goose? Must look that up.
Any other suggestions for side dishes and accompaniments? Our holiday meals are generally the same – we want something new to us for Christmas. Well, except for the pies.
I’d love to hear your thoughts. For my Brit friends, what do you have for a traditional English holiday meal?
My menu this week:
Sunday, Dec. 13: Turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, oyster stuffing, broccoli/cauliflower blend, potato rolls, apple pie with ice cream.
Monday, Dec. 14:
B: bagels and cream cheese, watermelon (Mr X dropped it so we have to eat it quick!)
L: Turkey salad sandwiches, fruit
D: Spaghetti and meatballs, salad
Tuesday, Dec. 15:
B: French toast w/cranberry bread, orange juice, eggs
L: Spicy eggplant and tomatoes, probably over noodles of some variety.
D: Turkey rice soup, cheese toast
Wednesday, Dec. 16:
B: Scrambled eggs and mango/strawberry yogurt parfaits (I admit it. I can only cook eggs two ways, scrambled or hard boiled)
L: Tomato soup, grilled cheese sandwiches (Tomato soup for 8: Large can crushed tomatoes, small can tomato paste, garlic powder, pinch cayenne. Stir, add water to make it soupy. Cook a little bit to get the tin can taste out of the tomato. Add basil from window, because you need to prune the plant before it starts climbing the walls to the ceiling.)
D: Dijon maple chicken breasts on spinach (from Saving Dinner, by Leanne Ely), brown rice, green beans
Thursday, Dec. 17:
B: Oatmeal with walnuts, raisins, and brown sugar, milk
L: Macaroni and cheese, green beans. (Shred lots of cheese for enchiladas, too.)
D: Chicken enchiladas, charro beans. (Double portion for Elizabeth ministry)
Friday, Dec. 18:
B: Pumpkin bread with cream cheese spread, oranges, milk
L: Black bean tostadas with lettuce, tomato, avocado, onions, and cheese, mango smoothies (guess which kind of frozen fruit was on sale?)
D: Butternut squash soup with cheese ravioli, spinach salad, garlic bread (More from Saving Dinner!)
Saturday, Dec. 19:
B: Cereal/kids cook.
L: leftovers, or peanut butter sandwiches with whatever kind of jelly the kids want. But I hope they pick apple butter before it goes bad.
D: Baked fish with creamy lemon dill sauce, red potatoes, broccoli.
I have to admit, I’m rusty on the thinking up new, fabulous meals to cook! I really like the Saving Dinner cookbook. It saved my bacon when I was working so much a few years ago.
The book gives you a week of meals, how to cook them, and a shopping list. The author is a nutritionist and she’s already thought to make sure you’re not eating chicken four nights in a row. I recommend it to anyone who has to make dinner every night, but is not a total foodie/gourmet with hours long recipes. Great for moms who want more than hamburger helper without being a slave in the kitchen, perfect for anyone with basic kitchen skills.
(Disclosure: I am an Amazon.com associate, so I get some kind of nickels and dimes if you order from my link. But I’m recommending the book because I liked it and it really helped me learn to menu plan.)
For more Menu Plan Monday, check out Laura at OrgJunkie!
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Semi-related question: I bought a couple of whole chickens on Thursday. Didn’t notice the sell-by date was Saturday. Should I roast them tonight or toss ‘em? I’m leaning towards roasting them since it’s a sell-by date, not a use-by date. What would you do?
Smell them and if they don’t stink, throw them in the crockpot. Or boil on the stove/roast them.
It’s not the La Boucherie one, is it?
Goose is like duck – a lot of fat and a little meat. You will be draining the fat off constantly (more fat than you would think could be in the bird), and end up with a bag of bones and skin. The fat makes most excellent roast potatoes, however.
A goose for your size family would be more than one bird, even accounting for children not eating adult portions.
Yorkshire puddings are the traditional accompaniment to roast beef, if that helps.
I just get a goose crown because there’s only three of us and I cook it in the slow cooker the day before (on top of balls of aluminium foil to keep it out of the fat). That way I have the fat the next day for roasting potatoes.
For the main course, we usually do goose, sausage or sausagemeat, stuffing, roast potatoes, sprouts (for those who like them), carrots, some other veg and gravy.
Pudding is Christmas pudding with white sauce.
We usually do smoked salmon and cream cheese parcels as a starter but we made that bit up – it isn’t traditional.
Apparently Queen Elizabeth I was eating goose when she heard the Spanish Armada had failed so she made a law that everyone had to eat it for Christmas dinner.
I have a great creamed spinach with parsnips recipe.
Kelly, that sounds delicious! Please share!
Off the top of my head:
Roast turkey stuffed with sausage meat ( and/or separate balls of sage and onion stuffing) honey glazed gammon, parsnips, roast potatoes, definitely brussels sprouts ( without which Christmas isn’t Christmas) bread sauce ( yummy)cranberry sauce, pigs in blankets ( cocktail sausages wrapped in streaky bacon)
For pudding: Christmas pudding (natch) carried to the table brandied and aflame, the room darkened beforehand, Spectacular! Typically this is served with white sauce, but we prefer cream.
Later on mince pies with brandy butter and lashings of hot tea.
Throughout evening regular top ups of red wine/sherry/baileys and grazing from the bumper box of Quality Street.
I feel squiffy and slightly pleasantly sick thinking about it.
We adore brussels sprouts roasted with bacon, but I’m not going to do turkey. We have turkey and ham throughout the winter months because they’re so cheap (and when you’re feeding 10, it makes sense to cook a ham!)
I think a good roasted beef with horseradish sauce (recipe I’ve always wanted to make, my steak and potatoes husband LOVES horseradish) and a goose because I’ve always wanted to have a Christmas goose, at least once.
Around here, pigs in a blanket are cocktail sausages wrapped in biscuit dough – sausage wrapped in bacon sounds like my husband’s dream appetizer!
Your menu looks yummy!
Here ya go:
http://www.delish.com/recipefinder/creamed-spinach-parsnips-recipe
It really can be prepared ahead and time and I ate a ton of it over thanksgiving. Although I was also full of steroids from my pneumonia so who knows.
Milehi
here we call sausages in pastry ‘sausage rolls’ but I think your ‘pigs in blankets’ works better because the pastry is more ‘blanket like’ than bacon. Funny how the nomenclature develops and changes.
I make a mean kolache, which is a sausage link in slightly sweet yeast dough. It’s a Polish word but the Texans have grabbed it. All of the donut shops carry kolaches!
Oh and my husband reminded me about the ‘devils on horseback’, which are prunes wrapped in streaky bacon. A surprisingly pleasing combination, and I have no idea why they were so named.
In the States a popular gourmet appetizer is cantaloupe wrapped in prociutto. Haven’t tried it but it sounds gross to me.
But, they sell maple bacon lollys online and I have a recipe for bacon cookies that sound awesome!
My kids would love any snack named devil on horseback, LOL!
I was about to set you straight about the heinosity of serving Yorkshire puddings with goose, but I see my compatriots have set you straight. I do vote for goose — it is really yummy and festive and there *is* good meat left on it after all that tedious fat-draining… But I cooked it pre-children for a civilised adult party of 6, so I take the point about needing several birds…
Sounds like we’re eating what Clare’s eating, sans the gammon (that’s for another day) but with the addition of red cabbage cooked with apples and spices, yum. Oh, and pork and apple stuffing, ditto. Oh, and (this is becoming like the O antiphons of the Christmas dinner) brandy butter with the Christmas pud. I forgot it last year, mostly because it’s gross IMHO. You won’t find that among O sapientia etc.
Oh, no, I was going to have goose AND roast beast. For the pudding. With horseradish.