A Christmas Dinner That Couldn't Be Beat
Dec. 25th, 2009 10:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lillibetI've been making Christmas dinner for my family regularly--not every year, but many--since 1991. I usually make roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. This year somehow it all came out and came together better than ever before, so I thought I should write it down while it's still fresh in my mind.
Roast Beef I got a 7.8 lb. roast from BJ's, rubbed it with curry powder, and cooked it using the one-hour roasting method. I left it at 500F for 17 minutes and it was very rare--that's how I like it, but next time I think I might go ahead and leave it for 20 minutes before turning down the oven to get wider variation.
Sage Scallopped Potatoes They would have been walnut-sage, but I forgot the walnuts. Despite that, and some whisking adventures, they were very tasty and I highly recommend this recipe. Having them in the slow-cooker took some pressure off the oven space, which was an added bonus.
Brussels Sprouts Au Gratin These were really spectacular. Despite the recipe's claims, the top didn't brown, so I turned on the broiler for 3 minutes and that did the trick. We only ate about half the batch, but my sister insisted that all the leftovers were hers, so that was fine.
The Best Broccoli of Your Life I've honed this recipe down to a science: broccoli, minced garlic, salt and cracked pepper, drizzled with generous quantities of olive oil, cooked at whatever temp above 400F is convenient for 15-20 minutes until the tips begin to brown and then tossed with some basil (chopped fresh is best, but dried works fine). The basil really takes it over the top--it doesn't taste like basil, it just brings out the natural sweetness of the broccoli in a beautiful way.
Yorkshire Pudding After making the Joy of Cooking recipe successfully many times, last year it mysteriously turned into Irish soda bread. So this year I went with this recipe, minus the chives and green onions and using butter instead of drippings, since those were in short supply this year. It worked perfectly.
Gravy Mom is our master gravy-maker and she did herself especially proud this year, since she was making do with very little in the way drippings. I think it helped that the potatoes weren't such as to require gravy, so a little went further than it might have done.
Bistro Salad Anne's contribution to the meal was this lovely spinach salad with pecans, dried cranberries, poached pears, tossed with balsamic vinaigrette and a choice of goat or blue cheese.
I think the surprising thing, and what made it so successful, was how well the flavors went together. Given how different the spicing was on each dish--curry, sage, basil, etc.--that was a very happy accident.
And then came dessert:
Cinnamon Egg Nog Ice Cream Jason made this, working from this fairly simple recipe. It was a little grainy, but very light and nice.
Holiday Cookies I've been making cookies all month, drafting![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
muffyjo, Alice, Mom and Jason to help me with the traditional Hunter family recipes. We had lebkuchen, snowballs, currant cake, mincemeat bars, and date-nut pinwheels, as well as some of buxom_bey's excellent chocolate-peanut butter fudge. Everyone seemed very excited about the cookies and devoured a sizeable number of them.
We were all sad thatbex77 and audioboy couldn't be with us and Dad had a bad spell this afternoon that threatened to make him miss dinner, as well. But he rallied and it was really nice to gather around the table for some family time at Christmas.
I hope you've all had a wonderful day!
Roast Beef I got a 7.8 lb. roast from BJ's, rubbed it with curry powder, and cooked it using the one-hour roasting method. I left it at 500F for 17 minutes and it was very rare--that's how I like it, but next time I think I might go ahead and leave it for 20 minutes before turning down the oven to get wider variation.
Sage Scallopped Potatoes They would have been walnut-sage, but I forgot the walnuts. Despite that, and some whisking adventures, they were very tasty and I highly recommend this recipe. Having them in the slow-cooker took some pressure off the oven space, which was an added bonus.
Brussels Sprouts Au Gratin These were really spectacular. Despite the recipe's claims, the top didn't brown, so I turned on the broiler for 3 minutes and that did the trick. We only ate about half the batch, but my sister insisted that all the leftovers were hers, so that was fine.
The Best Broccoli of Your Life I've honed this recipe down to a science: broccoli, minced garlic, salt and cracked pepper, drizzled with generous quantities of olive oil, cooked at whatever temp above 400F is convenient for 15-20 minutes until the tips begin to brown and then tossed with some basil (chopped fresh is best, but dried works fine). The basil really takes it over the top--it doesn't taste like basil, it just brings out the natural sweetness of the broccoli in a beautiful way.
Yorkshire Pudding After making the Joy of Cooking recipe successfully many times, last year it mysteriously turned into Irish soda bread. So this year I went with this recipe, minus the chives and green onions and using butter instead of drippings, since those were in short supply this year. It worked perfectly.
Gravy Mom is our master gravy-maker and she did herself especially proud this year, since she was making do with very little in the way drippings. I think it helped that the potatoes weren't such as to require gravy, so a little went further than it might have done.
Bistro Salad Anne's contribution to the meal was this lovely spinach salad with pecans, dried cranberries, poached pears, tossed with balsamic vinaigrette and a choice of goat or blue cheese.
I think the surprising thing, and what made it so successful, was how well the flavors went together. Given how different the spicing was on each dish--curry, sage, basil, etc.--that was a very happy accident.
And then came dessert:
Cinnamon Egg Nog Ice Cream Jason made this, working from this fairly simple recipe. It was a little grainy, but very light and nice.
Holiday Cookies I've been making cookies all month, drafting
muffyjo, Alice, Mom and Jason to help me with the traditional Hunter family recipes. We had lebkuchen, snowballs, currant cake, mincemeat bars, and date-nut pinwheels, as well as some of buxom_bey's excellent chocolate-peanut butter fudge. Everyone seemed very excited about the cookies and devoured a sizeable number of them. We were all sad that
bex77 and audioboy couldn't be with us and Dad had a bad spell this afternoon that threatened to make him miss dinner, as well. But he rallied and it was really nice to gather around the table for some family time at Christmas. I hope you've all had a wonderful day!
