Nigella Christmas: Food, Family, Friends, Festivities (6 page)

NOTE:

Don’t use wholenut or other virtuous peanut butter here, only the regular sort. For what it’s worth, I go for Skippy.

MAKE AHEAD TIP:

Make the cups up to 2 days ahead and keep, loosely covered, in a cool place.

FREEZE AHEAD TIP:

Make the cups and open freeze on a baking sheet. When frozen, pack into a rigid container. Thaw overnight in a cool place on a wire rack.

ABOVE:

The sweet delights of a dessert-dedicated welcome table.

EGGNOG SYLLABUB

This is, in effect, an Anglo–American union: eggnog is the holiday tradition Stateside; and you could hardly get more quintessentially English than a syllabub. And actually, upping the Anglo-ante, I wouldn’t mind it one bit in place of the whipped cream in the Boozy British Trifle. Though, it really would pack a killer punch.

Just as it is here, piled creamily, with celestial lightness into dinky espresso cups or shot glasses, it is, quite simply, exquisite. You can certainly taste the trio of tipples, but you don’t feel as if you should avoid stepping near a naked flame after eating it.

Makes 15 × 60ml servings

(If you are having a bigger party and want more servings, it would be better to double the ingredients but make it in 2 batches)

1 egg (see note below)

2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

65g caster sugar

3 × 15ml tablespoons bourbon

3 × 15ml tablespoons dark rum

3 × 15ml tablespoons brandy

500ml double cream

good grating of fresh nutmeg (about a third of a nutmeg)

• In a large bowl, crack the egg and add the vanilla, sugar, bourbon, rum and brandy, and grate in an exuberant amount of fresh nutmeg; you will be grating some more on the top of the syllabubs later, too. If you don’t want to use all 3 drinks, then choose your preferred one and triple the single measure given.

• Whip together all the ingredients, except the cream, with an electric whisk; I use my freestanding mixer.

• Slowly whisk in the cream and continue whisking until the cream is softly whipped but will still hold its shape when the whisk is lifted out of the lightly bulging mass. Be patient: because the alcohol acts as a thinner, the cream will take a while to get desirably, floatily thick; this is why I suggest an electric whisk to do the work.

• Dollop moundingly into 15 espresso cups or shot glasses and grate a little more nutmeg over each one.

NOTE:

If you prefer not to give people raw egg to eat then replace the egg and 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract with 2 teaspoons of Bird’s custard powder, and reduce the sugar to 50g.

CHRISTMAS ROCKY ROAD

It’s not that I felt my usual Rocky Road Crunch Bars needed any improvement (though fiddling with recipes is one of life’s pleasures) but I thought they would benefit from some seasonal adjustment. So, out go the Rich Tea biscuits and in come amaretti and – in the seasonal spirit – I’ve crammed in some Brazil nuts and glacé cherries (as red as Rudolph’s nose), along with snowy mini marshmallows. The fresh snowfall of icing sugar on top might seem seasonal enough, but not for me. So I add some edible glitter in Disco Hologram White.

Makes 24 big-bite-sized bars

250g dark chocolate

150g milk chocolate

175g soft butter

4 × 15ml tablespoons golden syrup

200g amaretti biscuits (not the soft ones)

150g shelled Brazil nuts

150g red glacé cherries

125g mini marshmallows

1 × 15ml tablespoon icing sugar

edible glitter (optional, see Stockists)

• Chop both sorts of chocolate small, or use chocolate buttons made for melting, and then put into a heavy-based pan to melt with the butter and syrup over a gentle heat.

• Put the biscuits into a freezer bag and bash them with a rolling pin to get big-and little-sized crumbs; you want some pieces to crunch and some sandy rubble.

• Put the Brazil nuts into another freezer bag and also bash them so you get different-sized nut rubble.

• Take the pan off the heat, and add the crushed biscuits and nuts, whole glacé cherries and mini-marshmallows. Turn carefully to coat everything with syrupy chocolate.

• Tip into a foil tray (I use one 236mm × 296mm), smoothing the top as best you can, although it will look bumpy.

• Refrigerate until firm enough to cut, which will take about 1½–2 hours. Then take the set block of rocky road out of the foil tray ready to cut.

• Push the icing sugar through a small sieve to dust the top of the Rocky Road. Then, if you like, add a sprinkling of edible glitter for some festive sparkle.

• With the long side in front of you, cut into it 6 slices down and 4 across, so that you have 24 almost-squares.

NOTE:

If you want to, there’s nothing (except dexterity in my case) to stop you cutting these into tiny, petitfour size pieces, in which case you could almost double the number.

MAKE AHEAD TIP:

Make the Rocky Road and refrigerate to set. Don’t add the icing sugar yet, but cut into bars, then store in an airtight container in a cool place for up to 1 week. Decorate with icing sugar and edible glitter about 1–2 hours before serving.

FREEZE AHEAD TIP:

Make the Rocky Road as above and freeze for up to 1 month. Thaw overnight in a cool place. Decorate as above.

THE WELCOME TABLE

AROMATIC CHRISTMAS HAM

PUMPKIN AND GOAT’S CHEESE LASAGNE

CHRISTMAS COLESLAW

CHOC CHIP CHILLI

FULLY LOADED POTATO SKINS

THE BOOZY BRITISH TRIFLE

PRODIGIOUS PAVLOVA

You might be wondering what a “welcome table” is, and you’d be justified. I made it up. When I explain, I think you’ll understand: it’s the table loaded with food for people to plate up for themselves as they party. It could be called a buffet, I suppose, or a fork supper, but somehow both those terms make me feel I’m throwing a party on a cruise ship.

Besides, the essential element – the prerequisite of a party – is that mood of welcome and abundance, and this is what these recipes are all about. It really doesn’t matter if the plates are paper, and there aren’t enough chairs: this is food that’s easy to make, easy to eat, and makes people know you want them there.

You could make just one or two of the recipes for the hard-core, inner circle who invariably stay behind at the end of a drinks party, but I think of this, my welcome table, as the best way to feed a pile-up of friends at a warmly informal supper party to celebrate the season.

AROMATIC CHRISTMAS HAM

There’s no absolute need to have a cold Christmas ham on a welcome table, but there are few sights more seasonally cheering. I like to have some of the sweet, salty pink meat carved, and some still clove-studded and gorgeously whole, as a joint, on a wooden board. Obviously, it is fabulous hot, too.

If you feel like adding the Christmas Chutney, by all means do; I would. Though any number of other condiments in that chapter might also be a good match. Shop-bought mango chutney is certainly not infra dig – or not in my house – and I definitely need English mustard with this. Those who like it less hot could turn to the Redcurrant and Wholegrain Mustard Sauce (a quick stir-up, no cooking), perhaps using cranberry jelly (if already using in the glaze) in place of the redcurrant.

Serves approx. 10

water to cover

1 large onion, halved

2 cloves garlic (unpeeled)

1 head fennel, halved

2 star anise

1 × 15ml tablespoon coriander seed

1 × 15ml tablespoon fennel seed

1 × 15ml tablespoon mixed peppercorns

FOR THE GLAZE:

approx. 20 whole cloves

4 × 15ml tablespoons cranberry or redcurrant jelly

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

½ teaspoon red wine vinegar

• Put all the ingredients, except those for the glaze, into a large pan, on the stove but off the heat, adding water until the ham is covered.

• Turn on the heat and bring to the boil, then turn down to a simmer and partially cover the pan. Cook for about 3½ hours. (This may not seem long for a big joint, but as it will carry on cooking as it cools, and this is going to be eaten cold, I don’t want it overcooked. Nor do you.)

• Preheat the oven to 200°C/gas mark 6. Lift the ham gently out of the hot liquid, sit it on a board and let it cool slightly, not too much but just so that you can touch it without burning yourself.

• With a sharp knife, strip off the rind, and a little of the fat layer if it’s very thick, but leave a thin layer of fat. I love this work: it is peculiarly gratifying seeing the hot blubbery fat slither off. Use the same knife to score a diamond pattern in the remaining fat on the ham, in lines about 2cm apart. Stud the points of each diamond with a clove.

• Put the cranberry or redcurrant jelly, cinnamon, paprika and red wine vinegar into a little saucepan and whisk together over a high heat, bringing it to the boil. Let the pan bubble away, for about 5 minutes, so that the glaze reduces to a syrupy consistency that will coat the fat on the ham.

• Now sit the ham in a roasting tin lined with foil, as the sugar in the glaze will burn in the oven as it drips off. Pour the glaze over the diamond-studded ham, then put it in the oven for about 15 minutes, or until the glazed fat has caught and burnished. Take the ham out of the oven and sit it on a wooden board to cool (2–3 hours) before you carve it.

MAKE AHEAD TIP:

Cook the ham, loosely cover in a “tent” of foil and keep chilled for up to 1 week.

PUMPKIN AND GOAT’S CHEESE LASAGNE

One of the questions I am asked most often is how do I come up with recipes? The answer is simple: greed. When I’m not eating, I’m thinking about what I might want to eat, and the notion of pumpkin lasagne came into my head when speculo-salivating, and it found its way from my head to my kitchen to my stomach with gratifying ease.

This is an easy lasagne to make in that, unlike a traditional meat one, there are not two sauces to do in advance. I simply cook the pumpkin earlier and layer it up with fresh lasagne sheets (bought in vacuum packs from the supermarket) that don’t need pre-cooking and an easy cheese and egg mixture.

Don’t be put off by the length of the recipe that follows. It takes longer to explain than to do!

Serves 12–15

FOR THE PUMPKIN FILLING:

2 × 15ml tablespoons olive oil

30g butter

8 sage leaves

2 onions, peeled and finely chopped

3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced

2.2kg pumpkin, peeled, deseeded and cut into 3cm rough cubes (this is about half a decent-sized pumpkin, a proper eating one, not the Hallowe’en kind. When prepared, it yields just under 2 kilos)

75ml vermouth or white wine

60ml water

1 × 400g can chopped tomatoes

salt and pepper

FOR THE TOMATO SAUCE:

1 × 700g (700ml) bottle passata

500ml water

2 × 15ml tablespoons sugar

2 × 15ml tablespoons Maldon salt or 1 tablespoon table salt

good grinding of pepper

FOR THE CHEESE LAYER:

450g soft fresh goat’s cheese

500g ricotta cheese

3 eggs

good grating of fresh nutmeg

2 × 300g packets fresh lasagne sheets, 600g total

2 balls mozzarella

125g pine nuts, toasted in a hot dry pan

salt and pepper

• To make the pumpkin filling: heat the oil and butter in a shallow casserole and fry the sage leaves over a gentle heat for about 2 minutes.

• Add the chopped onion and minced garlic to the pan and fry very gently for another 10 minutes or so.

• Add the pumpkin pieces, turn well in the oniony oil and, after about 5 minutes, add the vermouth (or wine), the water and chopped tomatoes. Simmer, covered, for an hour, stirring occasionally so the pumpkin cooks evenly. Taste for seasoning – I tend to add quite a bit of salt here – and leave to cool.

• For the tomato sauce: simply pour the passata and water into a large jug or bowl, and stir in the sugar, salt and pepper, whisking it all together.

• To make up the cheese layer: in a separate bowl beat the goat’s cheese and ricotta with the eggs, nutmeg, and salt and pepper to taste.

• Preheat the oven to 200°C/gas mark 6, slipping in a baking sheet as you do.

• To assemble the lasagne, begin by putting 500ml of the cold tomato sauce in the bottom of a roasting tin (measuring approx. 36cm × 26cm × 6cm).

• Then layer with a third of the lasagne sheets, overlapping them well (Italians do it with the tin horizontal but the pasta vertical, if that makes sense, but I don’t know that it truly matters …). Leave the rest of the tomato sauce aside for the time being.

• Layer a third of the pumpkin filling over the lasagne, and dollop on a third of the cheese mixture, coaxing with a rubber spatula. It won’t cover completely; think more of spreading blobs about. Then start again with a layer of lasagne, followed by pumpkin, then the cheese. Repeat once more – lasagne, pumpkin, and the last of the cheese mixture.

• Pour the remaining cold tomato sauce over, letting it sink down and be absorbed in the layers.

• Slice and chop the mozzarella balls and dot over the top.

• Cook in the oven, on the baking sheet, for 1 hour. Once cooked, take out of the oven and let it stand for 15–30 minutes to make cutting and serving easier. (I love this when it’s stood for an hour or so, too.) As you cut and slice, you will notice a shallow tomatoey cheesey pool at the bottom of the tin; bread dunked into this is gorgeous.

• Sprinkle the toasted pine nuts over the lasagne, and cut into squares to serve.

NOTE:

I use a soft goat’s cheese log, sold as Chevrissime blanc, that has no skin and a texture more like that of a goat’s curd cheese.

MAKE AHEAD TIP:

Up to 2 days ahead, make the pumpkin filling, leave to cool and keep, covered, in the fridge. Make the cheese layer and keep, covered, in the fridge. When ready to use, assemble the lasagne and cook as directed.

FREEZE AHEAD TIP: