Christmas Dinner

No one's going to cook Christmas dinner until next year, but i'll put my recipe up anyway. I don't like turkey stock so i made a chicken gravy to go with the roast turkey. Cranberry sauce with pomegranate molasses and orange juice has a great tang and offsets the richness of the roast. I roast the parsnips separately from the potato's as they take less time and you can add maple syrup!!

Cranberry Sauce
Ingredients
2 tbsp pomegranate molasses
300g cranberries
Orange juice - fill until halfway below the cranberries
Zest of 1/4 of lemon
Caster sugar - to taste - i like it tangy but not too sweet

Directions
Fill a pan with cranberries and pour orange juice in until halfway up. Add the pomegranate molasses and lemon zest, bring to the boil and simmer until the cranberries break up (you can crush them with the back of a wooden spoon too). Add sugar to taste and simmer until the sauce reaches a syrup consistency. It will start to have a lovely glossy sheen! If your really keen you could strain the sauce to remove the cranberry skins but i like their texture. You can cover and reheat for the roast.

Sherry gravy

Ingredients

3 shallots skinned and quartered

1 carrot sliced into 1/4's

6 chicken wings

4 large stalks of thyme

4 garlic cloves, crushed with their skin on

olive oil

Salt

1/2 cup Sherry

1 cup red wine

300mls chicken stock

2 dried porchini mushrooms (for Unami)

glug of Sherry Vinegar (vinegar cuts through the cloyingness  of the fat)

Hunk of butter creamed with some flour and salt (this prevents the gravy getting lumpy)

Directions

Roast the veg, herbs and chicken wings. Then pour into a pan and add the liquids. Bring to the boil to cook off the alcohol and add the mushroom and butter. Simmer for fifteen minutes then strain.

Roasted Vegetables

Parsnips

If the parsnips are large cut off the thick bases and par boil these with the potato's (keep the spears dry as they cook quickly). You can then return these to the rest of the parsnips. Coat the parsnips with some mayple syrup, sunflower oil and a little butter before roasting for 35 - 50 mins at 180 degrees.

Potato's

Peel and par-boil until a knife will pierce the potato but not enter the middle. Fluff up by shaking the potato's when they have cooled. Toss with olive oil and a little goose fat. Roast with 4 rosemary stalks and 3 crushed garlic cloves for 50 mins at 180 degrees.

Roasted Turkey

Wash the turkey and season inside and out with salt (add some pepper at the end as it will scorch in the oven). Mix a large hunk of butter with 5 thyme stalks (take the leaves off them) and a little salt. Push the butter mix under the turkey breast and leg skin and stuff a bay leaf under each breast. Pop an unwaxed lemon inside the turkey.

I like to roast the turkey upside-down cover with foil under a high heat (220 degrees centigrade) for half an hour before turning the turkey over, covering it with pancetta and roasting for half an hour on a lower heat (150 degrees). Baste the turkey when you turn it over. Then continue to roast the turkey until nearly done (firm and juices running clear). At this point turn the temperature up and take off the foil to brown the breast. Each bird will take a different amount of time so the last stage will vary in terms of timing. Turkey crowns (without the legs) cook quicker. Leave the turkey to rest for 20 mins (covered with foil) before serving and don't forget some stuffing!!