kit
Instant Expert
T H E
Christmas Dinner Lesley Waters
The Celebrity Chef
Season’s Eatings
SHINY &
SHARP
Lesley Waters has some top tips that’ll help you
enjoy a stress-free and delicious Christmas dinner
How about vegetables? What are
your favourite trimmings?
Do you have any time-saving tips?
Get everyone on board. Don’t just work
yourself into a frazzle in a kitchen – that’s
bonkers. Put on some nice jazz, people
can have a glass of fizz and it’s fun. Don’t
put it all on you. I look after the bird and
everyone else does everything else. If you
really want to save time, get all your veg
parboiled the day before, get all your sauces
made, the stuffing and pigs in blankets done.
Do you have any top tips for
cooking turkey?
I like turkey very much, it’s delicious. You’re
far better to have a smaller bird that will
cook quicker and won’t go dry. Sometimes,
with those big birds, the thighs can take
ages to cook and the breast goes dry. I
generally stuff it with apricot and pistachio
stuffing. It’s quite traditional – streaky
bacon over the breast, salt and pepper, lots
of butter and a little bit of olive oil. I always
do a nut roast too. Cranks’ nut roast is really
nice! And I do a ham that’s baked on apples
and cider, and it is delicious. You can have
that cold on Boxing Day, too.
What sauces should we serve with
Christmas dinner?
We always make a raw cranberry relish –
it’s an American recipe. You cut up a whole
orange and whizz it up, the pith, skin,
everything. Then you add fresh cranberries
and whizz those in, and then you add a little
bit of icing sugar, a little bit of olive oil, salt
and pepper and whizz that up. It’s like a
salsa, and it is fabulous. Christmas Dinner is
quite heavy, so it’s good to have something
fresh. I also love proper bread sauce with
cardamom and nutmeg, so it’s slightly spicy.
For potatoes, I sometimes do what my
Grandmother does, which is parboil them
until they go flaky on the outside, put
them in a colander and give them a shake.
I cook them in butter and rapeseed oil,
and she used to sprinkle over just a little
bit of seasoned flour, and it makes them
go ever so crispy. I roast carrots, parsnips
and butternut squash in olive oil, salt and
pepper, squeeze lots of orange over them
and put the orange halves in. I stir-fry
shredded sprouts and finish them with
butter and nutmeg.
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What would you have for pudding?
I don’t do a traditional Christmas Pudding
because I find it too heavy. We have this
thing called an instant Christmas pudding,
and you can make it before or on the day
and it’s more like a carrot cake – it’s got
apricot, sultanas and grated carrot in it. It
hasn’t got any suet, and it’s quite light. I’ll
always do something chocolatey for the kids.
How do you ensure you’re not too
full?
We have