So that is that for another year - presents opened, festive food cooked and (mostly) consumed, washing-up done. Here's what we ate:
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| Potato scones, smoked salmon and bearnaise sauce for Christmas Day brunch - in the looming shadow of bubbly |
As planned, on Christmas Day we had a good brunch and then snacked on delicious nibbly things. Very simple potato scones, with lots of smoked salmon and some (bought) bearnaise sauce, with a glass of cava, made an excellent start.
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| Canapes |
In the late afternoon we had canapes with some more cava. Mini bagel toasts topped with cauliflower puree and salmon pearls (a favourite of ours for many years), and mini blinis topped with blue cheese mousse and marinated baby figs.
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| Absolute little sods to peel |
Later in the evening we had 'nduja scotch quail eggs. Peeling the quail eggs almost cost me my sanity - there were a dozen when I started and you can see the condition the surviving eggs were in. It's a pig of a job and the waste upsets me no end. Next time I am going back to the ready-peeled ones. The fresh quail eggs can wait for times when I want a mini fried egg or something.
On Boxing Day we had another good brunch (although with coffee, not alcohol) - these breakfast-in-a-bap. I very nearly followed the recipe, although I used 1 slice of bacon per bap and added a slice of black pudding. Cute, less fiddle than a fry-up and less calorific than the way we'd usually do it too.
Our contribution was dessert. I made the Italian Christmas Pudding Cake from Nigellissima, in a half quantity. Instead of tuaca and marsala, I used Pedro Ximenez sherry. Very, very successful, although without the tuaca it had much less of a boozy kick than Nigella's did (it was one of the things she made for the afternoon tea I went to last month).
After dinner we sat in front of an open fire and nibbled cheese and crackers, while drinking port. A very merry Christmas.
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| Boxing day dessert |
11 comments:
I want those scotch eggs! You're a brave woman, dealing with those fiddly quail eggs. The results look like the effort was worth it, though!
woah, what a feast! I could eat a dozen of those scotch quail eggs
Leaf - they were so delicious but I was very close to dumping the lot in the compost.
Adrian - I'll make them for you as long as I don't have to peel the eggs!
Those scotch eggs look amazing! And I never knew you could get already boiled and peeled quail eggs... definitely one to keep in mind for the future...
I got quite a chuckle from your photo of the eggs. Mine were chicken eggs and I had a pig of a time with mine, too, for some reason. All's well that ends well, though, and those Scotch eggs looked divine.
Your dessert is absolutely stunning and oh so festive!
Luff it all!!! Fabulous!
Love the snacky approach to Christmas day - it all looks great, although those quail's eggs do indeed look like sods to peel!
i'm glad the quail eggs didn't break you. :)
your food looks grand, especially your boxing day dessert!
happy new year. :)
Su-Lin - you can get them in Waitrose. A dozen, with some celery salt for dipping.
Arlene - I definitely wanted to share the process shot! We suffer for our blogging.
Joanne - and totally delicious, I recommend it!
FF - thank you! I still long for your ham & pavlova though.
Caroline - almost a week later & I am still having flashbacks to the horror.
Grace - it was a near miss. Happy New Year!
Nduja scotch quails eggs sounds fabulous, will definitely give those a try! Totally agree they're a real sod to peel but - having had to peel nearly 200 for an event a few months ago (weep for me!) - I have a tip that makes them a million percent easier. Tap them all over on a hard surface so the shell is covered in cracks, then use the edge of a teaspoon to flick off the shell piece by piece. Works a charm and avoids all the wastage caused by fingers!
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