Christmas Lunch 2019

Hello friends, and merry holidays or happy hopefully day off or whatever this time of year means to you. Yesterday was Christmas here, and I managed to actually muster up some festive feelings, which was nice. The day started with my traditional Christmas morning bikram yoga class, then home to presents, and making Christmas lunch. It actually rained quite a bit, which was delightful! I'll have several festive posts to share, but today I am focusing on our Christmas lunch for this year.

We decided to keep things pretty simple this year. So instead of making a centrepiece or even buying some big fancy roast, we went with the easiest options of some Tofurky smoked ham slices and a Field Roast Wild Mushroom Quarter Loaf that I had lurking in the freezer. It was my first time trying the loaf, and it had such a wonderful mushroom flavour. We sliced the loaf and gave it a quick pop in the microwave as recommended on the packaging as the simplest way to heat up, and the ham was from the fridge.





Tarragon Pea and Spinach Side from Keep It Vegan by Aine Carlin: The first of two new recipes I tried for our meal. This is very easy to make, using frozen peas and a bag of baby spinach. The recipe says to cover the peas with water to simmer, and once the liquid has reduced add the spinach to wilt. This would have resulted in a super soupy dish, so I ended up draining off most of the liquid before adding the spinach. I realised that I forgot to add grated nutmeg (doofus), and I also decided not to add the optional soy cream. It was a really nice, savoury, green side dish. Perhaps next year I will try it with the cream, and also remember the nutmeg!
Rating: :)



Miso-Glazed Roasted Carrots from I Can Cook Vegan from Isa Chandra Moskowitz: The second new recipe I tried, from my newest cookbook. This recipe is super simple, and super tasty. I made a half recipe, for three side serves. I had five skinny carrots, that I cut in half crosswise before cutting in half lengthwise, just because otherwise they would have been too long to fit easily on our lunch plates with everything else. The glaze is easy to make. It says to toss the carrots in it and then put them on the tray. This left most of the glaze in the bowl, so I scooped out the glaze and rubbed it on the carrots. I left out the red peppers, and topped with chopped parsley rather than scallions. I roasted these for a bit longer, and at a slightly higher temperature than the book suggested to make sure they were nicely roasted and glazed.
Rating: :)



Potato Squashers from Eat, Drink & Be Vegan by Dreena Burton: These have been a Christmas Day staple at our house for years. Salty, hot, crispy, roasted potatoes. Who can say know? We always bake them for about five extra minutes on each side once they have been squashed, to make sure they are super crispy.
Rating: :D



Cinnamon Citrus Cranberry Sauce from Keep It Vegan by Aine Carlin: Frozen cranberries are hardly ever available here, but I had some in my freezer still from when I bought a heap of bags last year when Woolworths randomly had them (they didn't this year). This is my favourite cranberry sauce to make, and I've made if to previous Christmas times as well.
Rating: :D



Mum also made this lovely tomato and cucumber salad with balsamic dressing.



Our Christmas table.



And my fully loaded plate.



For dessert, I got these mini vegan friendly Christmas puddings from Coles. It was great having them in individual portions, as we could each eat ours when we felt like it and it was just a small bite, rather than having a huge pudding to share with leftovers. I drowned mine in some Alpro custard, because I like a very high custard to pudding ratio.



Cute Kitty Photo of the Post



While she may not look impressed here, Dim Sim had a lovely Christmas day. She got a fresh packed of Greenies, enjoyed running in and out of the rain multiple times to get rubbed down and hugged, had many sweet lap snuggles with me, and ate very well.