Hello Dear Reader and a very Merry Christmas to you! I hope you had a wonderful Christmas full of love, laughs and joy? As well as lots of good food of course. Come and take a look at what my Christmas looked like in a two day Christmas Eve and Christmas Day celebration!
I am sure I've mentioned it before but when we were little we were really bossy kids (haha not much has changed). And my sister and I loved Christmas so much we persuaded our parents to start celebrating on Christmas Eve because why have only one Christmas when you can have two? And that was the theme this year too.
This year I was inspired to do a French Christmas after coming back from New Caledonia. Did you know what a French Christmas is quite similar to an Australian one even though the weather is vastly different? A French Christmas tradition on Christmas eve is called Le Revillon from the word réveil which means "waking".
It features an abundance of luxurious offerings from oysters, prawns, foie gras and smoked salmon. The main event is usually a chestnut stuffed bird (turkey, pheasant or another game bird) and dessert is usually a buche de noel. There is also a Provençal tradition that involves 13 desserts. You can see where this is headed no?
The seafood was super easy - we served smoked salmon, crab galettes, caviar, oysters and enormous king prawns. I wanted to roast a pheasant but they're not in season now so I made quails stuffed with pâté and chestnuts. I figured quails would be easy as they are perfectly portioned, plus I often get overwhelmed by leftovers.
Dessert was the hardest part. I'd like to say that you should make a buche de noel but it is definitely hard work. There is of course a log cake that is like a Swiss roll but the French with their sense of humour have a buche de noel that has 7 parts to it. It's sort of like making 7 sweets in one cake and involves an unholy amount of washing up. I made my buche de noel a mango and coconut flavour and regrettably it was delicious. Outside were gingerbread house cookies in pastel shades.
The Provençal 13 dessert tradition kept ticking around in my head. I ummed and ahhed and then decided to do the 13 desserts. Now this isn't quite as mad as it sounds. The 13 items can be things like types of dried and fresh fruit, nougat and cookies. I also had my secret weapon: cookies from my Dear Reader Matilda and her daughter Gabriella.
Every year since the beginning of the blog Matilda has sent me a box of her amazing Italian cookies. Every year we all look forward to them (and I truly hope I've been good enough to receive them). They formed the idea of the wreath of 13 desserts - well actually 12, the buche was the 13th.
My uncle Sam, his partner Lien and my cousins Richard and Roger and Roger's partner Catherine and their children Natalie and Jason came over to join my family at my place. Usually family dinners last about two hours (because Asian families) but this one lasted until the wee hours with lots of wine and talking and laughing about how mad our family is. My father who needs to be in bed by 7:45pm had to be driven home by Mr NQN while my sister Blythe and mother stayed for the festivities. It ended up going for all hours in an unexpected Le Revillon.
This is Mochi's second Christmas with us. She also had her first macaron. Not deliberately mind you. Mr NQN accidentally dropped a macaron from the 13 dessert platter and of course being the food obsessed little thing that she is, she found it and we only realised that she was snacking on a macaron when it was too late. She was fine thankfully but it was more sugar than she has ever had.
We exchanged presents- Mochi got the most presents with an avalanche of treats from my sister and mother. She is one very spoilt dog although we wouldn't have it any other way. As for me, I got all the presents that I wanted because I went out and bought them - ha! Mr NQN is fairly clueless with buying presents and I pretty much buy my own, otherwise there would be nothing under the tree ;).
The next day for Christmas Day we headed to the Central Coast to Mr NQN's aunt and uncle's house for Christmas lunch. It was my first time seeing the Elliotts in three years.
It was a nice, relaxing day once we battled the traffic and arrived at Murray's Beach. His aunt Sisko and uncle Seppo had put on a Finnish Australian spread of vegan food as well as prawns, smoked salmon and ham. Much of it was gluten free as well because some people have developed allergies.
There were these Finnish dishes called perunalaatikko (potato box), lanttulaatikko (swede box) and porkkanalaatikko (carrot box) that are tasty baked vegetarian dishes. And for dessert there were cups of Kiisseli, a dried fruit stew traditionally made in winter when fresh fruit isn't available. It was made with prunes, apricots and sultanas with very little sugar and potato flour to thicken it. It was served with vanilla ice cream and rice pudding. Along with this was a vegan bliss ball cake made by Mr NQN's mother and a carrot cake as well as three types of shortbread.
We learned some new things - that Mr NQN's father Roger is now acting using a very complex method that involves adlibbing and taking extensive notes that I didn't quite understand. Mr NQN's cousin Sam recently eluded being mugged by outrunning the group of thugs (he's a really good runner). And there was a new baby, 2 month year old Finn whom we met for the first time. But remarkably apart from that, everyone remained the same and we enjoyed seeing them. But then my father tapped us on the shoulder as he wanted to be back in Sydney in time for his strict bed time of 7:45pm and we had to leave.
I hope you had a great Christmas at your place Dear Reader? Were there any highlights of your Christmas? And what did you eat? And below are all the recipes of what we ate during our Le Revillon feast!
Click here for Oysters Mignonette recipe
Click here for Crab Galette recipe
Click here for Pâté Stuffed Quail recipe
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