Happy Sunday..

Is it though? This is always a sad Sunday for me. Christmas is over, even Boxing Day is now a memory, I’ve put on at least half a stone and pretty soon I’ll have to think about taking down the decorations. For someone who lives for the twinkly days and nights of December, this coming week is a little rough.

I did, however, have a wonderful Christmas week, so we can save the sob stories for next Sunday when January gets real, can’t we? For now, let’s take a little look at the best bits of life this week..

Earlier this week, I went over to the Jesh residence to partake in pre-Christmas merriment with a few friends, a lot of curry, and one big fat quiz of the year (a very vintage episode, I came second to last). The food was delicious, the company perfect and the laughs aplenty.

Just a few days before Christmas, my Mum, Sister and I got the train up to London to see my Godparents, eat delicious food and hang out with their adorable small humans. Usually, we’d do a fake Christmas in August or May or some other far fetched and seasonally inappropriate month but it appears that 2015 is the year of everybody having their shit together where Christmas is concerned. Go team.

As always, they rustled up a ridiculously good meal. I’m rushing out to buy a chicken as soon as the festive period is over and the butcher reopens so that I can make this amazing Ottolenghi chicken recipe before Veganuary!

Christmas Eve

Off to a family friends for a few drinks, too many crisps and a lovely bit of bruschetta before heading over to the Jesh residence for more festive fun. Josh made chorizo sausage rolls that blew my mind (so much so that I actually made my own on boxing day), Jess made focaccia with three delicious toppings, and I brought over some mince pies and Baileys martinis. We hung out and watched Gremlins, the Gavin and Stacey Christmas special and the best The Office Christmas specials. Basically, I had the most perfect Christmas Eve.

Christmas Day

I got a total of 2 hours sleep the night before Christmas. Bearing that in mind, I feel like I did a pretty good job with my first ever Christmas dinner. I didn’t do all the work myself, the boys cooked the meat in the morning before we arrived and my Uncle and little Sister helped with the “peeling and stuff” stage – but I was in charge for the first time, and I didn’t break anything. So I was happy.

I didn’t boil a single vegetable, everything on the table was roasted or fried. It’s Christmas, I just think that’s how it should be done. I made Felicty Cloake’s perfect nut roast for my Mum which she loved, and for dessert we had the James Ramsden chocolate, orange and hazelnut tart that I served last year. I collapsed after dinner.

Side note: guys, how awful was the Christmas Day TV this year? We had to actually talk to each other and interact as a family, it sucked, what the hell happened?

Boxing Day

A day of eating dangerous amounts of cheese, doing as much of nothing as you can possibly do and – in our case this year – playing the big fat quiz of the year to see how much of the last 365 days of life you can remember (it’s not as much as it should be).

How was your Christmas? Good, I hope. I’ll be seeing you soon for an introduction to Veganuary, and maybe some new years resolutions if I’m feeling optimistic..

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