A good Christmas. There were just the five of us on Christmas Day – the Husband, Stepdaughter, Stepson, Father-in-Law and myself. It’s extraordinary how much shopping, cooking and general Christmas preparation there was in the days running up to The Day for such a small number of people.

I suspect that part of the thing is the expectations put on everyone by the media for THAT Meal. I lost count of the number of articles in magazines and newspapers on the run up to Christmas on how to cook That Dinner. In addition for the two weeks before Christmas the tv channels had lots of programmes by all the famous chefs on how to cook the meal – I wouldn’t mind but all of them had different ways of cooking it and on what accompaniments to include and how to make them: Nigella Lawson soaked the turkey in water overnight, Jamie Oliver forced flavoured butter between the skin and flesh of the turkey, etc, etc. Those who are not confident on how to cook the meal would find it easy to get confused over what to do. It is, of course, a basic roast meal, only with several additional dishes and shouldn’t worry anyone if you take it a step at a time. Certainly our Christmas dinner turned out very well indeed.

Anyway, the Father-in-Law has returned home in time to spend the afternoon and evening of Boxing Day with his daughter and her family. We are now having a good time relaxing and working through the Christmas leftovers. But what do we do with all that leftover cream? We always buy too much cream, both plain and flavoured, and never learn to buy less.