One Christmas, as we sat down to the traditional turkey dinner, several of my nearest and dearest remarked with a certain asperity that a mother with the patient air of a tired saint does not add to the season’s jollity. They laughed at me for trying to do alone that which used to be done by a slew of female relatives for the delectation of the male relatives who were giving tone to the establishment by sitting in the parlor.
Whatever the validity of this observation, I do agree that full-scale turkey dinners are for large families where the problem of leftovers does not weigh upon the following week. (I have never understood, incidentally, why eating turkey leftovers for days and days and days should be a sign of moral virtue, as it is regarded by most people.) So, in a speculative mood, I worked out another Christmas dinner, where the food can be prepared beforehand and is more in tune with modern appetites. The menu has proved to be very popular, and not only at Christmas. Several of the recipes are found in good standard cookbooks; I give some of the others below.
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