Christmas Buffet Foods

[Kai Robinson]

This year, @boopbox123 and I are eschewing the norms of british culinary tradition during the primary gifting period and choosing to instead have buffet food on the day itself, instead of boxing day, which is normally what happens. Reasons for this are mostly because we can prepare almost everything in advance, and there's nothing that usually takes more than 15-20 mins on the day to whip up. There is also the secondary benefit of that you can graze all day and just have little plates - more conducive to enjoying the day as a whole. It'll also only be 3/4 of us in total (1, potentially 2 guests coming over for the day), and the stress of cooking is normally a little much on the day to genuinely enjoy the time, especially since this our first Christmas away from where we've been used to living, in a place of our own.

This is the kind of thing we've done in years past:

So, my question is this - what sort of buffet food/nibbles/canapé's do you all put out at this time of year? We're looking for ideas!

We have this list, so far, as a rough guide of what we're going for:

• Sausage rolls
• Pork pie
• Smoked salmon terrine (made)
• Findlaters smoked mackerel Paté (bought)
• Chicken liver paté (bought)
• Potato chips (Crisps)
• Cream cheese & chive dip
• Crudite platter
• New potatoes roasted in garlic and herb butter
• Loaded cheese & bacon potato skins
• Yorkshire puddings stuffed with roast beef and horseradish
• Honey roast ham (homemade, cold, sliced)
• Boneless rolled Turkey or Turkey crown (homemade, cold, sliced)
• Sliced corned beef
• Roast beef (homemade, cold, sliced)
• Frittatas & mini quiche's (homemade)
• Spinach & goats cheese tarte (homemade)
• Cheese twists (homemade, GF puff pastry)
• Pickled Onions
• Sauerkraut
• Pickled Red Cabbage
• Gherkins
• Sprouts and bacon / Sprouts and chestnuts
• Hard Boiled Eggs / Devilled Eggs
• Picalilli
• Cheese Board
• Baked Camembert
• Crackers
• Bread
• Lettuce/Mixed leaf salad
• Sliced Avocado
• Pasta Salad (?)
• Mayonnaise / Mustard / Cranberry Sauce / Tomato Chutney / Sour Cream / Horseradish
• Cocktail Sausages
• Pineapple
• Oranges / Tangerines / Clementines
• Shredded Spiced Apple
• Mulled Cider & Mulled Wine
• Christmas Pudding
• Mince Pies
• Melting Moments (great-great-grandmother's recipe - think shortbread that dissolves on your tongue)

A lot of that will be eaten on the days either side of the main event, too - so we can have a bit of variety and incorporate new and interesting things to munch for the week.

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

I’m a big fan of keeping it simple. We’ll typically put out a table of charcuterie, cheese, pickled items, dip, crudite’, & some munchies like nuts/chips/pretzels & just let folks graze. Most items are shelf stable so will last the celebration with little maintenance.

Table is typically built with beers and rested red wines. The above pic is from 2018. Warm eggnog by a fire/hearth is always nice as well if your new place has one.

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

Another idea that is great for a grazing table is to deconstruct a dish into edible sub sections like this - I took a salad champetre (could do this with something like nicoise as well) and deconstruct it to finished sub-ingredients that folks could enjoy individually or they could build the salad to their liking - very noshy & flexible eating experience especially for the picky eaters in your life.

 

[Kai Robinson]

Oooh, I like the idea of the deconstructed salad - that's definitely something i'd put out on the table.

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

This method is very handy in that you can prepare the ingredients ahead of time, plate at service and not be stuck in a hot kitchen.

individual croquetas/quiches/tartlets/meat pies are great for this as well.

Bake em off & next day give them a few minutes in the oven to warm/liquify the fat. Crush it with a very basic green salad

to augment the deconstructed salad (some might not get it) and rested libations. Again, all done day before so you can enjoy the celebration. Another do ahead option I employ (albeit more typically during the summer time) are gazpachos - a fav of mine is watermelon but any would do.

Colorful and better next day, they are a fresh do ahead option to brighten up a winter time table so the chef can enjoy the celebration.

If you have seafood lovers en route, another do ahead item is salmon. In your neck of the woods I’m thinking a Norwegian salmon would do well roast with a sweet n hot honey glazed red Chile crust. Like everything else, they can be done ahead of time and assembled right before the holiday entourage is to arrive.

of course I’m fundamentally about keeping it very basic, simple and relatable to the folks culinary lexicon I’m feeding.

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

Here’s another. - northern NM Red Chile pork tamales. I’m not going to lie as they’re a cap ton of work to meez up n process but are always the first to go during the holidays in my neck of the woods because they’re freakin delicious. Technically it IS a do ahead item so would open up plenty of time aside from re-steaming them for service.

We do a crap ton and freeze them and give them as gifts to family through the holidays.

 

[luminescentsimian]

Here’s another. - northern NM Red Chile pork tamales. I’m not going to lie as they’re a cap ton of work to meez up n process but are always the first to go during the holidays in my neck of the woods because they’re freakin delicious. Technically it IS a do ahead item so would open up plenty of time aside from re-steaming them for service.

In Arizona we make them very similar except with beef.

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

Last time I was in Tucson, I had these BOMB smoke brisket blue corn green Chile tamales.

SO GOOD.

If you don’t want to go to the trouble of individual tamales, you can execute en masse and steam up a tamale pie.

A personal fav of mine With a fried egg on top. This one was todays lunch, so we got into it before I thought to take a glamour shot. When I do this for a dinner party, I cut into squares and fancy It up with an over easy or poached chicken or quail egg over top. Sauce the plate with a green Chile sauce for a Christmas red/green holiday vibe and this nested over top has always proven to be a party fav.