My Favourite Ingredient - Christmas

Related tags Foie gras

Article on Christmas ingredients

Claude Paillet, executive head chef, Bricklayers Arms, Hogpits Bottom, Flaunden, Hertfordshire

"My classic favourite ingredient for Christmas is foie gras. It's the best time of year to buy foie gras because it is really top quality. We make our own terrine with foie gras we've marinaded in various alcohol - brandy, Armagnac, dry

sherry and port - for 24 hours then we cook it very quickly. We serve it with brioche and red onion jelly. It's a bit of an expensive dish to make and something that's more like a treat, so it really fits in with the Christmas occasion."

James Blowes, chef, the Alma, Arbour Lane, Chelmsford, Essex

"It's got to be chestnuts for me. You get your fresh chestnuts, soak them down, boil them up and make a purée. The flavour of chestnuts when you use them in a stuffing is just amazing. I make mine in a tear-drop shape with half of it minced pork and half of it chestnut purée, so half is light and half is dark-coloured. When you roll it up and put a slice on the plate next to the turkey it looks incredible - you taste the first mouthful with your eyes. Christmas is

the only time of year I use chestnuts and I only use them in stuffing, but you have to love the flavour."

Matthew Eke, Helyar Arms, East Coker, Somerset

"My favourite Christmas ingredient is mulled wine, which we make here ourselves. This year I'm going to be using it in a hot mulled wine soufflé. We have five chefs here and one of

them does only pastries and nothing else, so I said he could make this for Christmas parties this year: he's going to have a whole oven all to himself. It's basically just egg whites, sugar and mulled wine, so it's also cheap to make. Last year we did a mulled wine parfait, but this year I thought it would be good to do something different and have a hot pudding. We also serve the wine in the bar, of course."

Killian Callender, Merrie Harriers, Cowbeech, East Sussex

"Cranberries are my favourite Christmas ingredient and one reason is that they are so versatile - they can be used in both savoury and sweet dishes. They're also really plentiful

at this time of year. We make our own ice cream here so we're going to make some with cranberries for Christmas. We also make a cranberry preserve to go with the turkey. I think in the past few years people have become more understanding about cranberries. There's more awareness, thanks to people like Ocean Spray who have done a lot of advertising promoting it."

John Dixon, proprietor/chef, the Rose & Crown, Harpley, King's Lynn, Norfolk

"Sloes are great at Christmas. They just start coming out in September and October and we pick ours to make our own sloe gin for ourselves, then we freeze whatever's left over. They're great to freeze because doing that simulates a frost. We then use them in a compote. Another favourite is to put them in a jus with any berries we have left over from

summer in the freezer to go with a seasonal dish of pan-fried duck breast with Polpette - a Greek potato cake with lemon, oregano and feta cheese."

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