Thursford Christmas Spectacular

I know it is only January but believe it or not there are some people already thinking about Christmas 2012!  If you haven’t heard of Thursford it is a little place in the between Fakenham and Holt in Norfolk that houses the world’s largest collection of steam engines and organs.  During the year it is open for people to view these wonderful machines where Robert Wolf is often playing these beautiful organs.  There is a fairground carousel for the children and behind the scenes tours.  Of course no attraction such as this would be complete without a cafe and gift shop and Thursford does both of these things very well too.  During the year, Thursford is also a hive of activity behind the scenes as they plan their Christmas Spectacular.  This Christmas Spectacular is a mixture of dancing, singing, carols from a cast of over 100.  The ceiling and stage must contain the most Christmas decorations you will ever see in one place and will put the most determined Scrooge in the Christmas Spirit.  The Thursford Christmas Spectacular runs from 9th November and you must book early (in other words now) to get it as people come from all over to see it.

It never ceases to amaze me that a sleepy little place in the middle of Norfolk houses such a collection and a renowned Christmas show such as this but it is a triumph each year.  I would advise a sat nav or a coach trip in order to find it, in fact when Prince William and the then Kate Middleton attended prior to last Christmas on their first ever official visit I had wondered how all the journalists had managed to find Thursford – it’s amazing what Royalty can do.

http://www.thursford.com/default.aspx

Getting ready for Christmas 2012

I hope your Christmas went to plan and you had a lovely time. I know it’s January but now is a really good time to reelect on what worked well this Christmas and what we could improve. It’s a useful exercise and if you are planning a big family event at Easter you might be able to put some of the lessons learnt into action then.

I’ve got two immediate improvements I plan to make. Some of our guests were delayed and we had to keep dinner warm a little longer than expected in the oven. The problem was we didn’t have enough space. Well actually we did have enough space, what we didn’t have was enough shelves. This is easily fixed at a low cost. If you do a search on Amazon you’ll find lots of suppliers selling spare oven shelves often for under £20. I’m going to get a couple more selves as its a really cheap way to upgrade your oven. The other thing I plan to do is buy some new cooking trays which better fit the width of my oven. I ended up with roast veg in two trays, each taking a shelf when they could have been all together in one big tray on the same shelf. This will help with better oven space usage and help produce a better result. Most domestic ovens vary greatly from shelf to shelf in terms of heat and cooking time. You’ve probably noticed that things will brown faster on some shelves in your oven. So I think it’s really worth trying to pick up some new trays in the January sales.

London on Christmas Morning

While the rest of us were at home enjoying Christmas morning photographer Ian Mansfield decided to cycle around the empty streets of London and took some amazing pictures of a deserted London.  You can see his pictures of London on Christmas Day here.  One of my favourites is the shoot of the Millenium  Bridge  which is usually packed with people completely deserted.

And this shot of St Pauls.

Tags: Christmas Day, Empty, London

Royal Institution Christmas Lectures 2011

Just a quick reminder that the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures start this evening on BBC4 at 20:00 and then continue for the next two nights at the same time.  This year the theme is the human brian.  I’ll be sitting down with the family after dinner to watch this as it’s long been a tradition in our household.

Tags: Christmas, Lectures, RI, Royal Institution

Relaxing on Christmas Eve

It’s Christmas Eve and so far everything is going to plan and running like clockwork.  I did pop out to the local shop this morning to pick up a newspaper and found it was really busy, so I’m glad I didn’t have to do any more shopping today.  If you’ve been following my Christmas Planning hints and tips you’ll know that I booked a delivery from our local farm shop for  Christmas Eve morning.

I’m catering several days between Christmas and New Year and that requires a lot of sprouts!. I always recommend buying them on the stalk and then keeping them just outside the back door, as this really keeps them fresh for several days. If anything the flavour improves if they get a little frost on them.

I’m really pleased with the Turkey this year, it looks like a lovely bird and came really nicely presented. My Turkey cooking tip is to carefully remove the legs and cook these separately. I also carefully remove the wishbone as this makes carving so much easier.

Once I’ve removed the turkey legs I remove the bone and any tendens and then make lots of little cuts in the meat, season and then stuff with sausage meat.  I then roll this up tight and wrap in tin foil.  These legs can then be cooked separately the next day allowing you to cook the remaining breast part of the turkey just right.  It’s also a great way to make the turkey go further and make the brown meat more appealing to everyone.  I’ve been doing this for years now and everyone loves it.  I’ve taken a few photo’s this time and if I get a chance over Christmas I will type up the full method.

Tags: Ballotine, Turkey Leg Ballotine