How to Choose Your Christmas Dinner Menu

What are your favorite Christmas dinner recipes to make for your family and friends? Do you have any? After many years of cooking Christmas dinner for my family and friends I have several old favorites and every year I try to add at least one new recipe. One of the ways I've made Christmas dinner preparation and choice of main and side dishes very easy on myself is by the use of notes. Once our family and friends have said their good-byes and the dishes are done I sit down and review the day. What dish went over well? What dish didn't get eaten? That's how I decide what I'm going to cook for next year.

We're very traditional when it comes to Christmas dinner. We like a turkey and a ham. Just like our Thanksgiving dinner I roast a 15 lb. turkey with a sage stuffing inside. I always feel more confident that roasting a turkey stuffed will help to keep it juicy and flavorful. I don't add any meat or fruit to this stuffing, it gets a whole lot of flavor from the bird.

For Christmas dinner I don't make a side stuffing, I make a vegetable gratin dish. Some years I've made brussels sprouts au gratin, some years I've made pearl onions au gratin. I'm a fan of at least one rich creamy dish for a traditional Christmas dinner. I also like to have at least two vegetables, sometimes three. I also like to offer a very fresh plain vegetable, usually fresh green beans that are just blanched. My family also likes baby carrots. Some years I make a ginger butter for the carrots, other years I've just served them steamed. Creamed corn is another family favorite.

When I go online I see a lot of questions about how to pick side dishes. Perhaps because I watched my mother and grandmothers' make Christmas dinner I always had a good idea how to pick them. Of course you need a starch or two. I prefer regular mashed potatoes, my husband sweet potatoes. I use a ricer to make my mashed potatoes, it really helps them come out fluffy. I also use hot cream when I mash them, it helps keep them fluffy. Some years I've made very simply butter baked sweet potatoes. Hot and fresh.

So for our Christmas dinner menu we're having turkey with stuffing, mashed potatoes, brussels sprouts au gratin, steamed baby carrots and creamed corn. Then there's the ham. I love pineapple glazed ham. I call it a holiday glazed ham. It's something my mom made every years. Like she did, I trim and then score the top of a bone in ham. Into each cross-hatch I place a whole clove. I cover the ham with a glaze of pineapple juice, apple juice, orange zest, dijon mustard and brown sugar. Then I place pineapple rings around the ham, securing each with a cherry on a toothpick. It's festive looking as well as delicious.

The one thing I always try to remember is that too many complicated dishes can be overwhelming. When all is said and done people generally only remember three dishes from any meal they eat. So while I try to make sure that everything is cooked as well as it can be, that the turkey is moist and flavorful and the ham is browned in a glorious glaze and the vegetable au gratin dish is loaded with flavor I tend to not over do the other dishes. There is nothing more delicious than fresh blanched green beans or baby carrots.