There was an early Christmas dinner last night at my place, we took advantage of the great deal that Lawry’s are offering on a delivered turkey dinner (387 kuai for a 5-7kg turkey, chestnut stuffing, mashed potato, creamed spinach and corn, cranberry sauce and gravy). Fortunately I’d prepared enough sides to feed about 1000 people because the Lawry’s portions were too small for the 8 that were eating (I was annoyed at the mashed potato, you get 500g in the meal and are advised you can order extra portions for 35 kuai, I ordered an extra mash portion, when it arrived it turned out that this was an individual portion (basically a large spoonful), not an extra 500g), also the gravy they supplied amounted to around a mug-full, barely enough for 1, let alone 8! Luckily we only cared about the turkey, which was delicious, only just enough for the 8 of us though!
Anyway, I made a bucketful of roast potatoes which everyone agreed were very fine indeed, Woai ate about 1kg of them; a plate of carrots, which “John” wolfed down; 2 heads of steamed cauliflower, which everyone picked at; and a cabbage, which basically went untouched; oh, and a saucepan full of gravy! For dessert I made an apple crumble, which “John” enjoyed so much that he insisted on seconds and Debbie claimed was the finest she’d ever tasted, they don’t have them in the US apparently, they really seem most uncivilised..
While I was making the gravy I had the bright idea of dipping some bread into the boiling pot and taking a big bite, scalding the entire roof of my mouth, by the time we sat down to eat the skin from my pallet was hanging down in ribbons and I winced with pain at every mouthful. The worst was the crumble, I’d added lemon to the apples to make them a little more sour, I was so hungry I battled on but I basically got no enjoyment whatsoever from the meal, typical…
I was so busy organising everything I didn’t get round to taking any photos, fortunately Woai had brought along his setup (inluding his famous tripod) and took photos throughout the night (which I’m sure will be turning up on his blog at some point).
The highlight of the party was Secret Santa, Swiss James helped us pick the names at random and sent out emails telling us who we had to buy gifts for, we had to spend around 100 kuai and drop the gifts anonymously in a box by the door, here are some highlights:
“John” did very well with this extremely fine pair of Michael Jackson slip-ons:
And these rather splendid tiger print underpants: continue reading…
