Merry Christmas one and all. We’ve left the big day behind, so it’s time to reflect on what matters most…the food!

I jest (slightly) but Christmas is our greatest feast day. A celebration to lighten the darkest of days, coming shortly after the longest night, and one to bring families and friends together. And part of that is eating an absurd amount of food.

What would Christmas be without turkey? I can already see the counterpoints and arguments. I don’t like turkey. Turkey’s too dry. It takes forever to cook.

Of course, all of these arguments are invalid if turkey is cooked properly. Yes it is a monumental piece of meat, but it doesn’t have to be as painful as many make it out. This year our turkey cooked in about 90 minutes. That’s for a 5.6kg bird. And without poisoning anyone.

I have been brining turkeys for years now. It was my custom before I learned the real way to cook a big turkey properly (something that can be extrapolated to any roast bird). Spatchcocking. No, not an activity that should be reserved for after the watershed. Spatchcocking refers to removal of the backbone and flattening of the surface of the bird. This provides a more even cooking surface with dark meat being cooked at a similar rate to the breast meat (which is normally the first to dry out). Large flat surface equals faster cooking. It’s not rocket science…it’s turkey science.

Spatchcocking also involves some light cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). Use those chest compressions to flatten the turkey, then tuck in the wing tips and you’re pretty much ready to go.

Brining adds additional water and salt to the meat improving the moisture content and protecting against the heat of the oven to an extent. I added a layer of streaky bacon for the first portion of cooking which wasn’t necessary but it was delicious, and laid the turkey on a bed of vegetables which later became part of the gravy base (and turkey stock). The turkey is often too big to fit back into the fridge in a bucket, so I put together an ice bath to keep it at a safe temperature on our unseasonably warm Christmas eve (around 10 degrees Celsius overnight, which is odd for recent times).

The backbone and most of the giblets were used to make the gravy. Nothing goes to waste at Christmas. No Bisto was harmed in the making of this delicious solution, just pressure-cooked spare parts, vegetables, and aromatics. I used roux as a thickener then added a little more cornflour at the end of the process.

Once the turkey was cooked the rest of the dinner was a breeze. I made some sausage meat stuffing with cranberries and chestnuts, and the vegetables were prepared by our regular coffee shop (Rhubarb and Mustard) which was a departure from my usual approach of doing everything myself. The potatoes and other vegetables were parboiled and ready to be finished off in the oven, and vacuum packed to keep fresh.

Off the back of the last post, I managed to finish the cassata semifreddo although it was only decorated late on Christmas day. Once set, I turned it out on a board and drizzled with melted chocolate (mixed with a tablespoon of vegetable oil) then topped with some glace cherries and marzipan fruits. The cut surface was quite appealing, showing chunks of dark chocolate, pistachio, glace cherries, and marzipan. Let’s not get away from it. This is Christmas ice cream. A more mature and indulgent Viennetta.

Games? I’m too full for that

Yes, in between the mountains of food, videogames have been peeking through. We finally completed Disco Elysium which did not disappoint, and unusually we have been playing a current game. No, not Deus Ex Mankind Divided. This was a test to see if it would be possible to stream games from the desktop upstairs to the (significantly less powerful) laptop connected to the TV downstairs. Parsec is a remote desktop application which allows for low latency remote access which I was vaguely aware of some years back, which works tremendously well. The test was a sucess, so I moved on to bigger and better things.

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle

This is about as current as you can get in gaming. Through a trial of PC Games Pass I was able to access the new Indiana Jones game, but I wanted to be able to play it on the TV for a more shared experience. Enter Parsec and low latency streaming. The quality was impressive and the whole experience was mostly lag free. There were a few jittery points, but I suspect they would be alleviated by plugging the laptop into the wired network. I am considering installing a PC permanently for this purpose as it works really well and would open up the whole Steam library.

Back to the game itself. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is a first-person action adventure game with plenty of puzzle solving. The game opens with a faithful recreation of the first scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark. It feels a little uncanny playing it through but it works really well and gets you into the shoes of Dr Jones immediately. Trekking through jungle and trying not to be killed by traps in an ancient tomb. This is exactly what an action adventure archaeology game should be. It’s not long before you’re back at the university then jetting off to the Vatican in search of a stolen cat mummy.

Stealth is quite an important part of getting around. Disguises are helpful but certain enemies can see through them, and failing everything, just start whipping people and punching the living daylights out of them. It has gotten me out of at least one sticky situation. There’s always a frying pan or shovel sitting around that can be turned into an improvised weapon.

We have only played a few hours so it remains to be seen if the story holds water, but if it carries on as it has begun, it’ll continue to be a great game.