IT'S THE WEEKEND: Food and drink - Christmas recipes to give your festive feast some fizz

Beetroot, Raisin & Stem Ginger Pudding

Serves 6

Preparation time: 15 minutes

Cooking time: 3 hours

You’ll need:

3tbsp golden syrup

100g vegetable suet

80g dark brown sugar

100g raisins

50g wholemeal breadcrumbs

50g self raising flour

1tsp ground mixed spice

125g plain cooked (vacuum packed) beetroot, drained

3 eggs

100g stem ginger, finely chopped

To serve:

Custard

You will also need:

1 ½ pint pudding basin, well greased with butter

Baking paper, string & tin foil

What to do:

1. Pour the golden syrup into the greased pudding basin and set aside.

2. In a large bowl, mix the suet, sugar, raisins, breadcrumbs, flour and mixed spice.

3. Puree the beetroot in a food processor, add the eggs and blend together well. Pour into the mixing bowl, along with the stem ginger, and stir thoroughly.

4. Pour the mix into the pudding basin and pat well down with the back of a spoon. Cover with a layer of baking paper and tie securely with string, then cover with a double layer of foil.

5. Carefully lower the pudding into a large pan of hot water, ensuring the water comes no further than half way up the basin. Cover with a lid and simmer gently for 3 hours, checking every now and then that there is plenty of water in the pan, topping up if necessary.

6. Carefully take the pudding out of the pan, remove the foil and greaseproof and invert onto a serving plate. Serve with custard, crème fraiche or vanilla ice cream.

Pink Lady apple and mincemeat tarts

Serves: 12

Preparation time: 30 minutes plus chilling

Cooking time: 15-20 minutes

You’ll need

1 x 375 g pack ready rolled sweet shortcrust pastry

200g mincemeat

1 Pink Lady Apple, cored and finely diced

25g dried cranberries

icing sugar to dust

What to do

Preheat the oven to 200°C/180°C fan oven/gas mark 6. Unroll the pastry onto a clean board. Using a 7 cm cutter stamp out 12 circles and use to line a bun tin. Put in the fridge for 30 minutes. Reserve the pastry trimmings.

Meanwhile in a bowl mix together the mincemeat, diced apple and dried cranberries. Spoon a little of the apple mincemeat into each pastry case.

Using the pastry trimmings stamp out 12 small star or heart shapes. Put a star or heart on the top of each mincemeat tart. Bake in the oven for 15- 20 minutes until lightly golden and cooked.

Leave to cool for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack and dust with icing sugar. Serve warm or cold.

Roasted Turkey with Shallot Stuffing with Fresh Sage

Preparation Time; 15 minutes

Cooking Time; 90 minutes

You’ll need:

5kg free-range Totally Traditional Turkey

4 tbsp rapeseed oil

Sea salt and black pepper

For the stuffing:

75g butter

2 tbsp rapeseed oil

8 shallots, peeled and finely chopped

3 cloves of garlic, peeled and finely chopped

250g dried figs, chopped into small cubes

2 small eating apples

250g fresh breadcrumbs

3 tbsp fresh sage leaves, chopped

750g sausage meat

3tbsp of parsley, chopped

1 large egg beaten

Sea salt and black pepper

What to do:

Preheat oven to 230°C/Gas Mark 8

Remove turkey giblets and reserve. Rinse the turkey inside and out and dry well.

Place the turkey in a large roasting pan, brush the turkey generously with rapeseed oil and season with sea salt and black pepper and cover with foil.

Place the prepared turkey in the pre-heated oven and cook at this temperature for the first 30 minutes. Then, lower the oven temperature to 180°C/Gas Mark 4 and cook for approximately 30 minutes per kilo, basting every hour.

To prepare the stuffing, heat the butter and rapeseed oil until the butter has melted. Add the shallot and fry gently until well softened but not browned. Stir in the garlic and season well with sea salt and black pepper. Remove from the heat and place in a bowl, leave to cool.

Peel the apples, cut into quarters, remove the core and cut into small cubes. Mix the figs, apples, breadcrumbs, sage, sausage meat and parsley with the shallots, season well with sea salt and black pepper using clean hands and then mix in the beaten egg. The mixture should be quite firm, with wet hands, mould the stuffing into balls the size of a golf ball.

Place on a greased baking sheet and bake in the pre-heated oven for about 20 minutes, until golden brown and cooked through. Alternatively you can use the mixture to stuff an onion, per person, and place the rest of the mixture into an ovenproof dish to cook.

Take one small onion per person and peel, leaving the top of the onion intact and the base root in place. Peel and boil, whole, in salted boiling water for 8-10 minutes, until just soft, drain and cool in cold water. Drain and cut the top off the onion, about three quarters of the way up, so as to make a lid. Using a sharp knife, hollow out the onion and stuff with the stuffing mixture, replace the lid and brush all over with rape seed oil. Bake for 30-35 minutes in the oven alongside the turkey until cooked through and slightly caramelised.

When the turkey is approximately 35 minutes before the end of cooking, remove the foil, drain off any of the excess fat and cook for a further 35 minutes or until golden brown.

Transfer the turkey to a platter and cover loosely with foil and leave to rest for 20-30 minutes.

Serve the turkey carved with stuffing balls or stuffed onions and gravy.

Savoury baked Pink Lady apples with Sunday roast pork shoulder

Pink Lady apples, stuffed with herbs and nuts, a savoury version of the more classic sweet baked apples. A great, slightly posher take on apple sauce for a celebration Sunday roast pork dinner.

Serves: 4 - 6

Prep time: 25 minutes

Cooking time: for the apples - 40 minutes / for the pork - 2 hours & 10 minutes, plus 20 minutes resting.

You will need

for the pork:

Approx. 2kg pork shoulder joint (bone out)

A little olive oil

Salt & freshly ground black pepper

for the baked apples:

1 onion, finely chopped

1 tbsp olive oil

25g butter

2 rashers smoked streaky bacon, finely diced

2 tbsp finely chopped sage leaves

Salt & freshly ground black pepper

40g walnuts, chopped

4 small-medium Pink Lady apples

What to do

Pre-heat the oven to 220°C. Lay the pork joint in a roasting tin and rub all over with a little olive oil. Season with salt and pepper. Roast in the hot oven for 30 minutes.

Turn the heat down to 160°C and continue to roast for further 1 hour and 40 minutes (for a 2 kg joint). If your joint weighs more or less, simply roast at the hot temperature for 30 minutes, then roast at the lower temperature for 25 minutes per kg. Once cooking time has finished, remove the pork, wrap loosely in tin foil and allow to rest for 20 minutes before carving.

Once the pork is roasting in the oven, start the apples. In a small frying pan, gently sweat the onion with the olive oil, butter, bacon and sage, seasoning well with salt & freshly ground black pepper. Allow to soften over a low heat for around 15 minutes, stirring occasionally until the onion is lightly caramelized.

While the onion is cooking, prepare the apples. Slice the top off each apple, cutting about 1 cm from the top, and score a fine line through the skin all around the middle of each. Using a melon baller, sturdy teaspoon or small knife, carefully scoop and hollow out the core and a little of the surround apple, leaving you with a walnut-sized cavity. Finely chop the excess apple from the core and add to the frying pan, along with the walnuts and fry for a further 5 minutes.

Place the apples in a snug cluster in a small baking dish and spoon the filling into the hollows, packing it down quite firmly. Top each with the cut off apple top, creating a lid. 20 minutes before the pork is due to be done, slide the apples into the oven and bake 40 minutes until soft when pierced with a skewer.

Streamline black cherry mulled red cabbage

This intriguing twist on a classic makes preparing the perfect accompaniment to a roast really quick and simple.

Serves: 6

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 1 hour

You’ll need:

500g red cabbage

3 echalion shallots

2 Pink Lady apples

knob of salted butter

2 clementines

10 cloves

1 cinnamon stick

2 tsp mixed spice

100ml red wine vinegar

4tbsp Streamline black cherry jam

salt and black pepper

What to do:

Finely slice the cabbage, shallots and apples. In a large casserole, heat the butter then tip in the sliced cabbage, shallots and apples and toss well. Add the zest and juice of one clementine, stud the other clementine with cloves and add it to the pan along with the cinnamon, mixed spice, vinegar and black cherry jam. Season, stir and put the lid on.

Cook on a low heat for an hour until the cabbage is tender, stirring occasionally. If the mixture gets a little dry, add a dash of water. Serve hot or cold.

Streamline orange and thyme glazed carrots

These luxuriously sticky, fragrant carrots are a great way of livening up a traditional roast dinner or to spice up leftovers.

Serves: 4

Preparation time: 5 minutes

Cooking time: 10 minutes

You’ll need:

400g Chantenay or baby carrots

2 tsp cumin seeds

2 tbsp Streamline thin cut orange marmalade

1 tsp soy sauce

3-4 stalks thyme, leaves picked

salt and black pepper

What to do:

Boil or steam the carrots until tender.

Heat a frying pan and dry fry the cumin seeds for a moment or two until they become fragrant. Stir in the thin cut orange marmalade, soy sauce and 1 tablespoon of water until the marmalade has melted into a glaze.

Drain the carrots and toss them in the glaze until they look glossy.

Sprinkle over the thyme leaves and season. Continue to toss until everything is well coated, then pour into a serving dish.

Tenderstem Broccoli Tossed in Butter with Chestnuts, Black Pepper and Pancetta

Serves: 4

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 10 minutes

You’ll need:

400g Tenderstem broccoli cut into 2″ strips

50g unsalted butter

75g pancetta lardons

200g chestnuts roughly chopped

Salt and cracked black pepper

What to do:

1. Bring a medium sized pan of salted water to the boil, add the Tenderstem and cook for 30 seconds. Drain, then cool under cold running water and set aside.

2. Heat a medium sized frying pan then add the butter and lardons. Cook until the lardons start to release some fat and turn golden brown, about 5 minutes.

3. Add the chestnuts and Tenderstem. Cook for a further 2 minutes, season with salt, plenty of pepper and serve immediately.