h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

So, K and I have established our own little tradition of staying home on Christmas Eve and avoiding various bothersome relatives. This works out well. This year, we'd invited one of our friends, who has subsequently asked if another close friend of all of us, who has decided not to go home for the holiday, can come too. So I'm trying to put together a halfway decent spread of nibbles without making the whole thing too much like what we're trying to avoid.

We've got a couple different kinds of cookies, some crisp bread, rye bread, half a wheel of Bond-Ost caraway cheese (K's favorite traditional Xmas treat), pickles and pickled beets, potato chips, vegan French onion dip, multi-grain tortilla chips, edamame hummus, white bean hummus, and olives. For beverages, we have some Kinderpunsch, sparkling cranberry apple juice, and a bottle of cheap champagne. We have plenty of tea, coffee and cocoa in the pantry, just in case. And plenty of water in the fridge, of course!

For "dinner" I'm making cranberry sauce, brussels sprouts, and some baked Swedish brown beans. And dairy-free rice pudding.

I'm also planning a small veggie tray- broccoli and cauliflower florets, carrot and celery sticks.

So- does this sound like enough options? I'm sure we'll have stuff left over, and I won't go overboard, making a dozen servings of each. But I want our two guests to have stuff to choose from. Do you lot think I need to have some other sort of "main course" or does this sound good? K says he'd be content with what I've got so far, and our guests have both said that I shouldn't put myself out. But I like to be a good hostess.

Partridge? Pear tree? Lose the sprouts?

Sounds just fine. You've got more stuff than I've got for Christlyness day and I've got five people, three meaty peops and two veggies.

Caraway cheese.

I think your catering arrangements sound admirable.

I'm coming right on over, PC!

For some odd reason, we have eaten Moussaka on Christmas Eve since the very first year we were together. The only exception has been the one year since then that we spent Christmas with his family.

The MIL is queueing up to eat my first EVER turkey tomorrow night. I'm so calm it's starting to worry me.

It sounds nice PCandy. It sounds like a cozy pleasant get together indeed.

Ooh, I used to love moussaka.

Fingers & toes crossed for the turkey, ismarah. I'm sure it'll be fantastic and your MIL will love it. Let me know how it goes!

I've got a lot of the stuff out on the table, buffet style, the cranberry sauce is cooling and the rice pudding will be done in a bit. It looks like a good amount of stuff, so thank you all for alleviating my concerns (I hate to be a bad hostess but entertain so seldom!).

Hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas Eve, whatever you do and whatever you eat.

Hi, hiya, howdy!

Hi darlin'! I'm about to eat some dinner but popped on to check messages.

What have you got planned for the holiday? (And forgive me if I don't reply back till later tonight or early tomorrow AM).

I'm back on the ol' home farm. Currently snuggling the gigantic new kittycat.

We got him from the pound. He'd spent months on the street, crossing a four-lane autobahn every day to go search the bins behind the McDonald's for scraps! He's very large, and made of pure muscle.

But he's very cuddly and affectionate. A real people cat, and a good find.


Food, let's see... I just helped my mother buy gigantic amounts thereof. Much of it even looks good.

Hi y'all. I'm going to my sister's place tomorrow for a big family party. Then Christmas Day I'm going to a friend's party, and then we may try and catch a movie.

Mala, that cat sounds really sweet.

My grandmother's coming over tomorrow - my sister and her fiancé, unfortunately, have decided to spend Christmas with his mother.

Lots still to do tomorrow, like setting up our Christmas tree, so it's just potato salad and things like that for dinner - and we need to go to church, because my mother's in the choir and my sister's in the play.

Christmas Day is for recovering from Christmas Eve, and feasting. We're having raclette

And then on Boxing Day, the whole big extended family is meeting at my aunt's. There will be more feasting, and card games late into the night.



(Oh yes, and Joey really is sweet. Though he weighs nearly as much as the other three cats put together! When you pet him, he makes a noise like someone twanging a ruler on the edge of a desk And I just had to open the drawers in the wardrobe for Lili, so she could inspect them. She was quite insistent.)

Hi P/C and Season's Greetings to both you & K! Sounds like you've got it covered(the rice pudding & a cocoa/mocha would be icing on the imho)...hope things go as smoothly as I expect they will!

Hi Jaz'd (and all!).

Mala, Joey the cat sounds like a wonderful addition to the family. The poor, chubby thing. I'm glad he's found a nice family like yours to look after him.

This morning I woke up in a blind panic, afraid I've gotten *too much* food.

Last-minute jitters P/C~

He's not chubby at all, it's just pure muscle! Even his tail, it's nearly prehensile He appears to know Christmas, he loves the tree we just put up for him...

And I bought too much chocolate for it, as always. We'll be tying strings for quite a while. I'm always responsible for the , because one of the really good brands sells the mis-wrapped or simply excess ones very cheap in our cafeteria - €5.50 for two pounds!


Have fun with your guests!

One can never have *too much* chocolate.

Our Sho introduced me to an absolutely decadent Lindt bar made with a bit of chili. Last month, we went to the World Market to get the Kinderpunsch and guess what we found? Yes, the glorious chili , on sale! I bought myself six and one for my boss.

(I also discovered a company in Oregon who do fairly traded who have a South American version of chili cocoa! It's !)

I'm glad you liked it!

let me know if you ever want more - as Mala will tell you, I actually only live a spit from the Lindt factory (our train, as does hers, goes right to the town where it is)

Only... I've never actually been there!

Right now I'm enjoying the sage and onion smell coming out of the kitchen while makes the stuffing for our chicken tomorrow. It's bliss.

Which reminds me, I have bought him a special bar of chocolate. It has cheese in it...

There's a great chocolatier round the corner from me. He has a massive poster showing a family tree/timeline of chocolate. He does Chocolate with chili in and various other types. The candied ginger one is good. Even better though, he does big, big bags of what can only be described as off-cuts for £2.

My city used to smell of chocolate if the wind was in the right direction. We had a big chocolate factory here. I worked there. If the wind was in the wrong direction then the smell would be fish, or worse, tanneries. Or combinations

I heartily echo the "never have too much "! On the topic of chile pepper in , I've tried a few including Lindt with chile & cherry. I recently discovered a California company( http://www.chuaochocolatier.com )that make both a bar & a hot drinking with 2 types of chile. They specify pasilla chile but also mention cayenne pepper - possibly to denote that the fresh pasilla chile is used, bot the powdered cayenne pepper is also added. I actually tried an interesting offering from them, a 'Fireworks '. It was a 60% Venezuelan with a pinch of salt & popping candy(think Pop Rocks)...rather unique!