Christmas Eve kedgeree
Better than birthday cake
It’s funny how as you grow up and roll further into the realms of supposed adulthood (aside: at what age do you feel like a proper adult?) you increasingly gain more and more perspective on your childhood. And, for me, that is never more pertinent than at Christmas.
My endless fascination with other people’s Christmas traditions and rituals, and my subsequent questioning of anyone and everyone on the matter, has meant that over time I’ve come to realise just how special our childhood Christmases were.
The perennial felt advent calendars that made their annual descent from the attic, each little numbered stocking on the string then filled with chocolate coins. The frosty expeditions to find our carefully chosen tree, always on the look out for what we consider to be “a ballerina”. The gingerbread houses that took many hours and many piping bags to decorate, and presumably resulted in many more hours of clearing up afterwards. The evening spent unfurling and whirling lights around the tree. The smell of orange slices drying out in the bottom of the Rayburn. The steaming plates of golden kedgeree that marked Christmas Eve, which also happens to be my birthday. The joy of waking up the next morning to find reindeer dust trailed across the garden and leafy clementines buried in the toes of our stockings.
I am so grateful for all of these memories. And so grateful for the years of better-than-birthday-cake kedgeree. Thank you to the Christmas angel that is my mother.
Better-than-birthday-cake Christmas Eve kedgeree
Kedgeree has its roots in colonial India as British adaptation of the dish khichdi. This kedgeree recipe is the result of even more twists and turns in our kitchen, with leeks rather than the traditional onions (I think leeks work especially with haddock), crushed whole spices (including my favourite nigella seeds) and lots of fresh herbs (another stray from the traditional).
Serves 6