To complete the Christmas meal, I made 3 simple side dishes - Spicy Pork Stuffing, Roast Potatoes with Chilli and Tumeric, and Green Bean Salad with Mustard Vinaigrette. These are classic accompaniments to turkey but I’ve tried to add some modern touches to the recipes.
Spicy Pork Stuffing
300g minced pork
150g chorizo, or 2 sausages decased
Half an onion, finely diced
3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 apple, peeled and grated
Bunch of parsley, roughly chopped
Handful of walnuts, crushed
Half cup of panko bread crumbs
1 Tablespoon olive oil
Lemon zest
Salt & pepper
Using one-third chorizo in the stuffing gives it distinctive, smokey flavours, while the apple and lemon zest cuts through the meatiness. I couldn’t find any fresh sage in Singapore supermarkets and dried just won’t work in this recipe, so I used some fresh Italian parsley instead. I also prefer the lighter panko over standard white breadcrumbs that’s used in most other stuffing recipes.
What to do
Sweat onions ? in some olive oil for about 10mins. Add garlic and cook for another 5mins. Set aside to cool.
Combine minced pork and decased chorizo in a large bowl. Mix in apple, cooled onion and garlic mixture, herbs, walnuts, olive oil and lemon zest. Season with salt & pepper.
Mix in panko a little bit at a time, checking to make sure the mixture isn’t too dry. You should still be able to squeeze the stuffing into a ball.
Place stuffing onto a sheet of tinfoil, roll tightly, and twist the ends. Bake in oven at 200°C (or 400°F) for 45mins.
Roast Potatoes with Chilli and Tumeric
Recipe from Gordon Ramsay’s Ultimate Christmas Dinner
6 to 8 potatoes, cut into quarters
3 Tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon chilli flakes
1 teaspoon ground tumeric
Salt & pepper
What to do
Boil potato quarters in pot of salted water for 10mins. Drain water and put potatoes back into pot to steam for another 5mins.
Place potatoes into oven tray and season with chilli, tumeric, olive oil, and salt & pepper. Toss to coat and roast at 200°C (or 400°F) for 45mins.
To make the roast potatoes extra tasty, I used excess fat from the roast turkey instead of olive oil. If you don’t have turkey fat handy, add some butter instead. While the turkey was resting, I put the roast potatoes and stuffing into the oven at the same time since they require roughly the same temperature and time.
Green Beans with Mustard Vinaigrette
Bunch of green beans, ends removed
2 teaspoons French mustard
1 garlic clove, minced
Quarter red onion, finely diced
Handful of green olives, finely diced
Zest and juice of 1 lemon
60ml olive oil
Italian parsley, finely chopped
Walnuts, finely chopped
What to do
Boil green beans in pot of salted water for 5mins. Drain water and drop beans into ice water immediately to stop the cooking process.
Combine mustard, garlic, red onion, olive, lemon zest and juice in a bowl. Slowly add in olive, stirring constantly to emulsify ? the dressing.
Pour dressing over beans and toss to coat. Season with salt & pepper to taste. Garnish with chopped parsley and walnuts before serving.
I made the dressing about an hour before serving but I waited until about 15mins before to boil the green beans. This way they’ll be served slightly warm but still crisp and crunchy due to the ice water bath. I listened to Jamie Oliver and dressed the beans as soon as possible so they’ll soak up all the lemon and mustard flavours.