Perfect Christmas Day: 15 Essential Recipes for the Perfect Christmas (Penguin Specials)

Penguin Specials are designed to fill a gap. Written to be read over a long commute or a short journey, they are original and exclusively in digital form.

Christmas dinner is perhaps the one meal of the year where even the most relaxed cook feels the pressure of perfection – and, although few menus can be more familiar, it’s probably the one we all feel the least confident about.

Cooking Christmas dinner can be stressful, but there’s no need to rifle through recipe books, or frantically Google turkey cooking times on Christmas morning as Felicity Cloake has tried and tested recipes from all the greats – from Nigella Lawson and Simon Hopkinson to Delia Smith and Mrs Beeton – and pulled together the best points from each to come up with the ultimate Christmas Day recipe collection.

Based on Felicity’s popular Guardian column, Perfect Christmas Day combines invaluable prepping and cooking tips to calm the most frazzled of festive souls and, of course, fifteen delicious recipes. From mulled wine, blinis, stilton soufflés and the perfect prawn cocktail to turkey and gravy, stuffing, sprouts, roast potatoes, pigs-in-blankets, nut roast, and cranberry and bread sauce, to trifle, mince pies and brandy butter, Perfect Christmas Day is all you need to prepare the perfect Christmas dinner.