Amongst all the madness of cooking at Christmas, it can be easy to focus so much on the main elements of your roast dinner that you end up forgetting about gravy and leaving it until the very last minute. However, a good sauce or gravy is key for bringing all the elements on the plate together and should be given just as much thought as the rest. These are some of our favourite festive sauce recipes.
Any decent gravy should be made using the juices left from cooking the meat to give it plenty of flavour, and in this recipe Dominic Chapman uses the leftover fat from his roast turkey. By adding red wine, vegetables and stock to the juices before reducing it all down, you're guaranteed a lovely thick gravy that's packed full of flavour.
Charlie Hibbert's cranberry sauce isn't just delicious, it's also very quick and easy to make, meaning it's a no-brainer at Christmas. He chooses to add red wine vinegar and the zest and juice of an orange, providing some extra tang.
Whilst this may not technically be a sauce in itself, a beautiful goose stock can be reduced down to create an incredible gravy to serve alongside a Christmas goose. A great way of extracting every last bit of flavour from a goose carcass, Charlie Hibbert suggests you boil it for over five hours for maximum flavour. Perfect if you're following his recipe for the ultimate Christmas goose.
The idea of turning bread into a sauce must have seemed like madness when the idea was first thought up, but the comforting richness of bread sauce has rightly become a staple of a Christmas dinner. Dominic Chapman seasons his with freshly grated nutmeg and a bay leaf to give it a warm, wintery flavour.
