Annie Walton Doyle
Gordon Ramsay has revealed the optimum time to eat your Christmas meal – and it’s left the internet divided.
It’s one of the biggest debates of the holiday season. When is the best time to eat your Christmas dinner?
Some believe it should be a lunchtime meal, while others strongly feel it’s best saved for later in the day.
However, now one authoritative voice has spoken up on the matter.
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The problem of when to eat Christmas dinner largely comes down to the north-south divide within the UK, as explained by The Independent.
For northerners, ‘dinner’ refers to their midday meal, while the evening meal is referred to as ‘tea’.
However, for southern speakers, the midday meal is called ‘lunch, the evening meal ‘dinner’, and ‘tea’ is simply a hot beverage enjoyed at any time of day.
This means that logistically speaking (and who doesn’t enjoy some Christmas logistics?) dinner can be enjoyed anytime after 12pm.
It’s usually a much larger meal than most of us would opt for on an average day, and typically represents the ‘main meal’ of the holiday, no matter what time you eat.
But now Gordon Ramsay has offered his (typically strong-worded) view on when exactly Christmas dinner should be served.
The Hell’s Kitchen star explains that life with lots of children has largely dictated his family’s Christmas eating habits.
Ramsay and his wife Tana share six children: Megan, 25, twins Holly and Jack, 23, Matilda, 22, Oscar, 4, newborn Jesse, and their late son Rocky.
Ramsay explains to Wise Living Magazine: “We’re such a big family, everyone stresses out about that time. You can’t eat that lunch too early.”
“When I hear about people eating at one o’clock,” he tells the outlet in exasperation. “You do not want to eat that much food at 1pm.”
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He also explains that this deadline creates a major time crunch, adding: “And the pressure – do you have any idea what you’ve got to do before?!”
He then offers readers the full schedule to enjoy a Christmas, Ramsay style.
“We get up late, we do the stockings, and then we’ll have scrambled egg, a little bit of smoked salmon as a treat, fresh croissant, bread or toast – a really nice, relaxed breakfast, and then we’ll focus on Christmas dinner around 5 o’clock,” he says.
Ramsey points out that doing things this way means the family ‘get out and do a walk before, go in the back garden do an activity’, before focusing on the feast.
It also allows time to properly prepare the food, cook, and dress the table in style.
“And so you look forward to this lunch/dinner, and you eat slower, and you enjoy it better,” Ramsay concludes.
We have to admit, the man is making some sense.
Just make sure you leave enough room to properly enjoy some Quality Street in front of a Christmas film later!
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