A Traditional English Dinner Learn about Christmas in England from the children who live in Britain why do what we do at chrsitmas time

The is the main Christmas meal and is traditionally eaten at mid-day or early afternoon on Christmas Day in England, and also in the rest of Britain. © copyright of projectbritain.com

The Traditional Christmas Dinner

A traditional English and British Christmas dinner includes roast turkey or goose, brussels sprouts, roast potatoes, , rich nutty , tiny sausages wrapped in bacon (pigs in a blanket) and lashings of hot gravy. © copyright of projectbritain.com For pudding (dessert) we eat a rich, fruity pudding which is doused in flaming brandy – said to ward off evil spirits. This rich, fruity pudding is called the . Follow this link to read more about the Christmas pudding

Photographs of food eaten

Roast Turkey covered in bacon Roast Potatoes

Pigs in a Blanket (sausages wrapped in bacon) Brussels Sprouts and chestnuts Parsnips and Swede

Roasted Gammon

Ginger Bread Stuffing

by Nigella Lawson from Nigella's Christmas Kitchen

(Recipe)

Stuffing

Bread Sauce (recipe) Cranberry Sauce ( recipe) A Turkey Wishing Tradition

A Christmas tradition involving the turkey is to pull its wishbone. This is one of the bones of the turkey which is shaped like the letter 'Y'. Two people will each hold an end and pull. The person left with the larger piece of the bone makes a wish. copyright of projectbritain.com

Christmas Crackers

Traditionally a Christmas cracker is placed next to each plate on the Christmas dinner table. When the crackers are pulled, out falls a colourful party crown, a toy or gift and a festive joke. (Click here to find out more about crackers)

Interesting Fact about a Christmas Dinner One notable medieval English Christmas celebration featured a giant, 165-pound pie. The giant pie was nine feet in diameter. Its ingredients included 2 bushels of flour, 20 pounds of butter, 4 geese, 2 rabbits, 4 wild ducks, 2 woodcocks, 6 snipes, 4 partridges, 2 neats' tongues, 2 curlews, 6 pigeons and 7 blackbirds.

It is said that Henry VIII was the first English King to enjoy turkey. However, it wasn't until early 20th century that eating turkey became fashionable at Christmas.

What is a Christmas Cracker? A Christmas Cracker is a brightly coloured paper tube, twisted at both ends. A person pulls on each end of the cracker and when the cracker breaks, a small chemical strip goes “Pop” and the contents fall out. copyright of projectbritain.com

Christmas Cracker on a plate Crackers are very traditional items to have at Christmas. What is inside a Christmas Cracker? A Christmas cracker traditionally contains a paper crown, a small gift and a joke written on a slip of paper. The gift in a cracker depends on how much you have paid for the cracker.The more you pay the better the quality of the gift. A box of 12 crackers costing £10 could come with gifts such as a shoe horn, compact mirror, playing cards, screwdrivers, address book, tape measure, pad lock, bottle opener, tweezers, travel chess, photo frame and pen.© copyright of projectbritain.com How to pull a cracker The traditional way to pull a cracker is crossing your arms and ..

... pulling a whole circle of crackers around the table.

Everyone holds their cracker in their right hand and pulls their neighbours cracker with the free left hand. Why do we wear king's paper crowns? We wear paper hats on special occasions like Christmas Day and birthday parties. The tradition of wearing hats at parties goes back to the Roman celebrations (celebrated around 25 December) when the participants also wore hats. © copyright of projectbritain.com

The idea of wearing a paper crown may have originated from the celebrations, where a King or Queen was appointed to look over the proceedings. copyright of projectbritain.com

The paper crown hats we wear today are found inside the Christmas crackers. right of projectbritain.com

History of Christmas Crackers Who invented the Christmas Cracker? Christmas crackers were invented by Thomas Smith in 1846. During a visit to Paris he came across the bob-bon, a sugar almond wrapped in tissue paper (with a twist either side of the centrally placed sweet). Thomas decided to try selling similarly wrapped sweets in the lead up to Christmas in England. His bon-bons sold well at Christmas but not at other times of the year. In the early 1850s Thomas came up with the idea of including a motto with the sweet. As many of his bon-bons were bought by men to give to women, many of the mottos were simple love poems. © copyright of projectbritain.com In about 1860, Thomas added the banger, two strips of chemically impregnated paper that made a loud noise on being pulled apart. At first these novelties were called 'cosaques', but they soon became known as 'crackers'. Unfortunately for Thomas, his 'cracker' idea was copied by other manufactures and so he decided to replace the sweet with a surprise gift. © copyright of projectbritain.com When Thomas died his two sons took over the business. The paper hat was added to the cracker the early 1900s and by the end of the 1930s the love poems had been replaced by jokes or limericks. © copyright of projectbritain.com