For BBC foodie presenter and host of Discovering The World’s Table, Nick Kwek, Christmas is – unsurprisingly – all about food.
“We grew up with so much food around us all the time – like, quite gluttonous,” explains Fife ambassador Nick, 34.
His parents owned the Rickshaw in Leslie, and his father, George, used to run the Wok and Spice, a Chinese-Malaysian takeaway in St Monans.
In fact, he reveals, the opening montage of his BBC programme shows a clip of his late mum serving Christmas dinner to the staff at the Rickshaw.
And with the Wok and Spice right next door to the house where he grew up, Nick can’t remember a time when he wasn’t being fed.
“Because mum and dad worked in the trade, there’d always be loads of food and we’d constantly be making stuff out of the leftovers,” he recalls.
“At Christmas – or as we call it in our house, Kwekmas – my dad used to buy the biggest turkey he could find and we’d eat it for days and days after.”
Turkey chow mein, anyone?
Perhaps a common experience for the average Scottish family – but these were no commonplace turkey pieces, Nick insists.
“Because my dad’s a chef, he’d make it into delicious things. He’d make a turkey chow mein, take the turkey and fry it with noodles and soy, and garlic or chilli. And we’d have turkey curry with rice.
“You knew that you were on day seven of eating turkey when the curry was made,” he adds brightly, “because curry was originally intended to mask meat going off!”
A huge fan of a traditional Christmas dinner – “one of my favourite foods in the whole world is a roast potato” – Nick admits his dad’s Eastern cooking techniques didn’t always impress the Scottish side of the family on the big day.
“Because my dad is from the East, he didn’t really have experience cooking roast turkey and the trimmings. And what I found funny was that instead of roasting potatoes, he would deep fry them.
“Just like he’d do prawn crackers or spare ribs or banana fritters in the takeaway. So it was funny to see his Chinese takeaway approach to cooking Christmas dinner, which raised the eyebrows considerably of my mum’s relatives, who were all from Fife.
“Dad would say: ‘Don’t ask, just eat!’”
‘If you don’t serve prawn cocktail, we’re not coming’
This Christmas, Nick and his wife Andrea will be hosting the Kweks – George and his girlfriend, plus Nick’s sister Caroline and Natalie and their families – for the first time in their new home, over in East Lothian.
Nick is doing all the cooking – including “canapes, turkey, stuffing, oven-roasted carrots, Brussels sprouts with chestnuts, cranberries, fresh sage and toasted almond flakes, roast potatoes – done in goose fat, not deep fried – chipolatas, parsnip puffs” and something called a chestnut patty.
And to say he is nervous would be an understatement.
“Oh I am 100% under pressure,” he says, at his customary million miles per hour.
“It’s not just my dad – my sister Natalie owns a wildly successful cafe and bakery (The Haven) and Caroline is a food influencer (The Ultimate Feeder) so the heat is on!
“We’re already having arguments over WhatsApp about what I’m going to be doing. And Caroline said: ‘If you don’t serve prawn cocktail, we’re not coming!’
“This is how strongly the Kweks feel about food. With us, it’s all about the food – we don’t care about anything else.”
So will he be serving the prawn cocktail?
“Oh yes, the classic 1970s kind out of crystal glasses. Because why not?”
Nick Kwek presents Discovering The World’s Table, available to watch on BBC iPlayer.
Conversation