Christmas dinner for one Miriam Nice

• 3 pork chipolatas
• 1 small apple, cored, ½ grated, ½ cut into wedges

  Apple

  ap-pel

  Grown in temperate regions, apples are one of the most widely cultivated tree fruits. There are…

• 3 pecans, chopped
• 2 slices white bread, chopped into small pieces
• pinch of dried sage
• 1 skinless chicken breast
• 4 rashers streaky bacon
• 5 Brussels sprouts, trimmed

  Brussels sprouts

  bruss-ell spr-ow-t

  The quintessential Christmas dinner veg, Brussels sprouts are throught to have been cultivated…

• 2 small potatoes, quartered
• 1 medium parsnip, trimmed

  Parsnip

  par-snip

  The fact that the parsnip is a member of the carrot family comes as no surprise - it looks just…

• 1 garlic clove, sliced
• 3 bay leaves
• 2 tbsp vegetable or sunflower oil
• 250ml milk

  Milk

  mill-k

  One of the most widely used ingredients, milk is often referred to as a complete food. While cow…

• 2 cloves
• 1 shallot

  Shallot

  shal-lot

  Related to the onion (as opposed to being a younger version of it), shallots grow in clusters at…

• 2 tsp butter

  Butter

  butt-err

  Butter is made when lactic-acid producing bacteria are added to cream and churned to make an…

• 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar

  Balsamic vinegar

  bal-sam-ick vin-ee-gah

  True Balsamic vinegar is an artisan product from Modena, in Emilia Romagna, Italy, and is made…

• 250ml red wine
• 250ml beef or chicken stock (can be made with ½ stock cube)

  Beef

  bee-f

  The classic cut of meat for a British Sunday roast, beef is full of flavour, as well as being a…

To serve

• 1-2 tbsp pickled red cabbage

  Red cabbage

  red cab-idge

  A favourite winter vegetable served hot with roasted game birds but equally good as a colourful…

• 1 tsp cranberry sauce

1. Heat the oven to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Squeeze the meat from one of the chipolatas into a bowl, discarding the skin. Put the grated apple in a clean tea towel and squeeze out any excess liquid, then add to the sausagemeat with the pecans, a quarter of the bread and the sage. Season, then combine using your hands and form into a fat sausage shape. Cut a long slit in the chicken breast lengthways on one side, being careful not to cut it in half (you should be able to open it up like a book). Stuff the chicken breast with the stuffing sausage, then wrap two of the bacon rashers around it so it’s fully enclosed, securing it with a couple of cocktail sticks. 

2. Put the stuffed chicken breast in a large roasting tin. Wrap the remaining bacon rashers around the remaining chipolatas and add to the tin around the chicken.

3. Add the apple wedges, sprouts and potatoes to the roasting tin. Cut the parsnip in half lengthways and put it, cut-side down, on a chopping board. Make very thin, close cuts into the parsnip halves that go almost but not fully through – put a wooden spoon on either side of the parsnip halves to stop the knife going through, if you like. Transfer to the roasting tin with the garlic and two of the bay leaves. Drizzle over the oil and season everything with salt and pepper. Roast for 40-45 mins, or until everything is cooked through. Brush the vegetables in the oil and meat juices once or twice near the end of the cooking time. 

4. Meanwhile, pour the milk into a small saucepan with the remaining bay leaf, the cloves and shallot. Heat gently for 5-6 mins, stirring occasionally, or until the shallot is starting to soften. Strain the milk into a heatproof jug, reserving the shallot and discarding the bay leaf and cloves. Return the milk to the pan with the remaining bread and cook, stirring, until you have a thick, porridge-like sauce. Add half the butter and stir until melted, then season, remove from the heat and set aside. 

5. Slice the reserved shallot, then add to a deep frying pan with the rest of the butter. Fry until just golden, then pour in the balsamic vinegar. Continue to cook until the vinegar has reduced and is thick and sticky, then add the wine. Cook until the wine has reduced by half, then stir in the stock and bubble until the sauce is glossy and slightly thickened. 

6. Gently reheat the bread sauce. Slice half the chicken (reserving the rest for leftovers) and put on a plate with the pigs in blankets and the roast apple, sprouts, potatoes and parsnip. Drizzle over the red wine gravy and serve with the pickled red cabbage and cranberry and bread sauces on the side.