delicious taste test: Christmas special

Smoked salmon
What we want from smoked salmon:

• A good balance of smokiness Smoke should enhance the fish, not overpower it.
• A non-oily surface If the surface is slimy, the smoked salmon hasn’t been prepared properly. Good fish is salted or brined to draw out moisture, then air-dried over smouldering wood, to give it a silky texture.
• Nothing bright orange! Good smoked salmon varies in colour from pink to reddish-brown, depending on the cure and how long it’s smoked for. But it is never, ever, bright orange.

Winner: John Ross Jr (Aberdeen) Ltd Traditional Scottish Smoked Scottish Salmon, £5.99 for 200g.

Waitrose Atlantic salmon fished from Scottish waters, prepared by hand and cold-smoked over beech and oak in brick kilns. Creamy, sea-salty and rich – the quintessential smoked salmon, glorious in its simplicity.

We also liked: Waitrose Select Farm Scottish Salmon Smoked over Peat and Heather, £5.99 for 140g.

This won our votes last year, too. The salmon are fit and healthy because they swim against the constant tides in the Orkneys and Shetlands. The combination of peat, heather, birch and sweet gale is like a smoky November bonfire in your mouth.

Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference Isle of Skye Responsibly Sourced Birch & Juniper Smoked Salmon, £4.29 for 120g.

These fish are slow-reared in fast-flowing waters on farms around the Isle of Skye in northwest Scotland. Smoked over birch and juniper for a really aromatic flavour, each slice is finished with an edge of black pepper.
 

Christmas puddings
What we want from Christmas puddings:

• Depth of flavour Whether you go for dark, 19th-century recipes or lighter puds that suit the modern palate, they should all have good flavours in common. Time equals taste, so look for a pudding that’s been matured for at least six months.
• Moistness, not fattiness If the pudding contains the right amount of fruit and alcohol, it won’t be dry. But cheaper brands often add fat – over and above the suet (most often vegetarian) – for flavour.

Winner: The Co-operative Truly Irresistible Christmas Pudding, £5.49 for 454g.

This was our favourite in 2008, and we feel it deserves a second year at the top. Rich in seasonal dried fruits that have been generously bathed in cider, brandy, rum and sherry, it’s fabulously moist, thanks to six months of maturing.

We also liked: Marks & Spencer Connoisseur Matured Christmas Pudding, £9.99 for 907g.

Are there any other Christmassy ingredients that could be stirred into this six-month-old pudding? We think not. Full of Dickensian darkness and fine flavour.

Mince pies
What we want from mince pies

• Less decoration, better pastry A dusting of icing sugar and pretty decorations can’t disguise bad pastry. Misleading photos don’t help, either. If only you could eat the box.
• A full pie A fruit filling right to the top, please, with no sugary syrup to bulk it out – there’s no excuse for all that air.

Winner: Marks & Spencer Deep Filled Connoisseur Mince Pies, £2.99 for 6

Nicely spiced raisins, apples and almonds, and someone let the bottles slip when they stirred in the brandy, cognac and port. They’re made with all-butter shortcrust pastry and are on the large side, too, which is never a bad thing.

We also liked: Waitrose Mini Star Mince Pies, £2.99

For 12 Melt-in-the-mouth pastry, made with oils rather than animal fat, encloses a nice, apple-rich mincemeat. Their dinky size means it won’t be a blow-out if you eat them with the pudding.

Christmas cakes
What we want from Christmas cakes

• Great cake It’s obvious, and a simple enough requirement, yet although all the cakes were reasonably moist, many lacked flavour, which is a crime when you consider how much fruit and booze is supposed to go into them.
• Tasteful decoration Those are two words not often used alongside Christmas cake. The smooth-iced cakes are pretty to a point, while the fruit and nut-topped ones border on the bizarre. It’s virtually impossible to cut through the helmet of huge, sticky whole fruit and nuts but, underneath, there is at least some good cake.

Winner: Waitrose Marzipan Fruits Cake, £22 for about 2kg.

As smooth and even as freshly fallen snow, the soft fondant icing and marzipan are dreamy together. And yes, the dinky fruit decorations are rather twee, but then it is Christmas, when good taste is often seen flying out of the window. The cake is pleasing, too: rich, moist – and big.

We also liked: Tesco Finest Fruit & Nut Cluster Cake, £9 for 1kg.

Top-drawer whole walnuts, brazils, almonds, shiny red cherries and whole apricots all jostle for a place on top of this golden cake, which is springy with dried fruit and spices.

Cheese biscuit boxes
What we want from cheese biscuit selection boxes:

• Crispness If the different flavours are wrapped separately in cellophane, that helps keep them fresher. The snag is, you’ll have to eat all of one kind first.

Winner: Marks & Spencer West Country Biscuits for Cheese, £2.79 for 300g.

These taste even better than they did last year, when they got top marks from our judges. There are tangy-sharp, Cheddar-topped onion seed biscuits, which are good enough to eat on their own; fragrant rosemary rounds; and, for something a little less showbiz, excellent wheat thins.

We also liked: The Co-operative Biscuits for Cheese, £1.75 for 300g.

We like the retro style of this generous selection of eight biscuits, with traditional names such as sesame carlton; poppy and sesame thin; and wheatsheaf digestive. There’s a flavour and texture to match any kind of cheese you’re serving.

Stilton
What we want from Stilton

• The genuine article You simply can’t go wrong with Stilton because the six dairies in the counties of Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire that are licensed to make it, all produce superb cheese, always from locally produced milk. And the cheeses are always turned rather than pressed.
• Good veining Those blue-grey veins are responsible for giving blue Stilton its distinctively pungent flavour (its strength depends on how long the cheese has matured). The veins should radiate out evenly from the middle of the cheese.

Winner: Cropwell Bishop Blue Stilton, £14.49 per kg, Waitrose.

It’s the smoothness of this award-winning cheese that marks it out. Creamy but still with that metallic kick, it’s made in the Vale of Belvoir on the Nottinghamshire/Lincolnshire border. Eat less dinner so you can eat more of this.

We also liked: Marks & Spencer Mature Blue Stilton, £2.39 for 330g.

Tuxford & Tebbutt in Nottinghamshire – another award-winning creamery – has matured this handsome cheese so it combines a full, rich taste with a crumbly texture.