For some people, Christmas isn’t Christmas without a turkey. For others, it’s goose or nothing.

The two birds couldn’t be more different and each requires its own cooking tactics. Goose comes with a seemingly endless supply of fat, which the cook needs to render during cooking, leaving the rich meat and crisp skin. For this reason, I prefer to cook the stuffing separately, otherwise much of the fat would end up in the stuffing.

With the meatier turkey, you need to prevent the delicate meat from drying out. By pushing the stuffing gently between breast and skin, you can protect the breast meat at the same time as imbuing it with flavour, giving every carved slice a border of stuffing just inside the skin.

So here are the ground rules for cooking goose and turkey, along with two updated stuffings. To match the nature of the birds, the goose stuffing is fruity and tangy with redcurrants to cut through the richness, while the stuffing for the turkey is rich and smooth with chestnuts.

Vegetables are less partisan, although red cabbage spiked with a little vinegar particularly suits the goose, and roasted root vegetables or a potato gratin would suit the turkey. Creamed Brussels sprouts (Rules’s creamed Brussels sprouts)go very well with either bird, along with gravy, bread sauce and relishes. Have a wonderful meal — and don’t forget to warm the plates.

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Roast goose
Feeds 6. Takes 2½ hours plus resting.

An immaculately plucked bird, of the type that Goodman’s Geese (www.goodmansgeese.co.uk) supplies (along with its liver and giblets and a tub of goose fat), makes a cook’s job so much easier. Pan-fry the liver and spread on little toasts or include it in the stuffing, and add the giblets to your stock or gravy for extra flavour. Roast potatoes in the goose fat.

1 oven-ready goose, about 4.5kg (10lb)
1 lemon, halved
Few sprigs rosemary and sage
1tsp sea salt

Remove the giblets from the goose cavity and wipe dry. Weigh the goose and allow 15 minutes cooking per 450g (1lb), ie, a 4.5kg (10lb) goose will take around 2½ hours plus resting.

Pop the lemon and herbs into the cavity, tie the legs neatly together with string and rub all over with salt. Prick well all over with a fork and place breast-side down on a rack set over a roasting pan.

Bake at 190C/Gas mark 5 for 30 minutes, then remove the goose from the oven and carefully turn breast-side up.

Cover the legs loosely with foil to avoid burning and cook for a further two hours. The goose is cooked when the juices run clear from the thickest part of the thigh when pierced with a skewer. (Put the stuffing, see below, in the oven with one hour’s cooking to go.) Pour off any rendered fat from the pan and allow it to cool and set. (You can store the rendered goose fat in the fridge for up to six months and use it for cooking potatoes and basting.) If the skin is not crisp and golden, increase the heat to 220C/Gas mark 7 for ten minutes. Remove from the oven, drain the goose cavity and rest for 20 minutes, loosely covered with foil.

To carve, first cut off the thigh at the joint, then the legs. Cut out the wishbone, then carve down either side of the breastbone. Slice the meat from the legs. Serve with stuffing and piping hot gravy.

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