My local Co-Op have already started stocking mince pies. So far I'm resisting the temptation to get a pack on the principle that it's only bloody September and an upstanding Brit I should join in the fight against this relentless commercialisation that happens earlier and earlier every winter, but I feel I might just be cutting my nose off to spite my face. I fucking love mince pies.

This year can we be a bit more creative with Autistic Andy please?

>>11807
Cweative Cwissmuss?

I think I'm more excited about Gotta Be Andrew than I am about my inevitable depressed-double-dinners with my separated parents. In fact, I know I am.

Sageru because it's only bloody September!!!

>>11809
Go on, lad. Regale us with tales of depressing Christmases past.

>>11806
Mate, it's either Cooplands brandy butter mince pies or nothing.

>>11810

Maybe in a few months, schadenfreudlad.

>>11811
You've clearly never tried Duchy Originals. My family were gifted some once by a couple of very well off lawyers; I've never tasted a better shop-bought mince pie since. The plan this year is to resist all other supermarket brands and go straight for the royalty-approved luxury; if the quality has changed since I last had them I'll be very distraught.

>>11810

Not him, but you can have some of mine if you want.

When I was a teenlad squaddie, my first Yule tide leave consided with my alcoholic semi-PTSD dad becoming a born again Christian. No serious person on person violence took place, but lots of other things were damaged. I remember a big foot sized hole being kicked through a pretty sturdy door and a small fire in the conservatory. This was accidental rather than arson. It was like an Eastenders special, but upper middle-class and sad rather than entertaining.

After getting married, I used that as an excuse to have less family time at Christmas, but going to Liverpool to spend time with my mother in law. This was on some level perfect for me, but less so my ex as it would basically involve her mother fussing over me, me averaging two pints of Scotch per night and listening to her drone on about various groups that she felt were ruining the country, generally Inuits and homos. It was as if /pol/ posts were being read by a Scouse Barbara Windsor.

My dad buys hundreds after Christmas. Hundreds and hundreds.

I spotted some in the Tesco bakery last night. Best before next Friday. I can kind of understand the boxed stuff, but this?

>>11816
I've only tried non-Aldi/Lidl stollen a couple of times, most recently M&S, but it's a shite imitation.

I'm on my second box of Lidl stollen since Sunday.

>>11805
I wouldn't get any of that German filth. I hear their stollen are lebkuchen are fitted with so-called "Defeat Devices", to detect when their raisin or ginger levels are being tested.

>>11815

Dr Ben Goldacre is obsessed with Christmas cake. He has an extra freezer that he uses just for Christmas cake. He buys square ones from M&S so he can pack them in more densely.

Think about that next time he's condemning the pharmaceutical industry.

>>11818
I think I see what you did there.

>>11819

The man knows what he wants, and he knows how to get it. It makes sense to me.

Lidl are selling Thai red curry sauce that's suitable for vegetarians. It's the first jar I've seen in supermarkets without fish in it.

I'm not impressed with Aldi's "specially selected" mince pies. The top is far too detachable and the filling was a bit bland, plus there wasn't enough of it.

4/10.

I'm working my way through a box of stollen just now, it helps with the crippling anxiety.

>>11840
That's what brandy is for.

>>11841
Dipping the stollen in brandy is the way to go.

>>11842
Brandy butter. You mean brandy butter.

>>11843

I prefer vodka margarine.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gy0HGvCa978

Bloody hell, chaps. It's only eight more weeks until Christmas. Better start planning on ram-raiding Iceland for vol au vents before all the other bastards get the chance.

>>11845

Eight weeks is still 8/52, or around 15.4%, which is not a negligible chunk of year you're dismissing, there.

>>11846
It is nevertheless a pretty busy time for shopping. In the city where I used to live, pretty much all the way through December the queues to get into the main Tesco backed up onto the main road and tailed back some considerable distance. Where I now live now, the queues near Morrisons at rush hour are pretty nasty, and combined with the Asda across the road causes tailbacks upwards of a mile in early December.

Aldi's Christmas tree pretzels are lovely. It's just a shame there's little other reason to go there, although they have clementines on special buy so I got a 2kg box for £2.