Last Minute Cheese Board for Christmas Guests

The eldest junior recipe tester has finished school. Or, more precisely, he has finished the little quiz that thousands of young adults sit at the end of it, and which the rest of us have been mentioning in increasingly imploring tones since roughly Year 9.

He is delighted to be finished. About the quiz itself he is indifferent. I have no idea if this is healthy.

Finishing comes with a run of milestones, and the one he met with by far the most enthusiasm this year was the formal. (Not the study timetable. Nor the revision notes, of which there was a distinct scarcity.) A day or two before it, the request came through:

"Could everyone come back here afterwards?"

There is a part of me that wants to be loved by my juniors. This is the normal, respectable part. But there is another part that wants to be liked. By them, and, it turns out, by their friends. I do not want to be the parent who says no.

"Here" is our house. "Everyone" was a number nobody gave me. Even after the party, I'm not entirely sure what that number was.

So I opened a very sensible internal spreadsheet and began the sums. How much sleep would I get before I had to function at work? (Not much.) What time would the party actually start? (Late.) What time am I generally asleep? (Before that.) By the third line it was clear I was not building a case for being the cool mum. I was building a case for being old. The evidence, upsettingly, was thorough.

Then the last piece dawned on me. These young people would have just finished a three course dinner. They would want to eat anyway. Again. Starting somewhere between 11.30 and 11.45pm.

An easy cheese and sweets board for last minute guests

This is what I put together, and it works just as well for the entirely planned Christmas party as for the guests nobody warned you about. Most of it is bought. It adds up to roughly enough to meet a supermarket's minimum delivery spend, so you can order it all in one go. The homemade bits went together in the gaps between photos at school and the entourage arriving. None of it needed a lot of stress.

Cheese. Choose three that you like: a soft one, a firm one, and something with a bit of bite, or a bit of mould, if you're that way inclined. As a rough guide, allow about 100g of cheese (total) per person if the board is the main event, or half that if it's a snack.

Crackers and bread. Two or three kinds of crackers (gluten free if you or your guests need them), plus sliced crusty bread. Bake-at-home rolls are the lazy way to crusty bread, and I fully endorse them.

Fruit. Different colours, different shapes, whatever is in season. I used watermelon, blueberries, strawberries and grapes. All of it can be eaten with fingers, which matters more than you'd think after 11pm. Wash it and cut the watermelon into slices. Leave the skin on so people have a handle to hold when eating.

Something chocolate. Brownies. The recipe is below.

Something sharp and sweet. Lemon curd tarts. Buy tiny tart shells and a decent jar of lemon curd from the supermarket, and spoon it in just before serving so the shells stay crisp. A blueberry on top is optional, but it looks like you tried. (Lemon curd is very easy to make yourself if you're feeling brave. No shame if you're not. Or if it's after 11pm.)

Put it all on a large-ish board or a platter, on a table, with a couple of cheese knives and very little ceremony.

Ours was demolished. Which tells you what a three course dinner is worth to a person of that age.

This is not the 11pm board. This is its bigger cousin from another party. The idea is the same.

The easiest melt and mix brownies (nut-free)

Makes about 20 decent sized pieces. One saucepan, no mixer.

• 250g butter, melted
• 200g plain flour
• 200g caster sugar
• 145g brown sugar
• 75g (¾ cup) cocoa
• 4 eggs
• ¼ tsp baking powder

Melt the butter, then mix in everything else. I use a large pyrex jug to melt the butter in, then set the jug on the scales and proceed to measure everything else in. Pour into a lined tin and bake at 160°C for 25 to 30 minutes, until the top is dry and the brownie is almost set. The middle will still be a little wet, which is the point. Cool completely in the tin before you take it out, or it will fall apart in your hands.

They freeze well, so you can make them well ahead and forget about them until someone knocks on the door.

Adapted from a Donna Hay recipe.

If you'd rather not assemble anything

Some years you want the self-assembled board. Some years you want to hand the whole day to someone else. If you're feeding the family on Christmas Day itself, or you simply cannot face the kitchen, we're cooking a three course Christmas feast for you. We hope it sustains you rather better than cheese and brownies will. Browse the Christmas Feast.

Every meal we deliver helps us cook for a family living with disability. Thank you, as always, for making that possible.