Last night I watched the double helping of Nigella’s Christmas Kitchen followed by Jamie Cooks Christmas and I have to say, I believe Nigella won in terms of content and general Christmassy enthusiasm. By the end of her shows, I was convinced that even a culinarily challenged cook like myself could knock out a passable turkey on the big day.

Nigella waxed lyrical and lovingly about her recipes, often appearing tousled and dressed in a silky dressing gown to simulate those Christmas Day early morning dashes into the kitchen between gifts to do obscene things to turkey.

But it was very convincing and it was difficult not to succumb to sharing her excitement about the turkey bath of spices and fruits – even though I was disturbed to see her ‘protecting’ the bucket in which she’d placed the turkey with a skateboard – and her gingerbread stuffing. I can’t imagine that Jamaica Ginger cake and pork make good bedfellows stuffingwise but I’m tempted to give it a go!

I also liked the look of her gravy and while I usually just dump the giblets in the bin, I plan this year to cook up a stock using them and daringly add it to the Bisto for a more homemade flavour. I’m not brave enough to not use Bisto at all… that’s just a step too far for me, but it’s got to be an improvement to make it with stock instead of just boiling water hasn’t it?

And I think that’s what made Nigella’s show a winner over Jamie’s; she made me believe in the Christmas miracle… a well presented, well cooked dinner is attainable, even to mere mortals like me who normally consider that a home cooked meal means personally microwaving stuff.

Yes, Jamie had some great recipes but they were all about what to do with turkey leftovers, which was just plain dull to be honest. I wanted to hear how to create a marvellous Christmas Day table, not how best to make the most of dark turkey meat. There was one very funny scene in Jamie’s show though when he conned his Italian friend into eating popcorn laced with xxx hot chilli flakes.

Jamie couldn’t speak for laughing as his friend gasped for air and his eyes bugged out of his head while he gagged, and it really was pretty funny to be fair. So I guess for humour value, Jamie won on points there.

However, Nigella wooed me again with her talk of perfect roasters and how to make cranberry sauce from scratch. I usually buy it in a jar but I just might make it myself; it looked very easy… but there, I’ve been conned like that before – http://primetime.unrealitytv.co.uk/are-you-intimidated-by-celeb-chefs-at-christmas/ – but even still, Nigella’s recipes last night were far more exciting than Jamie’s.

I was quite shocked to see though that Nigella didn’t prepare any mashed potatoes nor did she make pigs in blankets which I thought were compulsory for Christmas dinners? Nor did she make apple sauce which I always do and was hoping for some tip about, but no, so nil points there Nigella I’m afraid. However, nor did Jamie make any of those things, so that point was a tie.

Jamie did make what looked to be beautiful truffles though and they looked very easy to make however his caveat about not heating it all up too much or else it’d separate made me just know that if I tried to make it, it’d all separate, so I’ll stick to buying mine pre-made.

I have to say too that though Jamie did cook up some indulgences, Nigella seemed to be actively intent on giving her family a coronary as well as a lunch. She used about six tonnes of butter in everything and enough alcohol and cream to guarantee that even the children at the table would be both drunk and have furring of the arteries by the time the coffee was served. Still, Christmas is all about over indulging so again, Nigella won on points for most unhealthy – but best tasting – food over Jamie’s quite healthy turkey and leek pie.

My joint criticism of them both however was the liberal use of spices and stuff that I’ve never heard of, and a quick squizz on Tesco’s website revealed that they didn’t stock them, but I plan to improvise and just put a lot more of the things I do have into any recipes I’m tempted to try. Some of the things they used looked pretty gross too; in fact, one spice that both of them used looked alarmingly like a dead spider so I’ll just stick to lobbing nutmeg in… you can’t go wrong with nutmeg. Well, I can, but I’m a useless cook…

So if you watched last night, who do you reckon won on points for Christmassyness; Nigella or Jamie? I’m going to vote Nigella!