The Christmas Cottage

This little book began, as most things worth keeping do, beside a fire. It was Christmas Eve, and the cottage was full of the kind of quiet that only comes when everything that matters is already in place — the pudding made, the greenery hung, the candles lit. I thought of all the Christmases that had shaped me, all the women who had pressed their warm hands into pastry and tied ribbon round brown paper parcels and carried traditions forward like lanterns through the dark. I wrote this book for them, and for you — whoever you are, wherever your cottage is, whether it has stone walls and a low ceiling or simply a kitchen that smells of cinnamon and belonging. May it sit on your shelf, perhaps a little flour-dusted by February, and may it bring you back, each December, to something slow and true and homemade. ---

Christmas at Rosewood Cottage has never been about excess. It is dried oranges strung by the fire, the pudding stirred by every hand in the house, the mince pies cooling on the rack, the greenery gathered from the lane. Over the years I have kept every recipe and ritual that made our Christmases feel like Christmas — and here they all are, ready for you to make your own. May your festive season be less about buying, and more about making, gathering and love.

— Agnes