Get your Christmas glaze ready, the results of the most important vote of the year are in; ham will be the most popular protein on Kiwis’ plates this Christmas Day. The result comes as part of the Great Kiwi Christmas Survey – the fourth edition of the poll run by Retail Meat New Zealand in conjunction with Beef + Lamb New Zealand.
The poll of over 3,300 Kiwis covers a range of Christmas traditions and debates, and this year saw pork take the lead with 36.2% of the vote – 3.2% up from the poll in 2020. Lamb follows closely at 31.2% and beef at 10.9%.
CEO of NZ Pork, David Baines, says it’s no surprise following a year of Covid lockdowns that Kiwis are excited to come together with friends and whanau to celebrate over scrumptious Kiwi kai.
“The holiday season is a time to celebrate – to catch-up with friends and family you may not have seen for a while, to share food and spend time together. New Zealand ham is the centrepiece of many Kiwi family Christmas tables and it’s no surprise why, it’s a delicious, traditional favourite that guarantees plenty of leftovers to enjoy in the days following.”
Of those polled, 61.2% of respondents expect to have at least 1-2 days of leftovers – only 4.3% manage to eat it all in one day.
56% of Kiwis will be having two meals on Christmas day, with the majority sharing the day’s festivities with over 10 people (30.7%). Cooking methods for the meat on the day are dominated by ovens and BBQs, capturing 62.8% and 32.5% respectively – which represents a further swing to ovens from 2020 when it was 61% and 35%.
Most people (37.3%) will take 2-3 days to prepare their Christmas meal, which will be enjoyed in the early afternoon (53.2%). Only 1.7% of people will be tucking into their meal in the late evening, after a day spent opening presents (79.3%), playing backyard games (49.2%), driving to other family members’ houses (41%) and sleeping (33.4%), while only 5% of Kiwis will be carol singing this year.
Pav for dessert
Most respondents agreed that you can’t have a scrumptious festive feast without dessert. The Kiwi favourite, pavlova, won out (70.6%) with strawberries and ice cream coming in second place (45%). Notedly, for our cousins across the ditch, 97.9% agreed that New Zealand created the meringue and all its whipped cream delight, first.
As with pavlova-gate, the survey also sought answers to some long-standing debates in a series of head-to-head matchups.
Michael Bublé took out the gold (52.7%) with ‘It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas’ pipping Mariah Carey and ‘All I want for Christmas is You’ (40.8%) as the must-have song on the Christmas playlist. It must be noted that 78.9% believe Christmas music should only be played during December (tell that to the 7.3% of people who think it’s okay to play all year around, and then again to the 5.2% who believe it should never be played).
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern recently weighed in on the ‘Die Hard’ debate*, believing that it should be included in the Christmas film category. 60.2% of those surveyed agreed that ‘Die Hard’ should be officially classified as a festive film.
87.1% believe that adults should definitely get Christmas presents, while 93.1% believe that Christmas morning is the correct time to open presents (2.5% will be opening as soon as they get them).
61.6% of those polled ranked spending time with family as their favourite part of the festive season. We can all agree that 2021 has been a tumultuous year, and while we can’t snap our fingers and return to normal, we can take the time to celebrate with our friends, whanau and communities this holiday season.
Stay safe and enjoy the festivities, you deserve it!
Retail Meat New Zealand and Beef + Lamb New Zealand wishes everyone a Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year.
