Take a holiday from cooking turkey this year with these festive take-out options

A holiday turkey dinner is something that takes hours of planning, shopping, preparation and time in the kitchen to make, but there are options if you’re looking to take a break from cooking or if you’d rather leave it to the pros.

The Fairmont Château Laurier one of many options for a fully prepared holiday dinner, and it’s proving to be popular for anyone who’d rather not cook or doesn’t know how.

“Pick this up, take it home, throw it in the oven and not have to worry about any of the cooking yourself,” says Greg Voge, director of food and beverage at the Fairmont Château Laurier.

“It’s a really popular offering,” he says. “You don’t need to think about temperatures and times and everything else, you just take it out, put it on the table and everybody gets to enjoy. There’s even less dishes to do.”

It will save you time, but it will cost more than making it yourself. A complete dinner for four costs $450 at the Fairmont Château Laurier.

From hotels to high-end restaurants, grocery stores and caterers, complete holiday meals can be prepared by a pro, but most need to be ordered well in advance.

“We’ve had record sales to the extent that we are now officially sold out,” says Thyme and Again co-owner Sheila White.

Thyme and Again has been selling holiday meals for more than twenty years.

“I think this year, people are trying to focus a little bit more on reconnecting with family, people that haven’t been celebrating Christmas as much, and they really want to focus on the connection as opposed to being in the kitchen,” White says.

Chef and co-owner Michael Moffat says the prepared meals take some of the pressure off at Christmas.

“People are just generally happy that we offer this - there’s a certain amount of relief,” Moffat says. “For people that don’t do this all the time it’s quite the undertaking.”

While the full dinners are already sold out, White says they have many other options and additions available for pick-up.

“We have lots and lots of items in the shop. Mike and the team have created a lot of the sides, the stuffing, the gravies, the cranberry sauces, hors d’oeuvres will all be here to grab and go, going right into Christmas Eve.”

Grocery store Farm Boy also has to-go holiday meal options available for pick-up, including a Christmas Family Dinner. It serves six to eight people and costs $179.99, with no taxes added, according to a Farm Boy spokesperson.

Farm Boy executive Josh Drache tells CTV News Ottawa that the price hasn’t increased from last year and orders are expected to sell out by the end of the week.

World-renowned chef Michael Blackie at west Ottawa restaurant Next isn’t new to serving up Christmas dinners.

“I was doing it while I lived in Hong Kong and Bali, Indonesia as a chef. Travelling the world on an expat lifestyle, you’re always catering to expats and for me, like in Hong Kong, we would do 400 to 500 turkey takeaway dinners,” he tells CTV News Ottawa.

It’s also a popular option at his Stittsville restaurant.

“I’ve changed my formula now because I’m trying to be a bit more price-savvy and conscious to ways that the economy is changing… for a family of four it’s $169. It’s a four-course plated dinner that you get the day before,” he says. That price is plus tax and gratuity and delivery is also available.

If you’re looking to do New Year’s Eve in Style at home many places also offer to-go packages too.