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The Lost Estate’s iconic Christmas Carol experience is back. Opening on 1st November, The Great Christmas Feast, a festive essential in London’s winter calendar, will transport guests to a Victorian Christmas with sights, smells, and tastes in a fully immersive experience. The 2024 menu, devised by Executive Chef, Ashley Clarke is the culmination of years of Victorian feasting refined into one exceptional Christmas menu. We caught up with Ashley and chatted about all things Charles Dickens, menu development and what goes into creating a fully immersive experience.

Tell us a little bit more about The Great Christmas Feast? 

The Lost Estate puts guests at the heart of the greatest stories in history, transporting them to real and imagined locations. The Great Christmas Feast is an immersive dining experience in Charles Dickens’ house based around the retelling of Dickens’ quintessential Christmas story, A Christmas Carol.

What inspired you to focus on Victorian cuisine?

The narrative is brought to life through all the elements of the experience: interior, set design, music, drinks, food, merchandise, and more. Every element plays a vital role in the storytelling. Our food offering is integral to this as it has been designed to exist within the world.

Your culinary career has taken you from Gordon Ramsay Group to SMOKESTAK and Temper Soho. How have these experiences shaped your approach to curating menus for immersive dining experiences like The Great Christmas Feast? 

It gives me the opportunity to use skills learned in catering for large numbers to a high standard of cuisine. I am also able to draw on 30 years of experience including the classically trained part of my career.

What’s your process like when translating a concept into a full dining experience? Where do you start? 

I start with a brief from the founders and then go away and do many hours of research. I then write a couple of draft menus/ideas and then move into developing the physical dishes. Once I am happy with them I start a round of tastings with the founders and MD, and go back and forth over a few weeks till we lock in the final menu.

How important is storytelling in your dishes, particularly in such a theatrical setting? Do you think about the narrative of a meal as much as its flavours? 

The food has to fit in with the narrative and the world we create; it also has to wow our guests, and be a little bit playful while feeling modern and classical at the same time.

Everything public-facing, such as the name of the dish, the ingredient list, presentation are carefully curated to be ‘in world’ e.g believable within the story that’s being told. And that helps guests maintain the fantasy and draws them deeper into the world.

The Great Christmas Feast is known for being a multi-sensory experience. If you had to describe it in three words, what would they be?

Immersive, unique, joyful

Are there any historical periods or cuisines you’re eager to explore in future Lost Estate shows? 

The 70s, Roman or a medieval feast.

What’s the one Victorian Christmas dish you think everyone should try at least once? 

Real mince pies!

To buy tickets to The Lost Estate’s A Christmas Carol, see here.

Photo credit: Lateef Photography