Christmas With My Family is one of my favourite days of the year. Chaos, noise and the occasional meltdown from a child is almost guaranteed, but I love it anyway. We’re not a perfect family, but we’ll all tumble into my parents house with arms full of food, drink and gifts and lots of news to share that we will all try and share at once! The girls will end up chatting around the kitchen bench and there are usually bets on which over-tired Dad or Uncle will fall asleep first. Amy Grant’s Christmas album will be on repeat and the kids will hover around the tree until everyone has arrived and Nonni and Grandad say ‘It’s TIME’ to open the gifts.

And probably one of the best bits, is when my Dad stands up and always a little choked with emotion, gives thanks to God for his family, our many, many blessings and the gift of his son, Jesus.

And if he can’t get through the prayer, my brother usually takes over.

Then there will be countless loads through the dishwasher and a few fights from over-tired and over-sugared children, as we wait for the late night breeze to blow through the house and start to cool us all down.

This is will be my family Christmas and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I enjoyed making and eating this salad last summer, from memory I made it for a Christmas gathering and enjoyed it again at our NYE celebrations.

After looking back at the original recipe from Delicious Dec 14/Jan 2015 I realised that it could lose a step or 2 to make it a little more achievable for the time poor cook.

And you could even go one step further – if the thought of char-grilling your peaches overwhelms you, just thinly slice them and add them to the salad just as they are. Chargrilling anything just ‘caramelises’ the natural sugars in the food and brings out the sweetness.

This salad is best assembled right before eating, so if you need to make it in advance, just prep your ingredients and store them separately, putting it all together at the last minute.