It's easy to think meat, meat, meat at this party-ish time of year, but even for us carnivores, why not plan some Christmas meals based on marvellous veg, salad and fruit? Many of us think that summer is the time for that sort of food, with an overflow of tomatoes, herbs, soft fruit and crunchy lettuce, but there's a huge abundance of fruit and veg at their best right now.

Red peppers and chillies are at the end of their natural season and have stored away all that summer light and sun. They are at their sweetest at the end of the year. Florence fennel is fat – at its most bulbous – through the autumn and early winter. When the weather is hot and dry, it tends to bolt – try to flower – and can be stringy and mean. This plumps up when the days get short and dark. Use the bulbs in a tart and the feathery tops to give flavour to a whole fish. An organic salmon, its cavity packed with soft-skinned, unwaxed lemons and fistfuls of fennel, baked in a salt snow mound, feels right at this time of year.

Warm salads are also a joy – as a first course to start a big, rich meal – mixing the brilliant colours of red chicory or the crimson-splotched variety, "Variegata del Castlefranco". Contrast this with the bright acid-green heart leaves of Savoy cabbage scattered with the shiny red seeds of a pomegranate and you're on to something good. Pomegranates are deep red, ripe and juicy in the early winter, and eating plenty of them is good for your health, so consume lots of them to help you sort out some of your party excesses. Now is also the time for delicious and unusual citrus – blood and then Seville oranges. They only have a brief winter moment, and you want to make the most of it.

If you feel like preparing a few things before the great day, you could make some Limoncello – a lemon-flavoured vodka – to drink over Christmas, or to give as presents for friends. If you have a couple of hours to spare, go to town and bake the walls, roofs and chimneys of a gingerbread house. You can construct the house and decorate it as soon as it's cool, or stash it all away to build with everyone over Christmas. This is like making an edible toy. It's a very jolly, pre-Christmas thing to do and then sits there looking good for at least a month, like a model of what you hope home life might be. If you have bags of time, why not make a miniature of your own house? It may take you longer than the standard couple of hours, but hey, if not now, when?

Wilted winter green salad

The colours here – crimson and brilliant green – look good and, served warm, this is an ideal Christmas salad. It's good as a first course, or as a side, and ideal as a main dish for a light lunch. For non-vegetarians you can top this salad with baked prosciutto (about 300g) – or stick with the blue cheese.

Serves 4 as main (6 as a side dish or starter)

250g radicchio chicory
250g Savoy cabbage
1 tbs olive oil
200g blue cheese, cubed
100g pomegranate seeds (from 1 fruit)
100g rocket
For the dressing: 3 tsp Dijon mustard
3 tbs lemon juice
50ml olive oil
salt and pepper

Tear apart the radicchio and cabbage. Remove and discard the chunkier stems and cut or tear the leaves into 6-8cm strips. Then wilt together in 50ml of olive oil for a few minutes, so they are still crunchy but warm. Take off the heat.

Lay the wilted leaves out on a large plate and top with the cubed blue cheese and pomegranate seeds.

To extract the pomegranate seeds, roll the fruit gently around a few times on the table. Then slice it in half and gently tap the skin of one side with a wooden spoon. The seeds will then drop out into a bowl.

Add the rocket and dress and toss the whole thing at the last minute before you serve.

Blood orange and pink grapefruit sorbet with limoncello

After a big Christmas meal, there's nothing better than a few mouthfuls of this sharp and sweet blood orange and pink grapefruit sorbet. Fill a glass with a few scoops and pour over the lemon vodka, or limoncello.

Serves 4-6

juice of 5 blood oranges (should give about 500ml juice)
juice of 2 pink grapefruits (should give about 300ml juice)
150g sugar
limoncello, to serve

Scrub and dry the fruit and, using a zester, remove the zest of the oranges. Dissolve the sugar in 200ml water in a small saucepan over a low heat. Add half the orange zest and bring to the boil for 2-3 minutes. Allow to cool and strain.

Squeeze the juice from all the oranges and grapefruits and combine it with the cold syrup and reserved, uncooked zest.

Pour into an ice-cream maker. Freeze/churn for 20-25 minutes and pack into a plastic container. Freeze for at least an hour before serving. If you haven't got a machine, pour into a plastic food container and freeze for 2 hours. Take out of the freezer and stir with a fork. Return to the freezer and repeat this process twice, stirring at two-hourly intervals.

Allow the sorbet 20-25 minutes in the fridge to soften slightly before serving. Put 2 scoops per person into a glass and pour a little limoncello over each one.

Limoncello

This is quick and easy to make – it will take about 10 minutes – but then needs to be left for a couple of weeks at least before you drink it. Then the lemon zest and lemon grass really infuse the vodka to give a delicious sharp but rich taste.

Makes 750ml bottle

8 unwaxed lemons
2 lemon grass stems
700ml bottle of good quality vodka
220g caster sugar

Zest the lemons and crush the lemon grass and put them into a large sterilised kilner or preserving jar and pour over the vodka.

Put the sugar into a saucepan with 350ml water, bring to the boil, turn down the heat and simmer for 3-4 minutes. Leave the syrup to cool, then add it to the lemon zest mixture.

Seal the preserving jar and leave for a couple of weeks in a cupboard, shaking and turning every so often. Then strain the limoncello into bottles. This is best served ice cold, straight from the freezer.

Sweet red pepper and feta tart

I like a piled-high tart for a lunch at some point over Christmas, with a good mound of delicious sweet red peppers looking as if they're about to burst the pastry case. A good slice of this will make everyone happy, served with some roasted squash chunks and a peppery winter leaf salad of rocket and watercress with a base of lettuce in a sharp lemony and fruity olive oil dressing. This is an adaptation of a tart in my Christmas Food & Flowers book, but with more abundant contents.

Serves 6-8

1 large onion, chopped
olive oil
8 red peppers (or a mixture of red and yellow)
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tbs white balsamic vinegar
1 dsp caster sugar
20 black olives, stoned and halved
50g anchovies, chopped
small bunch of thyme, leaves stripped and chopped
300ml single cream
4 eggs, beaten
salt and black pepper
300g feta cheese

For the pastry:

110g unsalted butter
220g seasoned plain flour
1 egg yolk mixed with a little iced water

First make the pastry. Rub the butter into the seasoned flour or pulse in a food processor until it resembles breadcrumbs. Add just enough of the egg and water to bring the pastry together into a ball. Line a 28cm tart tin with the pastry – leaving extra draped over the sides to avoid problems with the pastry shrinking – and chill for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas 4.

Prick the bottom of the tart with a fork, cover with a round of greaseproof paper or foil and weigh this down with some baking beans or rice. Bake the pastry case blind in the preheated oven for about 15 minutes and then neaten up the pastry case, removing the extra draped over the sides. Keep the oven on, ready for baking the filled pastry case.

In a heavy-based saucepan, sweat the chopped onion in olive oil for 5-10 minutes over a gentle heat and put to one side. Halve and deseed the peppers and grill or roast them until they are beginning to blacken. Put them into a plastic bag when you remove them from the heat, and after a few minutes the skins will be easy to remove.

Slice the peppers and put them into the saucepan with the softened onions and the crushed garlic. Add a drizzle of oil and the balsamic vinegar and sugar and cook over a gentle heat for 5 minutes or so, until the peppers are soft but still have a bite. Remove from the heat and add the black olives, anchovies and thyme.

In a separate bowl, combine the cream and eggs, and season well. Spread the pepper mixture over the pastry, crumble over the feta cheese and pour on the cream and egg mixture.

Bake in the preheated oven for about 30 minutes, or until set and golden.

Fennel and gorgonzola souffle tart

Vegetarian or not, I'd be happy to eat this for a lunch or light supper over Christmas. Serve with a green salad or a very finely sliced kohlrabi and radish salad drizzled with truffle oil.

Serves 6-8

5 heads of fennel, cut into quarters or sixths, depending on size
extra-virgin olive oil
200ml milk
40g unsalted butter
1 heaped tbs plain flour
3 large eggs, separated
125ml plain yoghurt
1 tsp Dijon mustard
zest of 1 lemon
salt and black pepper
40g parmesan, grated
100g gorgonzola
50g toasted walnuts, broken up and toasted for 3-4 minutes, to brown but not burn them

For the pastry:

110g unsalted butter
220g seasoned plain flour
1 egg yolk mixed with a little iced water

To make the pastry, follow the red pepper tart instructions.

Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas 4.

Blanch the fennel heads in boiling water for 2 minutes and then roast them on a griddle in the preheated oven with a little olive oil, salt and pepper for about half an hour, until they are beginning to turn brown and caramelise.

Melt the butter in a small saucepan and stir in the flour to make a fairly stiff roux. Add the milk – ideally warmed – and whisk.

Mix the egg yolks with the yoghurt and Dijon mustard in a bowl, and add this to the roux, along with the lemon zest. Season with salt and black pepper.

Sprinkle the pastry with the grated parmesan (this acts like flour in the base and absorbs any moisture from the fennel bulbs) and lay the roasted fennel over the tart base. Break the gorgonzola over the top and scatter the walnuts.

Whisk the egg whites until stiff and lightly fold into the roux. Spoon this over the fennel, cheese and walnuts and bake the tart in the oven for about 30 minutes or until it is risen, golden and set to the touch.

Whole fish baked in salt

You want to bring this whole fish to the table hidden in its crust and then crack it in front of everyone – food for showing off. The mix of the two salts bakes to look very snow-like. Serve with fennel seed and lemon sauté or mashed potatoes, or slow-roasted bulb fennel and a winter salsa verde or sorrel and yoghurt sauce.

Serves 8-10

3 kg fine table salt and 750g Maldon salt
2.6kg organic salmon or sea bass, cleaned but not filleted
2 unwaxed lemons, sliced
handful of fresh fennel stalks and leaves

For the salsa verde:

1 large bunch of parsley
1 large bunch of mixed winter herbs (eg chervil, coriander, sorrel and one or two sprigs of thyme or winter savory, the leaves stripped from the stem)
4 gherkins, rinsed
20-30 small capers, rinsed
250ml olive oil
juice of ½ lemon
salt and black pepper

Preheat the oven to 200°C/Gas 6.

In a large mixing bowl, mix the salt with about 500ml cold water to give a sand-castle consistency.

Fill the cavity of the fish with the lemon and fennel. Cover the bottom of a baking dish with half the salt and lay the fish on top. Cover the fish completely with the remaining salt and pat it down with your hands to form a smooth surface.

Bake the fish in the preheated oven. After 30 minutes, insert a skewer into the fish. If the tip of the skewer is hot to the back of your hand, the fish is ready. If not, put back for another 5-10 minutes.

Crack open the salt crust by knocking in a large carving knife with a rolling pin and remove the hard salt pieces, taking care to brush away any loose salt from the flesh of the fish. This is easier to do if you leave the fish skin intact. Carefully lift the fish and place it on a platter. Remove the skin.

To make the salsa verde, chop the parsley and other herbs coarsely. Add the gherkins and capers with the olive oil and lemon juice. Blitz in a food processor just briefly, or chop by hand, so that you have a coarse-textured sauce. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Gingerbread house

If you have a few hours to spare one weekend between now and Christmas, use them to make a gingerbread house. I had a good time this week creating a template – with Molly, our youngest daughter – for a very English gingerbread house. Lots of the patterns around are Scandinavian (this gingerbread recipe comes from Norway), as they're much keener on making gingerbread houses than we are, so we decided to make a cottage/ramshackle farmhouse instead. We then made the house and stuck it together with toffee and iced the roof with dollops of snow. A final massive dusting of icing sugar did wonders for hiding any cracks and holes.

A piping bag is handy for the toffee but not essential, and you need a large tray or cake board. The house here is on a 30cm by 50cm tray, leaving a bit of room for a garden.

Makes a small house

For the gingerbread dough:

450g runny honey
4 eggs
350g caster sugar
1kg plain flour
zest of 1 lemon and 1 orange
100g ground almonds
100g ground hazelnuts
8 tsp ground mixed spice
pinch of salt
2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

For the toffee: 225g white caster sugar

For the royal icing:

2 egg whites, beaten until frothy
450g icing sugar
juice of 1 lemon

To make the dough, heat the honey gently. Beat the eggs and sugar until fluffy, add the warm honey, and then combine the wet mixture with the remaining dry ingredients. Fold them gently together and knead into a soft dough. Wrap the dough in cling film and leave it in the fridge for a few hours.

Preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas 4.

Roll out the dough thinly (approximately 5mm thick) and cut it into the shapes of your pattern.

Put the sections on greaseproof paper rubbed with a trace of sunflower oil, or a silicone mat. Bake each section in the preheated oven for about 15 minutes until golden brown and leave to cool on a wire rack. The gingerbread will be soft when it comes out of the oven but cools to a crisp biscuit.

(The dough will keep for up to 4 weeks in the fridge. If you have any left over, make biscuits and shapes to hang on your tree.)

When you're ready to construct the house, make the toffee to use as glue. Melt the sugar slowly in a saucepan until it starts to brown. Take care not to let it burn. Pour the toffee into a measuring jug, and from there into the piping bag. Take care not to touch the toffee as it will be exceptionally hot. (To be extra safe, use heat-proof gloves.) Pipe the toffee out of the bag, using it to stick one bit of the house to the next.

Next make the royal icing for the base and snow on the roof. Whisk the beaten egg whites until frothy but not stiff, and mix in 2 tbs of icing sugar and the lemon juice to make a paste. Gradually add the rest of the icing sugar until the icing is soft and holds its shape. If the mix is still sloppy, add more icing sugar.

First spread the icing all over the base board quite thickly – like snow – using it to hold the walls in place. Then pipe it on to the house. For the one on page 15, we iced the tops of the windows and ridge of the roof and then dusted the whole thing with icing sugar.

If you don't eat it straight away, the gingerbread house will keep for months.

• Sarah Raven is the author of Sarah Raven's Garden Cookbook and Sarah Raven's Complete Christmas Food & Flowers (both published by Bloomsbury)