Meghan Markle released the festive special of her much-derided Netflix show today as she taught her American celebrity friends about Christmas crackers.
The Duchess of Sussex introduced the British tradition of pulling crackers to New York restaurateur Will Guidar and then explained to him to make them.
In ‘With Love, Meghan – Holiday Celebration’, which came out at 8am UK time this morning, she said it felt ‘really connected and sweet’ to pull one with someone.
The ex-Suits actress filled the crackers with dried flowers, confetti and chocolates – and even put a mini burger inside one for her six-year-old son Prince Archie.
Meghan was also seen adding a handwritten decoration to her tree for the children, saying: ‘I love you because you are so kind. I love you because you’re so brave.’
She joked about putting together a Christmas dish containing all the foods that her husband Prince Harry hates, as he described one creation as the ‘anti-salad’
The Duchess showed off tips for festive wrapping gifts, including adding a wax seal. ‘It’s the tiniest detail that suddenly feels elevated,’ she said, before wrapping a bottle of wine in a cheap headscarf turned into Japanese furoshiki wrapping cloth.
Despite departing the UK in 2021, Meghan spent three Christmases in England – one at Nottingham Cottage in London and two at Sandringham with the Royal Family.
But while crackers are a key part of Christmas dinner in Britain, they are a foreign concept to Americans, giving Meghan the opportunity to explain them to viewers.
The 44-year-old explained to Mr Guidara that pulling Christmas crackers is a big part of the UK’s festive culture, telling him: ‘Typically people cross arms and do it.’
Mr Guidara replied: ‘No way. So you’re doing it with the other person?’ Meghan said: ‘Yes and they all pull at the same time.’ And Mr Guidara told her: ‘That’s awesome.’
Meghan continued: ‘It actually does feel really connected and sweet. The way that I really started to know them was they would always have almost a fortune cookie size joke or riddle and something sweet.’
The Duchess taught him how to make the crackers, before making them for her husband Prince Harry, Archie and their four-year-old daughter Princess Lilibet.
As she completed the cracker for Lilibet, Meghan said: ‘Lili really likes trying to be a grown-up lady at the moment. So this is like a little lavender roller ball.’
The Duchess then placed a mini burger inside a second cracker for her son, and said: ‘Now I’m onto Archie’s and I’m doing burgers. He loves the colour red.’
As for Harry’s, Meghan said: ‘My husband’s has a little love letter, a chocolate, a little hat.’
Mr Guidara told her: ‘Do you know why I love this? This idea of just doing something fun that’s orchestrated and intentional at the beginning of the meal I think is really cool.’
Meghan tries to evoke the spirit of a big family get together in the special, which was filmed a few miles from her home in Montecito and has a southern Californian feel.
Harry, who appears in the last five minutes of the 56-minute show, avoids the ‘anti-Christmas’ dish but gushes over one of his favourite dishes, gumbo – made to his mother-in-law Doria Ragland’s recipe by Meghan.
He concludes that it is good, but not quite as good as Ms Ragland’s.
The show is billed as a celebration in which friends and family create food, make personal gifts and share laughs while demonstrating tips for hosting Christmas.
To the sound of the Beach Boys singing their yuletide-themed song Little Saint Nick, it opens with her picking a 9ft Christmas tree from Lane Farms in Santa Barbara, before passing on tree decorating tips at the $9.5million farmhouse where the show was filmed.
Meghan said: ‘When I string the lights on a tree I do inside so it’s lit from within, and on the border, right on the outside. And the same with ornaments. You want to find the placement for them where they’re going to find their light.
‘I just loving having a tree up. There is just something about it that in one area in your house you’re able to really encapsulate your family story, really feel the passage of time and the different chapters of your life through the ornaments. For me a tree is part of my memory and love of the holiday season. I love it.’
At the same time, Meghan gave tips on how to maintain focus on what is important during a hectic season.
She said: ‘Trying to really embrace and lean into making every day of that month special as you’re wrapping up a year. But don’t feel like you have to do it all. Just embrace the special touches that bring you joy.’
The Duchess also admitted she often feels the pressure of making everything perfect at Christmas.
She said: ‘I get so fussed about everything being perfect that you lose the magic that even happens in the mistakes.’
Later in the kitchen with Mr Guidara, Meghan makes a dish that takes her back to her childhood. Puppy chow is a child-friendly snack made with cereal. ‘But for this season we will be calling it reindeer chow,’ she said.
Meghan added: ‘My elementary school math teacher, Miss Linda, she loved this. And I felt so excited that she loved something that I made.’
Another one of her guests, the TV chef and restaurateur Tom Colicchio, told her that one of his family traditions at Christmas, created by his grandfather, is to make a beetroot salad with red onion, celery, artichoke hearts, cherry peppers, with fennel, black olives, anchovies, parsley and garlic.
Meghan said: ‘Can I tell you why I’m chuckling? I’m so excited to eat this because you don’t cook the things as regularly that your partner doesn’t love to eat.
‘So if I gave you the top things that my husband hates to eat, beets – he would call them beetroot, as they say in England – black olives, fennel, and pickled vegetables. He hates all those flavours.
‘So I’ve not got to enjoy them certainly in a medley like that for a long time. So yummy.’
The pair made the salad and cook some salt cod to go with it, before Meghan made one of her family favourites, gumbo with chicken thighs, andouille sausage and shrimps.
‘So my mom’s family is from Tennessee, like around Chattanooga,’ she said. ‘I love soul food. I know there’s different versions of gumbo. This is the one that I know.’
‘Smells like Christmas now,’ she said and on cue, Harry came in, saying: ‘Hi guys, I smelled gumbo’.
Gesturing to Mr Colicchio’s family salad, Meghan told Harry sarcastically: ‘This is literally your favourite salad of all time.’
After his wife has listed the ingredients, Harry said: ‘Oh wow, that’s like the anti-salad. You must have known that I was coming,’ to laughter from Meghan.
Harry tells Mr Colicchio: ‘Gumbo for me is one of my favourites, especially her mum’s, but before the fish goes in.’
Having tasted the dish, Harry praised its spicy flavour before wading into dangerous territory.
‘I can feel it puncturing through the top of my head right now,’ he said. ‘It is delicious. I’m not sure it’s as good as your mum’s but it’s certainly close.’
Earlier in the show, Meghan wears red pyjamas to host her friend Lindsay Roth, whom she has known since she was 17, in homage to the Roth family tradition of wearing matching pyjamas for the holidays.
‘So for the love of Linds they forced me to wear pyjamas to honour this tradition,’ she said.
They are joined by another of Meghan’s closest friends, Kelly Zajfen, who is the co-founder of Alliance of Moms, a charity that supports young mother in the Los Angeles foster care system.
In 2022 Ms Zajfen suffered heartbreak when her nine-year-old son Georgie died from a viral illness.
Meghan also meets a new friend, the Japanese tennis player Naomi Osaka.
‘She’s such an incredible athlete and she also became a mom. So I’m thrilled to connect with her on that level, see how it’s going and just be able to get to know her a bit better,’ she said.
Discussing what is important to her during the Christmas season, Osaka told a smiling Meghan: ‘Honestly, I think family. I travel so much so I don’t get to see my family as often but I feel like the holidays is a time where you can focus on family and for me just take a break and kind of enjoy life.’
The pair then decorate a Santa’s cookie plate and mug. Osaka was embarrassed by her initial effort but Meghan told her: ‘I think it’s important to try things that we’re not not so great at, which I should remind myself when I try to draw or get on a tennis court. I am so painfully bad.
‘My mum found an old report card of mine and on the physical education part, ‘ability to throw or catch a ball; not applicable.’ They couldn’t even give me a grade.’
Amid shots of her making final preparations for Christmas and a party for the film crew, she told viewers: ‘The big day is almost here and we have felt the warmth of the holiday season in just so many ways the past couple of weeks.’
The duchess is also seen adding gifts to red-and-white advent calendars personalised with ‘Archie’ and ‘Lili’ on them, for her children Archie and Lilibet.
She makes the advent calendars for her children with little notes and small surprise gifts. ‘I love the idea of an advent calendar so I wanted to do it for my own kids. I am writing, ‘I love you because you are so kind. I love you because you’re so brave.’
In a 66-second trailer for the episode released on November 19, Harry appeared briefly when he and Meghan shared a kiss in a kitchen.
‘I love the holiday season,’ Meghan said in a voiceover on the trailer. ‘It’s about finding time to connect with the people we love, embracing traditions, and making new ones.’
The show, which sees Meghan offer hosting tips while she cooks with celebrity friends, was savaged by critics following its release in March – but a second series was released in August.
The show’s launch in March coincided with the unveiling of Meghan’s As Ever brand, which sells products including raspberry jam and flower sprinkles, which she repeatedly promotes throughout the show.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex secured a lucrative contract with Netflix, thought to be worth more than $100million in 2020, after quitting as senior working royals.
Harry and Meghan announced they had signed a new ‘multi-year, first-look deal for film and television projects’ with the streaming platform in August.
Meghan described the deal as ‘an incredible sign of the strength of our partnership’, despite rumours the streaming giant may be pivoting away from her and Harry.
At the end of the trailer, viewers were told to ‘discover more holiday cheer, shop As Ever’.
The new festive range was posted to the asever.com website and features a 43g spiced cider mulling spice kit priced at $16 and a three-pack of spreads in a gift box for $42.
