Who pays most for Christmas dinner? French families face heftiest bill while Romanians pay the least

• Global study finds Romanians households will pay less than €18 for their traditional Christmas dish
• French families will fork out €81.70 this year for the festive dinner
• Spanish face second highest bill as cost of festive meal in Spain soars 24% vs last year
• US families can enjoy traditional turkey and trimmings at 9% cost reduction vs 2022

Romanians will pay the least for their traditional Christmas dish this year, while families in France are potentially facing the world’s most expensive Christmas dinner, according to a study of 12 countries across three continents by trading and investment platform eToro.

eToro looked at local supermarket prices of traditional Christmas cuisine and found that a typical Romanian Christmas meal with sarmale, polenta and traditional accompaniments such as sour cream and hot peppers would cost a family of four less than €18. Meanwhile, a typical French meal of stuffed turkey alongside liver, chestnuts and eggs will cost €81.70 for a family of four, with 5 kg of turkey alone costing over €65.

Whilst French families face the priciest Christmas dinner in eToro’s study, several other countries have experienced significant price hikes compared to last year. A typical Danish Christmas dinner of pork roast, served with potatoes, onions and red cabbage is 25% more expensive in 2023 compared to last year, while a classic Spanish festive meal of turkey and trimmings has jumped in price by 24%, up to €75.30.

Ingredients in the Christmas shopping basket which have seen the biggest inflation in price since 2022 include pork in Denmark (+46%), olive oil in Spain (+30%) and chicken in Australia (+40%). In Romania, pork and beef meat prices rose around 13%, year on year. But other typical ingredients saw their prices reduced, like corn meal (-11%) and vegetable oil (-25%).

Roast turkey tends to make up for most of the Christmas dinner cost for the countries that eat it. However, unlike last year, turkey costs in Europe stabilised in 2023, while in the USA, the cost of turkey has actually fallen from 2022 prices, helping to bring down the cost of Christmas dinner for an American family of four by 9%.

Ben Laidler, Global Markets Strategist at eToro, said: “Inflation may be moving in the right direction around the world, yet families will still be feeling the pinch this year with Christmas dinner in nearly all of the countries we looked at more expensive than it was last year. Danish households in particular will be spending considerably more this year on their festive meal given that the price of pork is up a whopping 48% year-on-year.”  

Table shows cost of Christmas dinner ingredients across 12 countries in euros

Just above Romania, households in the UK will enjoy the second cheapest Christmas dinner amongst those countries included in the study – with a typical roast turkey with the usual trimmings setting a family of four back €24.80.

Bogdan Maioreanu, market analyst for eToro said: “What the price data shows us is that many inflationary pressures are local, with big cost differences between countries, some of which border each other. Romanians will see higher prices to meat but lower prices to other ingredients for the Christmas dinner, the cost staying almost the same as the one of last year. ”

Food price inflation has surged globally this year, with the latest EU food inflation figure at 9.1%, Romania at 8.7% whilst the corresponding figure for the UK is 10.1%, and the US far lower at 3.3%.

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