Christmas exclusive: We reveal how many mince pies - and how many litres of sherry - Lancaster children leave out for Santa

Everyone’s favourite jolly old fellow will be tucking into an astonishing 14,310 mince pies, if every local family with children leaves him a plate of the traditional festive fare.

Altogether Christmas Eve in Lancaster will see Santa consuming 118,800g of fat - more than 1,000 times higher than his recommended daily limit - and around 61,000 teaspoons of sugar.

And it’s a good thing he will have Rudolph on hand to take charge of the navigation, as he can also expect to wash the calorific treats down with a staggering 720 litres of sherry.

Registered nutritionist Charlotte Stirling-Reed says it sounds like Mr Claus is in for a bit of a rough night.

“Poor Father Christmas, having to eat all that,” she said.

“I can imagine he wouldn’t be feeling great after eating so many mince pies – most of us would probably struggle to eat two or three in a row before our brains and fullness signals kicked in to tell us we’ve had enough. Perhaps he should also be eating Rudolf’s carrot, which would give him some added fibre, vitamin A and vitamin C to go along with his mince pies?”

During his travels across England this year, Father Christmas will be tucking into a grand total of more than 6.5m mince pies.

These would contain the equivalent of 100,000 bags of sugar. He will also slosh his way through more than 4,000 average-sized bathtubs of sherry, making for a very merry Christmas indeed.

Ms Stirling-Reed said: “The best thing about Christmas is obviously the food.

But that doesn’t just mean sweets, cakes and biscuits – I love thinking about all the festive, in-season foods that are available at this time of year including cranberries, chestnuts, sprouts, tangerines and parsnips. There are so many ways to enjoy them too.

“Maybe Father Christmas can put out a request for some of these when he delivers presents next year.”