Christmas Eve: how many sherries and mince pies will Santa get through the North East?

Father Christmas will drink 16,025 litres of sherry and consume over 70 million calories just from mince pies as he visits every house with children in the North East tonight.

NationalWorld has carried out some very scientific number crunching to find out just how excessive a night is in store for old Kris Kringle while households up and down the country are sleeping on Christmas Eve.

Boys and girls in the UK traditionally leave out a mince pie and a glass of sherry to help their favourite gift-giver through his delivery shift, alongside a carrot for Rudolph – although some might opt for milk or even a distinctively non-traditional pint of beer. Mum and dad’s tastes have no bearing on what is left out, of course.

Using data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to find the number of households with dependent children in the region, the NationalWorld elves have done some number crunching.

Sherry typically has a strength of 17.5% ABV – at least that is according to a scan of the offering on shelves at major UK supermarkets. Then, looking at mince pies from big supermarket retailers this year, the average number of calories for the sweet treat is 219.

To make it all make sense, we've translated the quantity of sherry liquid into bathtubs (80 litres each) and compared the quantity of mince pie calories to a yearly recommended amount for a man (equivalent of 2,000 calories per day).

Below you can see in which parts of the North East Father Christmas might be feeling the merriest and, perhaps, a little bit of indigestion too.