You’ve done a Christmas advert with Walkers, which is a very British brand. Are you ready for a quick fire round of questions to test your British-ness? Let’s start with how you eat scones, jam or cream first?

[British accent] What would you do darrrling? You’re the expert?! I don’t know – I think I’d go for a touch of cream and then a little splash of strawberry jam.

Okay, what about your tea - would you dunk your biscuit in it? And is it milk before or after?

No way, I’m not a dunker. I mean, I would hope that most people would put their milk in after, but I don’t know. There’s all these tea rumours out there.

So this Christmas will mark the 25 year anniversary of your iconic hit, All I Want For Christmas Is You. How are you planning on celebrating?

Well, I have a lot of different things I’m doing. There’s a Christmas concert in Vegas in December, that’s really a family show that’s going to be a lot of fun and a great way to end the year because I love Christmas so much. We’re also doing a small tour of the East Coast and ending that on the 15 December at Madison Square Garden.

Do you have any Christmas traditions you do every year?

I have a lot of favourite Christmas traditions – I look forward to Christmas the whole year round! We go to Aspen, which is my favourite place to celebrate Christmas because it’s always snowy and it’s one of the best places ever.

We do all sorts of things, we go on a sleigh ride with the kids and my extended family, I cook, Santa Claus comes over – I know it sounds like I’m making it up but it’s true – I know him personally, he’s my dude. We have live reindeer. It’s an extravaganza!

“I spent 7 surreal minutes on the phone with Mariah Carey and this is what happened”