Christmas Food Traditions!

[AmateisGal]

Every Christmas Eve, we gather at my grandmother's house for butterball soup, chicken, homemade bread, and cherry cheesecake. Then we open presents. And on Christmas Day we always, without fail, have homemade raviolis.

Sadly, I won't be traveling home this year and so we'll be making the butterball soup, but we won't have any homemade raviolis.

What are some of your holiday meal traditions for this time of year?

 

[Miss 1929]

Would you believe...

burritos on Xmas Eve...

 

[Starius]

A holiday Liver P?¢t?© from a recipe in a old Australian cookbook.

I loves it so much.

Sadly, this year, I think its getting postponed from Christmas to New Years.

 

[Mr. Lucky]

Via my F.B.I. wife (Full Blooded Italian) and fifty or sixty of her closest relatives, over the years I have been treated to a Christmas Eve feast of every type of pasta and sauce, without meat, that is known to man! Homemade marinara, oil & garlic, Alfredo, etc., etc. Mmmmm. Oh, and of course, homemade Zepoles - fried dough either rolled in powdered sugar or stuffed with anchovies!

And, sadly, we too will not be making the journey East this year. But my wife has pledged to try making the Zepoles. Might as well call the L.A.F.D. now...

 

[Pink Dahlia]

Baklava! Part of our Greek heritage. My grandma also makes Avgolemono soup every year.

 

[Big Man]

For the past 30 or so years, we've gathered at my parent's house for mid-morning Christmas breakfast that featured an egg and sausage casserole. After my Mother passed away 13 years ago, my wife took over the task of preparing the meal (same recipe).

We've done it so long, it just wouldn't be Christmas without that egg and sausage casserole.

 

[AmateisGal]

We've done it so long, it just wouldn't be Christmas without that egg and sausage casserole.

That's the way it is in our family with the butterball soup (a Germans from Russia recipe). But we can't find any butterballs on our end of the state, so we bought some when we were home for Thanksgiving and put them in the freezer so we could be sure and have our Christmas Eve tradition.

 

[kpreed]

A Christmas Eve a tradition for us, is Golden-glo salad made with Jello. My partner's Mother's recipe from nowhere Maine.

 

[RetroBabydoll]

Oddly, I tend to have pickled herring. My grandfather and other relatives eat it around Christmas, but my immediate family (mom,dad,sisters) hate the stuff. I keep my grandfather's tradition going by stopping by IKEA and picking some up for myself. It sounds strange, but it is really tasty.

 

[Helen Troy]

We allways eat wild animals, (is the english word "game" or something?) on christmass eve. Not a Norwegian tradition, only ours. We never thought about it until my sister was an exchange student in USA, and told her family that we usually eat reindeer and they reacted really stongly: "Oh my goodness, are you eating Rudolph! On Chrismas Eve!!??"

 

[Miss Crisplock]

Ah. We open presents and celebrate Christmas day, so the 24th is usually Pizza, Chinese or take out of some type.

This year it is going to my favorite Peruvian restaurant!

Christmas isn't Christmas without Smoked Salmon. My Mom would smoke it in November....This year I bought it. But now I know where to get pickled herring. Yum!

Do you know the Ludefisk Song?

(To the tune of O Christmas Tree)
Oh, Ludefisk, I'm not so sure, just why you are so pop-u-lar!

 

[Mike in Seattle]

Oh Lutefisk lyrics. There's a TV show up here in Seattle from the 50's & 60's and they did this every year from what I understand. The name's at the tip of my tongue...

There's also a second variant on the second line:

Oh lutefisk, oh lutefisk, how fragrant your aroma
Oh lutefisk, oh lutefisk, you smell just like Tacoma...

(Paper mills - there's a long running joke about "The Tacoma Aroma")

Someone used to bring lutefisk to the midnight service at the Lutheran church my partner sang in the choir of, and people would run. I never got the nerve to try it...somehow "cooking" a fish with the main ingredient of Draino (lye) just seemed a little odd...but the wassail they served would knock you on your butt...

 

[HamletJSD]

My folks always did my dad's family tradition of Mince Meat Pie for Christmas morning breakfast.

The really odd thing is that for a period of a few years no one in the house actually wanted to eat it, but my mom cooked it anyway because it was tradition. I am glad she persevered, because eventually I grew to love the stuff!!!

 

[Miss Crisplock]

Off Topic

Mike! I'm an ex-pat Seattlite as it were! I've lost my Stan Boreson tapes! I can't find him! He's not on I tunes, nor is Duffy Bishop's Latte Land.

Help!

 

[Twilight]

We eat schnitzel and a type of Czech potato salad on Christmas Eve.
As for Christmas Day, it's always something different. =]

 

[imoldfashioned]

Lutefisk--eek! I went to a high school with kids of mostly Swedish and Norwegian descent and every year they'd have a very serious discussion on how to avoid eating the lutefisk their grandparents would bring over for Christmas. They were all jealous of me because I was of Irish descent and I never had to deal with the dreaded lutefisk question.

Food traditions--

We used to eat cold cut sandwiches on Christmas Eve which I still do from time to time. My mother used to buy Totino's Pizza Rolls for Christmas Eve but I haven't had one of those in decades!

Some kind of danish/sticky bun/cinnamon roll on Christmas morning (bought when I was young, made by me as soon as I could do so).

Christmas dinner is all over the map--over the years I've done roast beef, turkey, italian (Braciole, chicken and sausage, eggplant rollatini), ham. I think it's going to be the latter this year.

 

[~*Red*~]

Christmas Eve we make tamales! Yum! And Christmas Day morning we have a big breakfast. I like to make Aebleskiver and apple fritters as the special treat. When we visit my parents we have a Christmas Day dinner similar to Thanksgiving. I can't wait for Christmas!

 

[AmateisGal]

These are so much fun to read! Keep 'em coming!

 

[Bud-n-Texas]

Baklava! Part of our Greek heritage. My grandma also makes Avgolemono soup every year.

Baklava!! It is not just for Christmas anymore I will take it anytime I can get it. Moderation is the key for me, being diabetic, I am not allowed such treats anymore. There is a restaraunt north of Atlanta called the Marietta Dinner. They have some of the best Baklava other than what Mom made.

 

[The Shirt]

We do hors d'oeuvres all night long. My littles sister actually gets a little testy if certain things are missing even though most of our tastes have otherwise grown up. Cheese dip, chicken wings, little smokies in my estimation could be given up or traded for stuffed mushrooms, bruschetta or a nice roast. But I don't think I will ever win that fight. It seems very 70s in a way I cannot explain. There is also a riot if certain cookies are missing from the plate. It's funny how stuck my family gets in a tradition.

Holiday morning we have this amazing german sausage handmade in this tiny town in Kansas that my father grew up in. And the creme puffs that we make all together a few days before are finally served (My favorite).

Ok I'm hungry now.