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The upcoming holidays and the thread about the holiday open house got me to thinking about traditions that we carry with us from our parents and even farther back. (cue background music....)
https://youtu.be/sWSoYCetG6A I don't tend to remember the past a whole lot, but among my strongest and sweetest memories is having Christmas Eve dinner every year at my grandparents' house. It's a mix of traditions (religious and otherwise), with particular foods being served at the meal. There's herring (in tomato sauce with onions and/or a vinaigrette with onions and mushrooms), the Lithuanian version of gefilte fish that we call "farširuota žuvis", a white fish in a tomato sauce, Russian salad (a white mayonnaise potato salad), beet and bean salad (turns pink!), and for dessert either some little poppy seed biscuits served with a poppy seed "milk" or a cranberry pudding called "kisielius". And, of course, some Lithuanian rye bread. And at midnight, the animals in the barn are supposed to talk about their owners....no barns in my childhood, and we only had one dog, so I don't know who he would have been talking to.... My late friend used to set a beautiful Christmas Eve table:   This cake is also traditional for dessert but wasn't typically part of our meal because, as you can see, it requires some heavy duty prep. We call it šakotis (same root word as šaka, which means "branch"). Germans call it "baumkuchen" (tree cake). Now it's pretty readily available in local Lithuanian bakeries or imported from commercial bakeries in Lithuania (think panettone....)   Do you have a tradition, holiday or otherwise, that your family holds dear?
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| (self-titled) semi-posting lurker Minor Deity  |
 So, a "bamukuhen" (Japanese pronunciation) is a popular thing in Japan, it was originally described to me as European butI always wondered where it came from! Now I know!!We have lots of family recipes for different kinds of cookies, Italian on my dad's side, Scots-Irish on my mother's side.... I'm trying to think of what other traditions we have... On Mr. SKI's side, the big holiday of course is New Years, and his mother would always make certain things, like ozoni (new year's soup with mochi). We also used to always get all the traditional new year's dishes from the supermarket (because they are super complicated to make), and since we've been in the US, those dishes are one thing Mr. SK misses a lot. You can order special platters of Japanese new year's foods in the US but they tend to be in the $300 price range! One of these days we'll do that. Oh, one thing we do here every year since can be done easily (and cheaply) is to have soba (buckwheat noodles) on new year's eve. Soba noodles are long and the traditional is that you eat them on new year's eve as you cross over into the new year, and you hope to have success in the new year and live a long life in the way that the noodles are long... (it sounds more poetic in Japanese 
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Has Achieved Nirvana |
Grandma was British and enjoyed a proper Christmas meal on Christmas Eve. She had all of the trappings to carry it off, too - Johnson Bros. china, silver flatware and tea sets, linen table cloths, various Victorian knick-knacks for the table (the olive pinchers were a favorite when I was a kid), and recipes that never varied. Shrimp cocktails, Prime Rib rare, Yorkshire Pudding. Whipped potatoes with scratch gravy. Yorkshire pudding (later pop-overs; the same batter baked in a cast iron muffin tin). Creamed peas with pearl onions (once available frozen, now I have to scratch make them), flaming plum pudding and Trifle for dessert. Trifle must be made with Bird's custard - much easier to find now than it once was. When mom passed we inherited the various dishware (except the Johnson Bros. - by that time we had our own Johnson Bros. set "Friendly Village") including the cool little goblets with glass inserts for the shrimp cocktails. The task of making dinner went to me and I still enjoy it. I no longer make plum pudding because no one else will eat it. For a while I would buy a little canned one and eat it myself (it's a good excuse to eat hard sauce), and when the grandkids get older I may start bringing it flaming to the table once again. I still remember the first time my parents did that - very impressive. Breakfast in the morning was always shirred eggs (a great way to make eggs for a crowd) and deviled kidneys. Mrs. Miller doesn't like either one so now we have some sort of strata. I miss that tradition. OTOH, I feel it's important not to cross the fine line between a tradition and a rut. This year I won't be cooking as we will be traveling to be with family in Ohio. We aren't even decorating this year, which I though I would miss but I haven't so far. My Mom used to pick fights over this and we're not going there. 
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| Has Achieved Nirvana |
what time and what can i bring? 
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Has Achieved Nirvana |
We are going to Ski Tip Lodge again on Christmas day. Made the reservations in October. Had some trouble getting a spot then. Ski Tip is the original ski lodge in this area. It is old, loads of character and the food is fabulous.
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Minor Deity |
The only tradition I have really kept up is Christmas Eve. We’ve been doing it so long, that the three ghosts and I really enjoy getting together and catching up on each others lives.… | |||
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| (self-titled) semi-posting lurker Minor Deity |
Steve, that’s a lovely table setting!!
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| Has Achieved Nirvana |
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| Has Achieved Nirvana |
Thanks! Grandma’s would have featured a lot more forks and a knife rest at every place setting. That china set has kind of gotten out of hand because people keep gifting us pieces of it. I think we have service for something like 20 and all manner of completer pieces. China like that is no longer popular but we’ve gotten plenty of use out of it. When the kids were little we used to throw huge Christmas parties with Santa Claus, Christmas Carols, piano and guitar accompaniment. We finally had to stop when it got too big.
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| Has Achieved Nirvana |
WTG, your Christmas traditions are beautiful and I thank you for sharing them. Years ago we got invited to some friends’ house for a traditional Hanukkah dinner. I remember it featured latkes but I’m embarrassed to admit I don’t recall the cultural significance. What I do remember is how important it was to the family and the memories this simple meal evoked. Powerful stuff, and to this day I feel honored to have been a part of it. They told the stories. Their children, and our children, seemed to understand. Nathan died a few months later, a victim of a sudden heart attack. He was a friend, soccer coach, mentor and all around good guy. The family has never really gotten over his passing. I haven’t either. We were fortunate to have been there to share his family tradition before his passing and I will always be grateful for that. I hope to be included in more family traditions and perhaps have an opportunity to share mine in the future.
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| Has Achieved Nirvana |
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Minor Deity |
Ditto. How lovely to have such traditions!
The Hannukah story is about the small band of Jewish rebels, the Maccabees who who heroically fought off the their Greco-Syrians oppressors to rededicate the 2nd Temple in Jerusalem for far longer than their numbers or supplies would have allowed for by mortal standards. Miraculously, though (the key symbol), the special eight-branched candelabra*, the Hannukiah (not a simple Menorah or light), burned brightly for eight nights on only enough oil for a single night. Hence, the nightly celebration of eight days - the Jewish "Festival of Lights", and since the candelabra was lit by oil, traditionally Hannukah highlights oily foods - especially (at least, in the Ashekenazi or Western Jewish tradition), latkes or crispy potato pancakes and other deep fried food, such as donuts. I'm afraid it's all too true that Jews tend to high cholesterol and heart disease, a matter apparently of genes and nurture, as oil was over-used in much Jewish cooking on all occasions. In order to keep Kosher, (i.e., not to mix meat and dairy), Jewshey especially favor schmaltz or the omnipresent chicken fat saved for cooking. (Sour cream too for non- meat meals.) Nb. if you hear something described as "schmaltzy" it means over-sentimental, kitschy. *There is actually a ninth light or candle too called the "shammes" or beadle/helper, used to light the others one at a time.
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