I love trying traditional dishes from various cultures during the holidays, so that influences some of our dinners.
St Lucy Day is Dec 16th. The 2 regions that celebrate St Lucy in a big way are Sweden and Sicily. In Italy, it’s traditional to eat wheat berries in a soup or in a sweet pudding. I think I will make a wheatberry soup this year. I may make Swedish saffron lussekatter buns, a sweet bun, that way, as well.
Dec 23rd, one friend throws a Festivas party, so that usually means my dinner is made up of appetizers and cookies that night
I only recently heard about Newfies celebrating Tibbs Eve on Dec 23rd. Tibbs Eve typically involves a lot of drinking, and the food is mostly simple appetizers like cold cuts and cheese.
I might make a Jiggs Dinner, a Newfie boiled dinner, which 8 have read about, but I have not tried. Not that it’s a Tibbs Eve tradition, just to make something from Newfoundland that I have not made before.
On Xmas Eve, I always make seafood. Sometimes I look at southern Italy for inspiration through the feast of the 7 fishes, sometimes I go in a more Galizien Polish Ukrainian direction with many vegetarian dishes, other times I make Moqueca or Oysters Rockefeller.
Xmas dinner is roast goose or duck, and spanakopita.
Boxing day dinner is leftovers.
I don’t have a special plan for Dec 27th-Dec 30th, other than I often make dishes with the cheese we received. Cauliflower Cheese or Macaroni and Cheese, mostly.
Dec 31st, my DCs used to go to a restaurant with their friends until Dec 2020, when the pandemic made us homebodies. I would either go out with friends, or eat take-out at home and hang out with my dogs. I think my DCs might go to a house party and my NYE plans have not been set yet. My DCs and I went to a house party last NYE, and the hosts served Ina Garten’s Bouef Bourguignon.
Jan 1st, I now make a fancy dinner with a few lucky New Year
r foods. I might make a Beef Wellington or Coulibiac this year.
