Christmas Foods

Dan asked what was our traditional Christmas dinner? Was it ham? Then he asked about any other traditional foods for Christmas. Jeff asked why we always did pigs-in-a-blanket for Christmas Eve? He said his family continues the tradition. When I asked, Aunt Lois said her family does too. This year with our Covid19 prescribed isolation, many traditions have taken a blow.But we have kept some of them. Pigs-in-a-blanket--My family of origin always had them on Christmas Eve so I guess I just continued that tradition. My sister and I used to compete to see who could eat the most! My mother told of checking to see which ones had the most meat--and then going for those. So the tradition must go back one more generation. The recipe is simple. I use Bisquick dough for the pastry and a combination of ground sausage and hamburger for the meat. The tricky part is coming out even with no meat or dough left over. They were delicious again this year--although we ate them on Christmas Day--so I guess we broke tradition a bit. Our Christmas Eve diinner was takeout from Olive Garden.

 Another tradition was making banket--a Dutch pastry with an almond filling. I had almond paste in the freezer left from last year but because of Covid concerns did not think I should bake banket to give away to friends this year. I gave some to Jeff's family and to Laura's family. When Katie heard that there was banket at her house but no one told her (and apparently ate it all), she said, "What? There was banket?" So I made her some--just for her--later. However, my family give-away only plan fell apart when Alonso, the head maintenance man here at Barclay Square, stopped Jim to ask if Mary was going to make that "good bread" again this year. So along with our Christmas gratuity, he got some banket too. 

 Susan gave us a container of her delicious Christmas mints and a container of her roll dough which we baked ourselves. The mints were delicious (they were on the counter so Jim could have had some but I think I ate almost all of them!) and the rolls were good--but not as good as when Susan bakes them from start to finish. So Jeff's family has its own traditions. I didn't make Christmas cookies but I know Jeff's family did (because they gave us some) and probably Laura's did too. 

 Now what shall we have for New Year's Eve? New Year's Day? I don't think we have any traditional eats but I know we will come up with something tasty--to eat in front of the TV probably--especially during the Rose Bowl when the Irish play Alabama.