On 12/23/2010 12:58 AM, Sky wrote:
> For Christmas day, it was a tradition to have boiled shrimp & cocktail
> sauce (aka 'shrimp cocktail') as munchies while the gifts & presents
> around the Christmas tree were opened sometime later morning. That
> 'snack' was to tide everyone over until the big Christmas dinner feast
> was served, usually around 1 to 2pm. For Christmas Eve, KFC was usually
> brought home No cooking for dinner was done on Christmas Eve since
> everything was mostly reserved for the next day's big family feast.
>
> Sky
>
> P.S. There was/is always the obligatory 'cheese straws', too! (groan &
> giggles!) Those cheese straws still have to be made!

We don't have a food tradition, per se, but one of our cookie traditions
is Christmas Roses. These cookies are rolled out and then cut in
circles of 3 different sizes. Then you put them together with one
small, one medium, and one large, putting a dab of water in the center
of each to make them stick together. Then you make 4 cuts around the
outside almost to the center. This makes the petals. Then you deep
fry them and they puff up a little and the petals separate. When done
you dust them with powdered sugar and put a glob of red currant jelly
in the center. They are beautiful and taste wonderful. I like to eat
them by pulling off the petals, one by one, and dipping each one in the
jelly before eating it. Yum.

My personal holiday food tradition - if you stretch the meaning of
"food" to include beverages - is mimosas for Xmas brunch. I started
this many years ago when I was living in So. Calif. My mother and
sister and her husband were living there also. We would all have Xmas
together and I started making mimosas for us to have with brunch. I
continued the tradition after moving back to Pittsburgh.

Unfortunately (?) I only have my 80-year-old aunt and my disabled cousin
to spend Xmas with and neither of them drink. Thus I must force myself
to consume a whole champagne bottle's worth of mimosas. It's a dirty
job but someone has to do it.

This year I'm doing something new. I found a recipe for Pomegranate
Mimosas. It's pomegranate juice, orange juice, orange liqueur, and
the champagne. I can't wait to try it.

Last year I kind of went off the trail and made bellinis instead of
mimosas. But I think I prefer the mimosas.

Happy Holidays everyone,
Kate

--
Kate Connally
“If I were as old as I feel, I’d be dead already.”
Goldfish: “The wholesome snack that smiles back,
Until you bite their heads off.”
What if the hokey pokey really *is* what it's all about?