Christmas Dinner Traditions
One thing we all have at Christmas are family traditions around what we have for dinner. For many of us, that means a turkey – often one we’re just about able to fit in the oven. And don’t forget the sprouts, complete with family traditions about putting them on to boil on Halloween!
We’ve already been warned that some of our Christmas favourites might not be available this year, and that some traditional staples might be in short supply. This means we might have to make do with substitutes, or even think up completely new menus for a special meal on the big day.
One thing we can be sure of is that Christmas is going to happen on the 25th December, ready or not, so planning your Christmas menu – and a few alternatives – now is a smart move. Here are a few alternative festive treats from around Europe to add to your table:
Portugal
The Portuguese go mad for cakes and pastries at Christmas. Particularly Christmassy are sonhos, which are a kind of deep-fried doughnut with plenty of sugar and cinnamon to spice them up. As well as being made from traditional doughnut ingredients such as flour and eggs, you are just as likely to find a variety made from flour and boiled, mashed pumpkin. A more popular Portuguese Christmas treat still is King cake (bolo rei), which has a little more in common with our traditional Christmas cakes. A dry cake, it’s made from a soft dough with nuts and candied fruits for sweetness. But there’s a trick – inside each bolo rei is a broad bean. Find that, and it’s your turn to buy the next round of cakes.
Czech Republic
Something savoury more your style? Travel to Prague in the run up to Christmas where you’ll see fish farmers selling live carp from water-filled tanks. The traditional Christmas meal for Czech families is fried carp with potato salad, a tradition dating back to at least the 19th century. Although perhaps your family meal might end up being just potato salad when you consider it’s also traditional to purchase your carp still alive, then have it swimming around at home in the bath tub until your Christmas Eve meal. If you are hardy enough to butcher your own carp for Christmas dinner, don’t forget to save a scale to carry around in your purse or wallet all year for good luck.
Germany
Germany is the home of the Christmas market, and a trip through a Berlin festive market at this time of year will bring you to several stalls serving glühwein and pfannkuchen – in other words, mulled wine and jam-filled doughnuts. Pfannkuchen are actually referred to as “Berlin pancakes”, or even just as a pancake (meaning John F Kennedy actually informed the people of Berlin in June 1963 “I am a doughnut”!). Berliners are sold all year round, but they have a particular role to play at New Year’s Eve parties; for every eight doughnuts that are filled with jam, you add one filled in with mustard to play a culinary trick on an unlucky guest!
Russia
Russian salad was born from necessity during the Soviet era when anything other than the basics in terms of party food was hard to get hold of. Rich mayonnaise is mixed with ham, eggs, potatoes, and any vegetables available (usually peas and carrots, often tinned), and it’s both filling and tasty – either on its own, or served with meat. The staple New Year film in Russia is “Irony of Fate”, a 1975 Soviety-era romantic comedy also known as ‘Enjoy your Bath!’, and based on the 1971 play ‘Once on New Year’s Eve’, and Russian – also known as Olivier or Stolichniy – salad features heavily. The film is so popular it has outlasted the Cold War era, and every New Year’s Eve millions tune in all over Russia and former Soviet states to watch. The premise plays on the fact that in the Brezhnev-era USSR, all apartments looked the same, even down to having the same front door key, and having the same addresses in multiple cities across the country. When a drunken young man is put on a flight from Moscow to Leningrad by mistake one New Year’s Eve, you can imagine what happens…
Whether you’re sticking to the traditional Sunday-Roast-Plus, or whether you’re adding in a Berliner and giving up the bathtub to a temporary pet carp this Christmas, be sure to get the season off to a festive start with a live video call direct from the North Pole with Santa Claus. Santa might be back in grottos this year, but by the power of Santa Magic, he’s also on Zoom, and ready to call you whenever you like as a family in the run up to Christmas. Get those Christmas jumpers on, make a mug of hot chocolate, and book your
video call with Santa from Santa’s Calling You today.
