Non-Traditional Holiday Treats

[Solfe]

On the night before Thanksgiving, my kids love "Taco Salad Night". We lay out a spread of salad, beans, cheese, tortillas, taco meat, carrots and celery and a variety of sauces/salsas. The children try to assemble and eat their very own tacos, but it ends up as a great big messy pile of taco themed food. Baths are run as dinner ends and afterwards we watch a movie.

Do you have any non-traditional holiday treats or events that have become a tradition?

Solfe

(This post is in honor of my friend Vanessa, who in a public speaking class, made up a list of ridiculous and horrifying family traditions. It was all taken at face value and haunted her for the rest of her college career.)

[Buttercup]

Nope.

We're still traditional.

Including baking a delicious fruitcake from scratch. The fruit within is only maraschino cherries, golden raisins, and chopped sugared dates; none of that "candied" fruit nor citrus peel (bleech!).

Might also make some homemade eggnog.

[pumpkinpie]

My husband doesn't care for turkey but he loves greek food, so in the past few years for Thanksgiving and/or Christmas we've been cooking dishes such as spanakopita and pastistio.

[Grey]

My father was a minister, so growing up, we'd all be getting ready and going to the Christmas Eve service at church, and we'd be there a while afterward, with no time in there to work on making dinner. So Christmas Eve dinner was always takeout from the local Chinese restaurant, which would still be open. We kept offering to pick it up before the service, so they wouldn't have to stay open as late, but they'd always insist on waiting, since the food wouldn't be as good if it wasn't fresh. We still often have Chinese food for Christmas eve dinner.

[Swift]

My father was a minister, so growing up, we'd all be getting ready and going to the Christmas Eve service at church, and we'd be there a while afterward, with no time in there to work on making dinner. So Christmas Eve dinner was always takeout from the local Chinese restaurant, which would still be open. We kept offering to pick it up before the service, so they wouldn't have to stay open as late, but they'd always insist on waiting, since the food wouldn't be as good if it wasn't fresh. We still often have Chinese food for Christmas eve dinner.

Being a good New York Jew, I've had Chinese on Christmas or Christmas eve on more than one occasion. But in New York and elsewhere, that actually is considered a tradition.

Not a food thing, but a holiday tradition in my house... my birthday is December 24. Since it is "my day", I get to pick what to do and one of my favorite things to do is go to the zoo. I always find it neat with no crowds, pretty close to the place to ourselves, and some of the animals are more active.

[Solfe]

We have the large part of our Christmas celebration on Christmas Eve, so Dec 25th is a really quiet day for us. We used to go to Chang's for Chinese for dinner, but they closed a few years back. Now we try all different places in the hopes of finding the best Chinese food. We haven't found any bad places, but nothing really stands out like Chang's. How I miss that place!

[MAPNUT]

I have a vegetarian guest this year, so I can't make mincemeat pie. I'm making mincevegge instead.