The roast beast at our Christmas dinner this year. Oops! My china is a bit uncoordinated.
Growing up, we always had turkey and dressing for Christmas dinner. Turkey for Thanksgiving, turkey for Christmas.
Not only that, it was always the exact same menu: turkey, dressing, sweet potatoes with pineapple, ambrosia, cherry coke salad, peas and asparagus casserole. For dessert we had pecan pie and pumpkin pie with perhaps a another dessert added like chocolate pie. Yes, we were heavy on the pies! Is there another dessert? Oh wait, at Christmas we had Christmas cookies if there were any left by the time the 25th rolled around. (There were six kids.)
It was all foods I absolutely loved, or grew to love. I certain I didn’t love the asparagus when I was five. I do know I started eating it just for the buttered toast drenched in cream of mushroom soup that was on top!
It was the only time of year we had most of those dishes, but a bit repetitive. So when I finally got the chance to host my own Christmas, I decided I wanted to do something different for dinner. I’ve changed the menu every year since, but a beef roast is often featured.
This year I noticed that I’m not the only one doing different Christmas dinners! My brother also did a beef roast, my sister had shrimp newberg, and my aunt had a pork roast. Just when did the traditions start changing? How long had there been a tradition of turkey anyway?
My grandmother grew up on a West Texas sheep rank in the early 1900s where they used to have to run from Pancho Villa periodically. She said they always had turkey for both holidays. They would order the turkeys from Sears and Robuck and raise them in a pen all year in anticipation! It was a treat, even when they had it twice in a row, because it was such a change from cabrito (goat). Her own holiday dinners were also both turkey, as were my mom’s. So I wondered, why does the tradition change now? Why not one or two generations ago? My granmom’s theory is that there are just so many different recipe available now. When she started cooking she only had one cookbook. If it wasn’t in there and she didn’t already know how to make it, it didn’t get cooked.
What about you? What did you have for Christmas dinner? Is it different from what you had growing up?
Christmas dinner is a collaborative affair, involving my mom, sister, and our husbands (the kids will try anything these days). We had lamb this year, which is something we don’t often have, so a bit of a treat. It was great, but I think I’ll suggest roast beef next year. You make it sound so good that I can hardly wait!
It looks very good on your post, too – despite the eclectic china!
I have Christmas china, but only the plates. So the strawberry platter went better with that. But then we had only a very little bit of juice from the roast (that’s *all* that came out of the entire roast) and I didn’t make gravy like I was planning to. Now I’m wondering why I didn’t use the matching cream pitcher to the platter… just now as I was writing this I realized I have one! I think it’s at the back of the cabinet. Usually we just pore the cream for our coffee straight from the carton. 🙂
I was tempted by the lamb when I was ordering my roast!