Classic Holiday Foods

[Trickeration]

I know we've touched on the golden era foods, but a funny incident at our house on Thanksgiving got me thinking about vintage era holiday foods AND their presentation.

Here's what happened while I was getting ready to serve Thanksgiving dinner. We were having Wild Root over, and as always we'd set a vintage table with jadeite dishes at each place and milk glass to serve from. Everything looked great, and my daughter was helping me with condiments and such. We got to the cranberry sauce, which I'd bought canned. ( It's the one thing I still haven't gotten around to making fresh ). Anyway, I opened the can and asked my daughter if she thought we should serve it as my old magazines suggest, by sliding the whole can into the low bowl instead of spooning it in as we usually do. In my 1940's magazines, the ads mention that this is to give a "log" effect. Actually, I always thought it looked terrible when my mom and grandmother did it when I was young. But, now at least I know where they got the idea, and why they did it.

Well, my daughter had fit. "MOM! You're not going to do that! If you do, I'll smoosh as soon as you're not looking!" she threatened. My son came in said "You're going to scoop it into the bowl, right?" He just looked confused when my daughter told him what I'd suggested. In the end, we spooned the sauce into the bowls like we do every year. I do prefer how it looks, and I'll probably continue serving cranberry sauce this way, but it made for a funny "Seinfeld" moment on Thanksgiving.

By the way, WildRoot felt the same way I did. Even though that's how the old ads say to serve your canned cranberry sauce, he also thought it was funny when his family did it. So what do you do? Do you spoon the sauce into a bowl, or do you display the "lovely" tin can-shaped log of cranberries at your table. Also, do you follow any other vintage food traditions during the holidays?

 

[Deleted member 259]

I can't stand the stuff, but my grandmother slides it out can shaped and then slices it, so that there are cranberry-shaped disks, and arranges them in a very shallow bowl.

 

[Mycroft]

I can't stand the stuff, but my grandmother slides it out can shaped and then slices it, so that there are cranberry-shaped disks, and arranges them in a very shallow bowl.

Liver . My mom makes it strait up in a pot, I think it looks best in a bowl all mushed up. It also increases the consitancy of flavoring.

 

[jamespowers]

It has actually been a while since my grandmother did Thanksgiving---probably the mid seventies. I really do not remember much about it.
We started our own tradition this year since I really do not like turkey in the first place and my mother and grandmother were not around to protest. My wife hated doing the turkey anyway.
So we did boneless leg of lamb and a prime rib with all the trimmings. I can live with that. :cheers1:
Christmas is probably going to be something about the same. Maybe I will get a Virginia ham---not the sweet sugary one either. I could never understand sweet ham. Ham is supposed to be salty not sweet. :kick:

Regards to all,

J

P.S. I can't quite understand the draw of cranberries sauce either though.

 

[Miss Neecerie]

No cranberry...

I was traumatized this year.....

My aunt unilaterally decided that 'no one eats it' and so thus didnt get any.

There was no point in arguing that 'I do so eat it every single year' because at that point, what are you going to do....

But I was traumatized that she would change this, over having paid what..75 cents to a 1.99 for a can that would then have leftovers.....

 

[jamespowers]

But I was traumatized that she would change this, over having paid what..75 cents to a 1.99 for a can that would then have leftovers.....

Hahahahahah! Good Point.
I would have sent the leftovers home with you.

Regards to all,

J

 

[Lena_Horne]

I can't stand the stuff, but my grandmother slides it out can shaped and then slices it, so that there are cranberry-shaped disks, and arranges them in a very shallow bowl.

That's how my grandmother does it, so it's also funny that now that I think of it, I never knew it was a vintage act. I never saw anything funny about it. I personally love cranberry sauce and dressing, but at this time in my life I'm a vegetarian so I won't be able to have any for a few years.

My cousin however is the one who can eat it "straight up." I need the dressing though.

L_H

 

[Nathan Flowers]

I personally like the can shape, so we slice.

 

[Twitch]

One thing I like is traditional fruitcakes. I know everyone jokes about them but send them to me if you don't want them!

 

[jamespowers]

One thing I like is traditional fruitcakes. I know everyone jokes about them but send them to me if you don't want them!

You know the funny thing is that they really do last forever! I was looking through my mother's closet and found a fruitcake in a box! Then I remembered where it came from. My mother took it from my grandmother's house after she passed away. It was the top layer of her wedding cake from 1916! The dang thing still looks good. Really strange what people save.
You want me to send it to you Twitch? Tell me how it tastes.

Regards to all,

J

 

[shamus]

You know the funny thing is that they really do last forever! I was looking through my mother's closet and found a fruitcake in a box! Then I remembered where it came from. My mother took it from my grandmother's house after she passed away. It was the top layer of her wedding cake from 1916! The dang thing still looks good. Really strange what people save.
You want me to send it to you Twitch? Tell me how it tastes.

Regards to all,

J

I bet you could put that on Ebay and sell it for at least $200+. all I ask is 30% for the idea

 

[jamespowers]

I bet you could put that on Ebay and sell it for at least $200+. all I ask is 30% for the idea

I don't know. It is, after all, a family artifact that maybe I should keep. Having it sell to a casino so they could put it on display might not be what I had in mind for my grandparents wedding cake. They would probably give me $1,000 for it.

Regards to all,

J

 

[Slicksuit]

I think that the whole cranberry-log presentation was borne out of the advertisements during that period - the shape being the undeniable indicator of the product's source. I can just picture it in my head..."Now featured in the Ladies Home Journal...from the Swanson company". In a similar way, Jello gained popularity and a multitude of uses in the 1950's due to their heavy product/media tie-ins.

Fruit cake is THE pentultimate in classic holiday treats, having been made for centuries. My understanding is that real homemade fruitcake is actually not all that bad, if made from quality ingredients. Having been a derivative from the Ancient Romans, the fruitcake as we know it came about during the Middle Ages. The invention of candied fruit as a means of preservation created a surplus of said ingredient, and fruitcake was a way to use it up. Using nuts in the preparation of the cake signified good luck for the following year's harvest. The cake owes its shelflife to the fact that it is soaked in alcohol, as well as the linen it is stored with.

 

[Slicksuit]

While the choice in traditional Christmas food is probably largely culturally and geographically specific, cookies, in some form or another, seem to be widespread. Gingerbread keeps coming to mind.

Some other classic holiday treats:
Eggnog (which is distinctly American)
Christmas pudding (aka. Plum Pudding)
Apple cider
Hot chocolate
Candy canes
Mince pie
Apple, Pecan, or Pumpkin Pie

Much overlap exists between Christmas and Thanksgiving in its main dishes (ie. turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce). It is interesting to note that the Christmas meal in Japan is akin to Valentines Day in the U.S. My family's tradition is to leave turkey exclusively to Thanksgiving, and serve ham on Christmas. And being of Italian descent, we always have some type of pasta available.

 

[Biltmore Bob]

Where I come from we enjoy...

Muskrat Pat?ɬ©

INGREDIENT:
Muskrat (the meat from 2 Muskrats)
5 Roasted Garlic Cloves
1 tbs. Soy Sauce
1/4 cup White Wine
4 Egg Yolks
3 Shake*
Chopped Pecans
Crackers
Hot Sauce (if desired)

SERVING SIZE: 12 Servings

DIRECTIONS:
To prepare muskrat, begin by skinning, removing all visible fat with your thumb and a paring knife. Open up the hind legs along the thighs from the base of tail to knee. Spot the musk sacks and remove.

Put 2 to 3 gallons of cold water in a pot. Add 1 cup of salt. Drop muskrat in. Bring to a boil. When water boils remove muskrat. Put another 2 to 3 gallons of cold water in pot. Dip muskrat in cold water, remove. Rub away excess fat and blood particles with thumbs.

De-bone muskrat meat from hind legs, spine meat and front shoulders, legs & neck. Make sure all meat is boneless. Put meat into a food processor with a steel blade. Add to each muskrat, garlic cloves, soy sauce, white wine, egg yolks and 3 Shake to taste. Blend until pulverized and smooth.

Using a small saucer, mound to a ball shape in the middle and sprinkle chopped pecans over the pat?ɬ© and refrigerate. Serve with crackers. A splash of hot sauce over the ball makes it GREAT!

 

[Marc Chevalier]

If it tastes good and doesn't give salmonella, serve it up!

 

[IndianaGuybrush]

My mom is Puerto Rican, and since she does all the cooking (it doesn't hurt that she's a chef with her own cookbook and show out!) we've always had Puerto Rican Christmas Eve's, and I wouldn't have it any other way. Here's a brief list, with some descriptions:

Pernil : A roast pork shoulder, seasoned in garlic, pepper, and adobo (a seasoning). Besides being delicious, the pork shoulder is always huge so we have plenty of leftovers for christmas Cubanos the next day.
Arroz con Gandules : Yellow rice and pigeon peas
Pasteles : These are kind of hard to describe, but I'll do my best. They're kind of like Puerto Rican tamales, but instead of being made of corn masa (meal) they're made of a masa of mixed tubers and starches, like yuca, yautia, calavasa, green bananas and plantains. This is all mashed together and mixed with seasoned minced pork, then wrapped in banana leaves and boiled. It's incredible, and having a christmas eve without pasteles would be inconceivable.
Mariscada en Salsa Verde : Mixed seafood in a parsely white wine sauce. Clams, mussels, scallops, shrimp, yummm......

Those are just the staples that show up every year. There are a bunch of extras that change in rotation from year to year, but we'd be here all day if I listed them... however, for those of you that are interested in learning more about Puerto Rican food, or Latin American food of all kinds, check out my mom's website : http://www.daisycooks.com/pages/main.cfm

You can purchase her cookbook there, and also get the times her show is playing at your local public television station.

 

[magneto]

My mom is Puerto Rican, and since she does all the cooking (it doesn't hurt that she's a chef with her own cookbook and show out!) we've always had Puerto Rican Christmas Eve ...

{{SNIP rest of interesting and tasty post}}
I enjoyed reading that! Being an Irish-Italian, inter alia, I fondly recall Christmas dinners involving antipasto and lasagna (because one simply cannot be festive without a pasta product involved).
I have thought about cooking a meal straight from my Golden Era cookbooks. Am definitely doing the fruitcake and mincemeat pies this year, at any rate.

 

[Jessica]

Hahaha, my family has always served the cranberry sauce in a can, and they present it in the log shape without slicing it our smushing it! That is so funny, I didn't realize it was advertised that way. How "retro" of my folks.