What Dish At A Holiday Dinner Or Other Family Gathering Has The Best Memories For You, And Why?
Italian Christmas dinners are not generally centred around a stuffed turkey or goose, or a ham. Like most Italian meals, they’re multi-course affairs starting with antipasti — and they generally include pasta, meats, fish, contorni and it goes on and on and on.
One year, I spent the afternoon preparing for our Christmas dinner with my 5-year-old niece Madelaine, teaching her how to clean and cook octopus. It would be really hard for me to pick a favourite dish since they are so intertwined with family memories, but one of the dishes that appears regularly at any Rocco Christmas feast is Polpo in Umido, and it’s a memory I share with my niece.
I have a Jewish friend who remembers her grandmother’s meat blinzes, a soft meat-filled crepe, very fondly. She says she’s never eaten a softer or more delicate crepe since and when she thinks of it, she remembers family dinners at her grandparents.
What is the dish you had at a holiday dinner that has the best memories for you?
Yahoo! Canada Answers Staff Note: This is the real David Rocco! His cookbook, David Rocco’s Dolce Vita (HarperCollins), is out now: http://www.harpercollins.ca/books/978155…
Tags: Best, Dinner, Dish, Family, Gathering, Holiday, Memories
Christmas Eve was ALWAYS Clam Chowder at Mom’s…I’ve made it at my own home, and it just isn’t the same. (The chowder’s better, in fact, but it just isn’t the same without the family gathered round…)
We always had family get gatherings for Christmas dinner. We had a very normal dinner with turkey and all the regular trimmings. The little kids had to sit and the card table. It was always decorated just like the big table. For some reason every Christmas we had a red and a green jello made in small corning ware dishes. I seldom remember anyone eating any at dinner but I will always remember how festive they looked on the table.
hmmm…come to think of it i don’t have any fond memories of fav dishes at family gatherings as yet but perhaps i ought to start making some now. I love to cook and my dads flying in from Edmonton for Xmas so i was planning on preparing a deli-sh menu since it is also gonna be my B-Day on Xmas. am getting a lil tired of all the samosas and biryani
It isn’t the most gourmet item on the menu, but my favourite has to be jellied salade. My mom makes it with cannned mandarin oranges, shredded carrot and celery. We had it every christmas for the longest time, and it has imprinted itself into my memory. We didn’t have it the last few christmases, so I begged my mom to bring it back this year.
it has to be . roast beef dinner. why ? because at age 8 from laredo mexico we went to laredo texas for christmas dinner not to a mexican family (we are mexicans) and that was what they serve for dinner and let me tell you is one of my best food memories of course I never had roast like that before en mexico I just can’t imagine if it would have been fried chicken ( just kidding ritzo ratzo
I would have to say bacon. When i was little, and would visist my grandparents house i use to get up really arly and wait at the breakfast table, utill my grandparents got up and ask if my bacon was ready yet. To this day, when we visit at christmas, i always have to ask “is my bacon ready yet?”
My grandma likes making some kind of pork roast and also roast beef, boiled potatoes, vegetables (corn, green beans, peas, carrots, saurkraut, etc) and her special own recipe gravy…and then for dessert she makes her either her own special recipe amazing apple cake or we have some crazy pudding stuff she loves to make. I love Christmas dinners with my whole family.
My Grandparents were Ukranian and we always had my Grandmother’s homemade Cabbage Rolls with our Turkey dinner. Well my sister and I are all grown up now, and my Grandparents have longed passed away. We’ve tried to make these delicious Cabbage rolls, but can never get it quite like my Grandmother did.
That’s easy. It is my mom’s special potato cheese dish and beef in her special wine sauce. I hate turkey or goose. Ham is okay, but not special enough.
We won’t be having it this year though as my parents have skipped off somewhere warm for Christmas so there’s going to be no “family Christmas”.
My Mother makes what we call “Mock Cherry pie” It is MY FAVOURITE Christmas treat. All the more special because only she and I like it, so it is something we share. It simply is not Christmas for me without that dessert.
It is made with Sticky raisins (no substitute) and whole cranberries. It is both sweet and sour at the same time, and best served warm with old fashioned French Vanilla Ice Cream
My mom was never a big turkey fan, so she always roasted a duck for Christmas. Since I’ve been away from home, my husband and I always end up at someone else’s home for Christmas dinner and they always of course make turkey. Once I start cooking my own Christmas dinners again, I will be making duck!
My mom’s turkey stuffing!
On christmas eve, we would both break the bread into little pieces and talk about the holidays, life, all kinds of things! it took a while, but I have some great memories of that time- it’s tradition!
Then on christmas day we’d eat the best stuffing ever made- I love her stuffing!
one christmas we had turkey with all the trimmings big family dinner .. my mom decided to put a few popcorn kernels on the turkey’s butt… well we heard this loud POP we ran to see what happened my mom was laughing so hard she said she blew the a** of the turkey.. that was memorable and funny….
For me, it was my Gramma’s squares, pies and buns that she always baked us for Christmas. When she found out she had cancer again and had no hope of recovery, she baked and froze enough for a couple of Christmases. It was a bittersweet day for all of us, those first and second years without her.
My best Thanksgiving was when my friend Verno came over. We (my Aunt and I) dumped water from the top balcony over his head!!! And later he got me to go to the garden to get a glass that fell and he got me good, He dumped a whole bucket on my head.
It was fun, we also went tubing and went into the lake at the ski hill!
I love Verno, he is my friend!
Love James and Henry
Pumpkin Pie with whip cream.I’d eat it all year round. Both of my daughters were born right around Canadian Thanksgiving. (mid-Oct.) and when i called my mom from the hospital, the first thing I asked for was pumpkin pie. My mom brought me some of her homemade pie each time. Yummy! I love pumpkins. Anything made with pumpkin, I have a weakness for. Don’t ask me why, I just love pumpkins!
We never had turkey because my mom is quite allergic to it. We always had minced meat pies and tortiere. I know that seems odd – British and French Canadian traditional fare, but my mom is French Canadian and my father is from N. Ireland…. made sense to have both. I still have tortiere every Christmas. I can’t imagine NOT having it!
Cheers!
my fondest holiday dinners were at my Omas at christmas time, she often made homemade chicken and dumplings for over 25 people, she would spend hours preparing everything, and when it came time to drop the dumplings we always seemed to have them at the same time, love you Oma
Grandma Hill’s cole slaw. It was always served for holidays. She made her own dressing for it, and I’m the only one who bothered to find out what went into it. When my family has a get-together now, everybody wants me to bring cole slaw, it seems to give us a sense that Grandma is still with us.
mine may sound strange, but the family xmas tradition for dinner always included macaronie baked with chunks of old cheddar cheese, eaten with lots of cranberry sauce! we could have had it all year long, but it was always saved for xmas dinner! so i do it now, and my daughters will follow!
Well, my Opa used to make ‘Roladin’ every Christmas. It was something everyone looked forward to. But after he died of cancer, we all brought up the memories of making it with him, and how fun it was. It’s nice to know he’ll never be forgotten.
My mom makes the BEST stuffing ever!! When I was a kid I would always offer to get it out of the turkey so that I could ’sample’ it (aka fill up before dinner) Yum
My dad’s gravy is also really good… my boyfriend doesn’t like gravy but he will eat my dads.
I really love having stuffing every year,
It’s so yummy and my grandmother makes it the best,
I never eat the day after boxing day because Christmas AND Boxing day are filled with so much food and family shinanagans I just get so full =]
omfg i love u david rocco
i love lasagne i have it every year and i make it myself from scratch it takes soooo long but it feels so good to rub it all over me
the warm sauce on my busum is so sweet
Hmm, that’s a tough one. So many holiday dishes bring back memories. I’d have to say my Grandmother’s deviled eggs. I always remember my cousin would take out the filling and only eat the white part. (:
The best dish I ever had at a holiday diner was plain bread, broken in memory of Christ and passed to all to appreciate before we dug in to the rest of the meal..
My mom would always make deviled eggs and sprinkle with paprika and sometimes if she had extra time she would pipe the filling in and it would be so pretty and elegant looking to me as a young child.
it was russian pancakes with black or red caviar inside. it was carried on by my great grandmother through out the year and was passed on my generations of my family.
This might sound gross.
But my grandmother’s caesar salad and running away from my uncle’s farts caused by the dressing.
Very good memory because everyone was laughing and smiling.
Fish and small bean soup
every Christmas my family eats it
Fish for the non vegetarian
Small bean soup for the vegetarian
and i dont know why does it has the most memories
being brought up in a Portuguese household sweet bread is definitely my favourite dish at christmas . my grandma made it all the time it never is a true christmas without sweet bread