Christmas Holiday menu, 2016

Christmas menu, 2016

Along with a Christmas gift list, I find planning the Christmas Menu and work list a lot of fun. Although over the years, my list for Christmas gifts has shortened, yet my Christmas Menu has increased, especially for Christmas Eve Dinner.  This year since we were going to have house guests over the Christmas season, I planned and prepared each day's meal so that it could be frozen in my deep freeze and brought out the day before to be popped into the oven.  I find that everyone wants to hang out in the kitchen and eager to eat right away.  Yes, our fast food generation! 

I have posted my Menu planning list and have added links to the dishes I have blogged before, some more than others, so these links have also been included with a date.  I will be blogging on the other dishes and including the link in this menu list! 

I found that by making ahead casseroles, I enjoyed Christmas very much but it did take about 2 weeks to prepare before hand.  But it was well worth it!  Do note that since my niece was a vegetarian, I had two casseroles for each meal ready. The vegetarian dishes went well with everyone!

I must add that everything went smoothly before Christmas with my husband chopping most of the vegetables for the casseroles. Things went so went and ahead of schedule that on the 22rd, I decided to self clean my oven, not because the oven was so dirty, but my expresso pot was.  Then my oven would not heat up!  My hubby, an electrical engineer, could not find the fuse, so 118 dollars later, my oven was working!  By then I had rethought how I was doing to prepare these dishes, at 2 am in the morning. On googling, it was suggested never to clean the oven before a holiday. Who knew!  

Dec 23

Mexican Cornbread Pie

Dec 24 Svata Vechir

Breakfast    Spinach Frittata. oranges 

Lunch    Hawaiian Sliders 

Christmas Eve

Kutcha

Loving Kutcha

Kolach

Appetizers

Herring

pickled mushroom

smoked salmon

Soup

Borscht with dumplings (Vuška), Borscht, 2015
Mushroom soup

Beet salad

Wild Mushroom gravy

Caramelized onions

Cheese and potato Pyrohy, 

Peroghies,Pyrohy, dumplings by any other name!

Pyrohy.. Ukrainian dumpling

Pyrohy, Vareneki

Sauerkraut Pyrohy
Sauerkraut Pyrohy for Christmas Eve

Cabbage Pyrohy for Christmas Eve

Cabbage Rolls
Cabbage Rolls,  Rice Holubtsi for Christmas Eve

Cabbage Rolls, Holopchi

Fish balls

Fish balls,2014

Fish Balls, 2015

Pampushky 

Pampushky  , Deep fryer

Pampushky, doughnuts by any other name!

Platter of fruit cakes, black bunt, white fruit cake, Dark Fruit cake, dried fruit and nuts

oranges

Late Night snacks, mixed of pickles, olives, cheese and sausage  and Italian Bread 

Christmas Day

Baked French Toast with Porchetta and cheese

Baked French Toast with Cheese

Baked Blueberry Pudding

Poppyseed rolls

Lunch

Sliders
Homemade Pizza

Christmas Day Dinner

Appetizers

mixed of pickles, olives, cheese and sausage and Italian Bread 

Jalapeno poppers

Borscht 

Steamed carrots

Green beans with almonds

Coleslaw

Twice baked Potatoes
Swedish Meatballs

Turkey with Dressing 

Tangy Cranberry sauce
Gravy

Cornbread Stuffing with oyster and shrimp gravy

Flamed Steamed pudding with Butterscotch sauce

Boxing Day- Dec 26

Breakfast Cowboy Breakfast casserole

Fruit cocktail

Lunch

Turkey Sliders

Carrot soup

Dinner

Prime Rib Roast

Make Ahead Gravy

Mushrooms

Steamed Broccoli

Caesar Salad, spinach salad

Beet salad

Guinness Bundt Cake with  Butterscotch sauce


New Year's Day 
Meat Fondue with Béarnaise Sauce 

Cheese Fondue 

Jan 6th

Herring Under a FurCoat 

Pan fried Fish

Lava Cake, A Canadian Love Affair

The theme for the Canadian Food Experience this month is a Canadian  Love Affair!  Initially, my thought was that since it was February, the theme would be on Valentines and with this all the delightful memories as young child and all the excitement of preparing for Valentines's day.  In school, the classrooms were all decorated with red hearts.  Everyone was given two large pieces of red construction paper with a heart outlined on the paper.  The hearts were cut out and personalized than either stapled together or bond together with yarn to form a pocket that would hold all the Valentines from classmates.  Every student would exchange Valentine cards that were cut out of a huge Hallmark Booklet with an assortment of Valentines along with envelopes that also needed to be cut out.  Great care was taken in picking out just the right saying on the cards for different classmates.  Valentine Heart people Valentine cards for the grandparents! Art classes before Valentines had students making Valentines cards out of red construction paper, trimmed with ribbons and paper doilies for parents and grandparents.  When my son competed internationally in Biathlon, he found out Valentines was not a tradition in many countries.  He had great fun running a Valentine poetry contest on Valentine's day in Poland.  Can you guess what the prize might be?  Making valentine treats for school My Mom's favorite Valentine gift was a crotched pineapple design to form a cushion trimmed with folded satin ribbon.  How I wish she had made me one of these beauties! Pineapple Valentine Cushion While in Puerto Rico on Valentine Day in San Jose.     All the store windows were decorated for Valentine's day with street venders selling valentine balloons, red baskets filled with chocolates, teddy bears and/or flowers.  Old San Jose was buzzing with families lined up for all the restaurants.  San Jose celebrated Valentines day as a religious holiday and family day.   In the beautiful Cathedral Basilica of St Joseph located in old city, the congregation was invited up to the round altar under the skylight dome.   Although the mass was in Spanish, my husband and I followed the congregation and were given a church blessing of love- in English, after the priest asked us, where we were from! As I reflect on this month's topic for the Canadian Food Experience and the direction it might take me.  A love affair that is Canadian!  Love affair is defined as either an intimate sexual relationship or episode between lovers or a strong enthusiasm.  Thoughts of intimate dinners with oozing chocolate desserts address the love affair part but the part of Canadian stands out for me.  To mind comes my Mom and Dad's love affair with being Canadian.  In spite of my parents being first generation Canadians, English was not their first language.  In fact, they were punished and strapped with a leather belt if they spoke their own language in the school yard.  English was not only to be spoken on the school grounds but also to and from their home on their walk from the school.  Mom spoke of road monitors that would report to the teacher anyone that did not comply to this rule.   Yet, my parents embraced Canadian ways and were most proud to be Canadian first! Ethnic food was something that was made for feast day such as Christmas and Easter but generally speaking food served were local products from one's garden and farm.  Meat and potatoes  with vegetables  were the norm.  Ingredients used were seasonal.  One remembers well the first crop of lettuce, radishes, onions and spinach.  Raspberries and rhubarb  were another sign of spring that  ended up in pies.  That first taste of honey in the spring from the dandelion blooms.  Some of the tastes are not as wonderful as is that taste of milk in the spring! Yuck!     I grew up eating food that where greatly influenced by Le Cordon Bleu trained chef and nutritionist, a Felician sister my mom worked for in the hospital kitchen.  Only recently do I appreciate the expertise of my Mom's cooking that was so greatly influenced by French Cooking at a very young age.    Nellie mixing up a lemon pie filling in a bain-marie My recipe is one that I came across only recently but have wooed those that I have prepared this winter for birthdays and celebration.  To me, valentines is a celebration of family but mainly loving life, self and those around us!  This recipe is perfect to make for a dinner party, for those you love or just for yourself!!  The storage of uncooked batter in the refrigerator makes it perfect for one's self indulgence! Microwave Lava Cake One Brownie Mix 2 eggs 1/4 c oil 1/4 c water Follow the recipe on the back of the Brownie Mix, but use an extra egg for the batter and you can also use rum as the liquid in place of water.  Prepare the custard cups or  canning jars.   The wide mouth jam jars work well! Pour in about 1/2 cup of cake mix into each prepared dish.  Stack two pieces of chocolate together and push the chocolate into the centre of the batter, making sure the chocolate is covered.  Bake one cake in a Microwave for one minute at full power.  Cooking times will vary depending on your microwave.  In my Panasonic microwave, 2 cakes cook at full power for 1 1/2 minutes.   When I cooked 2 cakes for 2 minutes, the cakes were not as moist as I would have liked them to be. These cakes can be decorated in many ways.  With vanilla ice-cream or whipped cream and fresh fruit.  The end of the Butterscotch sauce that was made for the Christmas Pudding was used in the below picture!   The best thing about this recipe is that it can be made ahead of time, covered and refrigerated up to a week. How perfect if you are using jars as you can easily use the lids from the jars.   Do remove from the refrigerator to warm up to room temperature 30 minutes before cooking. Happy Valentines to all the bloggers for the Canadian Food Experience and my wonderful family!