Christmas preparations.

[StevieR]

Clootie dumpling and Christmas pudding are both very similar suet and fruit based puddings. Christmas pudding was also traditionally steamed in a cloth but steaming in a bowl or basin is now more popular. Happy to pm you my nan's recipe if you fancy a go! You've still got time but need to be quick as they need to mature for a few weeks.

[Laird_M]

We only do Xmas for the kids as its not a Buddhist celebration.
Will be making a traditinal style cake this weekend, and a clootie dumpling nearer the time.

Only snag is we nomally put our tree at the bottom of the stairs or by our bay window. We've now moved Imi's computer downstairs by the window and she wanted a bearded dragon for Valentines which is at the bottom of the stairs...

Xmas eve we have a goat mutton curry with lots of gravy, pol sambul (grated coconut with toddy vinegar, onions and chilli), tose (rice flour pancakes) and dahl. And I wear my kilt as I ALWAYS eat too much. The wife's cooking is superb, and its one of my favourite meals, so I can let it out...

[David Thorpe]

Having spent many years in South Texas, I was introduced to deep-fried turkey, pan de polvo and home-made tamales. All are delightful holiday treats.

[Destin_scot]

Differences between Thanksgiving and Christmas "feasts", not much; both seem to be excuses to forget about diets, and succumb to at least 2 of the 7 deadly sins.

Thanksgiving for me is a pretty big gathering of relatives and friends, usually somewhere between 100 and 200 people show up. It's pretty much a pot-luck meal with people bringing a dish of some kind. Vegetables, salads, desserts, breads. Meats are: turkey: roasted, smoked, deep-fried; baked/smoked-cured ham; roast pork. Brunswick Stew.

Christmas is a much, much smaller gathering, usually with friends and sometimes with family. meal wise: a beef roast or steak, sometimes a turducken, (if you don't know what this is, google it), a starch of some kind, bread, vegetables or salad, and a dessert of some kind.

both are usually finished with a good whiskey/whisky of some kind.

[StevieR]

At Christmas, when I was small, it was always roast turkey and all the trimmings - chestnut stuffing, pigs in blankets, roast potatoes, parsnips, sprouts, carrots, bread sauce and cranberry jelly and proper gravy - followed by Christmas pud. Always served at lunch time with washing up done in time for the Queen's speech. A buffet of cold turkey, homemade sausage rolls, cheese, pickles and salad with mince pies, Christmas cake and trifle was the tea time treat. There was always plenty and various leftovers cooked up in different ways that saw us through the next few days (no doubt inspired by the waste not want not attitude of my parents and grandparents for whom rationing after WW2 didn't end until the mid '50s).

More or less the same now, but the main meal on Christmas day has moved to the evening and the turkey is usually supplemented by a brace of pheasants or mallard. The buffet has moved to Boxing Day and both days are always family affairs. We still like to make the most of the leftovers, so bubble and squeak, turkey curry and turkey soup remain firm favourites. If we are hosting it's about twelve on Christmas Day and twenty on Boxing Day. It's a double whammy this year so we are going to be very busy!

[BCAC]

At Christmas, when I was small, it was always roast turkey and all the trimmings - chestnut stuffing, pigs in blankets, roast potatoes, parsnips, sprouts, carrots, bread sauce and cranberry jelly and proper gravy - followed by Christmas pud. Always served at lunch time with washing up done in time for the Queen's speech. A buffet of cold turkey, homemade sausage rolls, cheese, pickles and salad with mince pies, Christmas cake and trifle was the tea time treat. There was always plenty and various leftovers cooked up in different ways that saw us through the next few days (no doubt inspired by the waste not want not attitude of my parents and grandparents for whom rationing after WW2 didn't end until the mid '50s).

More or less the same now, but the main meal on Christmas day has moved to the evening and the turkey is usually supplemented by a brace of pheasants or mallard. The buffet has moved to Boxing Day and both days are always family affairs. We still like to make the most of the leftovers, so bubble and squeak, turkey curry and turkey soup remain firm favourites. If we are hosting it's about twelve on Christmas Day and twenty on Boxing Day. It's a double whammy this year so we are going to be very busy!

That sounds just like the Christmases that I had when I was a nipper. Real christmases.

I must say that, unfortunately, the French people have a strange way of celebrating Christmas. Their main Christmas meal (some sort of fowl or seafood) is always on the 24th late in the evening and is supposed to carry on until after midnight but it always feels strange to me to celebrate Christmas on Christmas eve. Christmas day has nothing special and boxing day doesn't exist. Unfortunately, the Christmas spirit which was always around when I lived in the UK (from about the beginning of December onwards) just doesn't exist in France.

It's the time of year that I always miss being at home. I always try to get back for at least a long weekend during the month of December.

That's the French though. They also have a national day (Bastille day) which is the 14 of July. They always celebrate that one with partys and fireworks and always on the evening of the 13th of July. Strange habits.

[chemist93]

We had the mountain Christmas family gathering at my grandfather's house. Since they're gone now, part of the great majority. My step-mother likes going to a local cafeteria for dinner. My grandfather loved watching the Waltons Homecoming. It reminded him of his childhood. Meats were turkey or ham, spiced bread dressing, potatoes, sweet potato casserole, etc. Venison was preferred by me and a few others. A couple years we served beefsteak.

[kiltedrennie]

Clootie dumpling and Christmas pudding are both very similar suet and fruit based puddings. Christmas pudding was also traditionally steamed in a cloth but steaming in a bowl or basin is now more popular. Happy to pm you my nan's recipe if you fancy a go! You've still got time but need to be quick as they need to mature for a few weeks.

I'd love to give it a go. Thanks!

[usonian]

Last year's thread about suet puddings may be of interest here! Christmas puddings don't seem too widely consumed here in the US, at least from my experience growing up in New England. I made Nigella Lawson's Christmas pudding recipe (using frozen vegetable shortening instead of suet out of deference to a vegetarian family member) and it exceeded all expectations - I think it's going to become a tradition. It was really very delicious, and I'm looking forward to making it again this year. Maybe make a second batch too, to divide into some smaller puddings to send as gifts to a select few far-flung friends.

I've never heard of a Christmas-type pudding as a Thanksgiving tradition, but why not? One year I made a Boston Cream Pie (using Gale Gand's recipe) as a change from the usual apple/pumpkin/blueberry/mincemeat pies you usually see at Thanksgiving. It got such raves that I've made it 11 years running!

[rmccool]

Thanksgiving dinner will likely include turkey (stuffed and roasted) and ham (baked) with a variety of side dishes including mashed potatoes, other vegetables (corn, beans and/or peas, etc.), casseroles, sweet potatoes, cranberry jelly, gravy, bread and/or biscuits (what our UK friends would call scones), and a few desserts.

In our family, Christmas dinner will be a bit lighter, with only one meat, few sides, and with more emphasis on desserts.

For us, Thanksgiving dinner is a larger and somewhat more formal meal. The principal dishes tend to be hearty and savory. Christmas meals are generally a lighter luncheon and supper, with lots of "grazing" on snacks and desserts throughout the day.

That's just the way things work for my family, however; it may or may not bear any relationship to what other American families do.