Holiday meal planning and traditions
hairsprayhon
Posts: 334 Member
How is your holiday meal planning progressing? And what are your special meal traditions.
I ordered all of the seafood for our Christmas eve feast. It is seafood because MIL is Polish and at her mother’s house we would have a full Polish feast and break oplatki Communion-like wafers to share with each other as a sign of family. MIL let that tradition go, but we will do this again, now that the celebration is at our house for the first time. One of the things I am trying to do is to think of ways to make the food just as good but healthier. For the first time I will be making the shrimp and we will grill them instead of smothering them in butter. Even if it is a white Christmas, Bob does not mind grilling outside.
**I want to do a dessert that involves apples and cinnamon in the oven while we are eating dinner, does anyone have a healthy suggestion?
I ordered all of the seafood for our Christmas eve feast. It is seafood because MIL is Polish and at her mother’s house we would have a full Polish feast and break oplatki Communion-like wafers to share with each other as a sign of family. MIL let that tradition go, but we will do this again, now that the celebration is at our house for the first time. One of the things I am trying to do is to think of ways to make the food just as good but healthier. For the first time I will be making the shrimp and we will grill them instead of smothering them in butter. Even if it is a white Christmas, Bob does not mind grilling outside.
**I want to do a dessert that involves apples and cinnamon in the oven while we are eating dinner, does anyone have a healthy suggestion?
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Replies
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I like to peel the apples, cut into chunks, spray with butter flavored PAM and sprinkle with cinnamon & a tsp or so of splenda brown sugar, plus a tsp or so of cornstarch all mixed up together. Just adjust the amount for the number of people. You can make each person his/her own baked dish of the apple pieless-we call it that around here because it tastes like apple pie but has no butter, minimal sugar and no crust. If some of them can have more calories, you can put a frozen biscuit on top and sprinkle cinnamon on that, then bake it that way. For the in betweeners, use 1/4 of a biscuit, thawed first, and then flattened so you get the taste/texture but fewer calories.
HTH
barb
ETA-It's Christmas--so I am following family tradition and making crap and garbage loaded with fat and sugar for anyone who wants to eat it. I will try to moderate my own intake and have some things that are low-cal that everyone will like and they'll never know it's diet junk food.0 -
An apple crisp without the massive amounts of butter. For the crumbles, you can add oats, flaxseed, whole wheat flour, raisins, walnuts, or any other combo that appeals to you. Sounds like it will be a lovely dinner at your house.
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In our home we celebrate the feast of 7 fishes Christmas eve. I'm making a seafood stew with 6 of the different shellfish and the 7th will be Bakala (salted Cod). I'm trying to make Christmas eve a little lighter and healthier, because Christmas day is everything but!0
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^^^ We celebrate the feast of the seven fish as well, complete with Bakala. Christmas day I'm making chicken scapriella, and my mom makes her famous homemade spinach ravioli 0
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At home, I'm tryinig a lot of new vegan recipes - so far enjoying them immensely! But when we travel to visit family, I don't expect a special menu just for me. I'll plan to load up on veggies, fruits and grains, take it easy on meats, and pass on the sweets. The tough part will be all the snacks - Chex mixes, nuts, cheese balls, chips and dips.0
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My son is a chef, sadly he is working his butt off Christmas ,but I am keeping my fingers crossed for some of his roast pumpkin & butternut squash soup with cinnamon cream fraiche, or Isle of Wight crab cakes, oriental salad, sweet chilli dressing or maybe wild mushroom veloute, truffle oil served with cheese straws for starters, main is of course Roast Turkey with oak smoked bacon, stuffing, roast potatoes, parsnips and carrots, cauliflower, brocolli, peas and pigs in blankets, which are UK style, that is chipolaters wrapped in bacon, ummm cranberry and port sauce, bread sauce followed by Christmas pudding aflame and served with brandy sauce....mmmm0
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As our family has grown and created their own families, we have lost many of our traditions yet created new ones. Like another poster, we are predominantly vegetarian now so our meals have changed quite a bit from the traditional crap I used to eat. I find it hard lately to actually feed crap to my loved ones, so I try to make things from scratch as healthily as possible. I made my own cranberry sauce at Thanksgiving and froze enough for Christmas dinner today -- perfect! I made a curry pumpkin soup for the first course, very healthy. I served a non-mayonnaise coleslaw and a big salad as well. Plus large bowls of chopped brocolli and corn for veggies. Baked potatoes instead of mashed buttery ones. The worst thing on the table today was those delicious Hawaiian Rolls, real butter and meat, so not too bad.0
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This is a favorite of mine, courtesy of "Eat For Health" by Dr Joel Fuhrman:**I want to do a dessert that involves apples and cinnamon in the oven while we are eating dinner, does anyone have a healthy suggestion?
Apple Supreme (serves 4)
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6 apples, cored/peeled/chopped (I don't peel mine)
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
3 dates, pitted (I use medjool dates)
2 Tbs ground flax seed (optional)
1/4 cup unsweetened soy, almond or hemp milk
1/2 cup raisins (golden are good, so are currants)
1/2 cup old fashioned oats
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Preheat oven to 350 deg F. In a good blender, blend 1 cup of the chopped apples with cinnamon, walnuts, dates, flax seed and soy milk. Pour over remaining chopped apples. Add raisins and mix well. Sprinkle oats on top. Bake for 15 minutes.
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I mix the oats into the mix as well and then dump the whole thing into a pan and bake. It makes a nice breakfast dish on a cold day and the grandkids like it, too.0
