Winter Holiday Food Traditions in the US, Explained

Winter holiday food traditions in the US run well beyond turkey. Italian American families serve fish on Christmas Eve, Mexican American families gather for tamale-making parties, many Jewish families go out for Chinese food on December 25, and Kwanzaa closes on December 31 with a communal feast called Karamu.

What are the main winter holiday food traditions in the US?

From Thanksgiving to New Year, the country eats a patchwork of meals that came with different families. Some began as religious rules, some as ways to share hard work and some as a clever answer to a day when most places were shut.

Knowing the story helps in two ways. You read a December menu with more understanding, and you ask better questions of the people cooking. Four traditions with deep roots follow, all of them about what is on the plate. For opening days, see the guide to restaurants open on Christmas Day.

What is the Feast of the Seven Fishes?

The Feast of the Seven Fishes is an Italian American Christmas Eve meal. National Geographic reports that it developed in the US over roughly the past century and is not a custom brought whole from Italy, where the night is called la vigilia, the eve. Fish is eaten mainly in southern Italy, and most Italian immigrants around 1900 came from rural southern towns.

As families spread out and assimilated, a simple meal grew into a feast that marked identity. Seven is a sacred number in Christianity, though many families serve more than seven dishes. Typical plates include salt cod, fried calamari, stuffed escarole, fried smelt, conch salad and stuffed clams. Reasons given for fish include cost, the sea as a link to the old home and Christian symbolism.

Why are tamales a Christmas tradition?

Christmas tamales come from a tradition far older than the holiday. The Austin Chronicle quotes a University of Texas scholar who says tamale-making belongs to the native cultures of Mesoamerica, where tamales were tied to ritual and the agricultural calendar. Spanish colonizers and the Catholic Church later adapted the custom, and Mexican migration into the American Southwest carried it north.

Tamales are labor-intensive, which is why they became a group effort. Families hold a tamalada, a tamale-making gathering, often led by mothers, grandmothers and aunts, and the work may begin after Thanksgiving for a Christmas Eve table. The Chronicle says San Antonio and El Paso were among the first Texas cities with a commercial holiday tamale tradition, and tamales were sold to the public as early as the 1920s. Fillings it mentions include pork, poblano with queso panela and chicken mole. The Chronicle also notes that street vendors sold tamales, and the history of food trucks shows how that kind of mobile selling grew.

Why do many Jewish families eat Chinese food on Christmas?

Chinese food on Christmas is a tradition with a clear history. Mental Floss reports that Chinese restaurants stayed open on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, and that Jewish immigrants lived on Manhattan's Lower East Side next to a growing Chinatown. Historian Yong Chen is quoted saying diners saw Chinese food as a sign of American cosmopolitanism and middle-class status.

There were practical reasons too. Many Chinese dishes use little dairy, so meat and milk are not mixed, and pork was often chopped or sauced and easy to overlook. Chinese and Jewish people were also then America's two largest non-Christian immigrant groups. A Yiddish newspaper joked about Jewish diners' love of chop suey as early as 1928.

What is the Kwanzaa Karamu feast?

Kwanzaa runs from December 26 through January 1. The National Park Service says it was created by a scholar and activist and first celebrated in 1966 as a holiday with roots in African harvest traditions, and the name means first fruits. The Karamu is a communal feast on the sixth day, which is called Kuumba, and it includes poetry, music, dance and storytelling.

The Karamu is not a fixed menu. Families and community groups bring dishes that matter to them, so a gathering might include dishes from across the African diaspora. If you are invited, ask what to bring and whether it is a potluck.

How do you eat these traditions when you are out?

Menus in December are busier and sometimes shorter, so ask what is served and what a dish includes. If anyone at your table has a shellfish or fish allergy, ask the place directly. Mosey can hide dishes that a place lists an allergen for, but a dish with no listing says "Allergens not listed, ask the place."

For the big meals at home, read about Thanksgiving dinner out and the New Year's Eve dinner guide.

How can Mosey help you keep a holiday food list?

Mosey is for remembering what you ate. When you try a holiday dish, rate the dish and not only the place, because the tamales and the rice can deserve different scores. Add tags such as Celebration or Family Friendly to a rating so you can narrow a search next year.

Keep a list called December eats and add a note to each stop, such as the dish a family member loved. Share the list with friends by link, even if they are not on Mosey yet, and follow friends to see where they rate and save. Mosey is free for a place to list, with no hidden fees, so a rating costs a small business nothing. The lists feature page explains how lists are shared. More seasonal reading is in the US food guides.

What should you remember this season?

Be patient when things are crowded, ask before you assume what a dish contains and thank the people who cook on a holiday, since many of them are working while others celebrate.

Download the Mosey app, rate the first holiday dish you try this year and start a list called December eats, so next winter begins with your own notes.