Each country has its own traditional, fancy for other countries, festive dishes. In Europe, Christmas is a more significant holiday than the New Year, and therefore we will consider the top 10 countries and their traditional dishes at the Christmas table.
10. Italy
In Italy, they like to serve seafood for any holidays, but at Christmas fried eel is considered traditional, since on Christmas Eve you will definitely see this dish on the table by Italians. Before frying, the eel is pickled and then sprinkled with spices.
As for the rest of the seafood, Italians adore shellfish and crustaceans. They can be seen on the festive table either as a snack or as an addition to the main dish - pasta.
The last traditional Italian dish is stuffed baked rooster. The carcass is stuffed with minced pork, veal tenderloins, chestnuts and parmesan, and white wine is also served.
9. Costa Rica
At Christmas, residents of Costa Rica love to cook the so-called tamalitos. To prepare this dish, various beans, beans, corn, cashew nuts and cayenne pepper are used. Mashed potatoes or cod soup are also traditional.
For dessert, they like to serve rice with milk or coconut sweets.
8. Portugal
In Portugal, they bake Christmas for sure. The most famous pastries are called “sonyush” (very much like our donuts) and rabanadash - this will remind you of Russian croutons, that is, slices of bread soaked in milk and eggs, and then fried in a pan.
But Portugal’s most famous Christmas pastry is a cake called Bolu Rei. This is a sweet cake decorated with raisins and fruits. Traditionally, edible surprises are hidden in it - beans. If you come across a bean in a pie, then you will be happy in the coming year.
7. Denmark
On the Danish Christmas table you will see very familiar products for a Russian person: duck, jellied meat, sausage, red cabbage, oranges, marinades, fruits, dried fruits and rice porridge.
The duck is traditionally baked with apples and served with sauce from expensive port, broth, sugar, cream and duck fat. Danish people really like red cabbage salad with oranges. To cook it, you just need to chop the cabbage, melt the duck fat in a pan, fry the cabbage in fat and add the juice and pulp of oranges. Salad ready!
6. UK
The main dish on the English Christmas table is a baked goose or a turkey. Served with small sausages wrapped in fried bacon. Smoked salmon with brown bread and shrimp is used as a snack on the table.
Of course, traditionally there are stewed vegetables on the table, among them are potatoes, parsnips, chestnuts, Brussels sprouts, boiled carrots.
For dessert, puddings are preferred in this country. And preparing home pudding for four weeks! And at the stage of mixing cream and sugar, you can make a wish, the British believe that it will certainly come true. Of course, it is not without desires at the time of eating: a coin is traditionally hidden in pudding, but you need to be careful with inedible components. They can still be swallowed or broken a tooth. It is for this reason that in Denmark beans are hidden in a pie, not coins.
5. Finland
In Finland, as in Denmark, they also love sweet rice porridge, decorated with almonds and cinnamon. Also, Finnish people love cabbage porridge, which is very simple to cook. You need to cook all the vegetables until completely softened, then add milk and spices. If desired - beat with a blender and porridge is ready.
Cloudberry jam is preferred as a dessert in this country, and shanga, a fat pork pie, serves as a serious dish in Finland. In Finland, they traditionally bake Christmas bread themselves, and bake cookies with raisins and carrot casseroles.
As you can see, in Finland they love everything high-calorie and baked.
4. France
In France, the main dish of the Christmas table is a baked goose. Seafood in France is an attribute of luxury on the table that everyone wants. French prefer oysters, black caviar with pancakes and lobster.
Of course, on the French table you will find classic cheeses and traditional wine, moreover, different dishes are served for each dish. After a hearty meal, the French move on to desserts. In this case, they make charlotte or tangerine ice cream, they like quince pastille, biscuits, nougat and candied candies.
3. Germany
It seems that throughout Europe they like to serve baked goose for dinner, Germany is no exception. Moreover, each family has its own recipe for poultry, they are similar only in that the fatter the goose, the tastier the result. Goose is baked with prunes and apples, and watered with wine.
The Germans prefer potato as a salad. It is based on coarsely chopped potatoes with additional ingredients, for example, some pickles or onions.
Gingerbread cookies sprinkled with white icing are prepared as a dessert. Strudel is also baked for the German table, but German housewives add nuts to the usual apples and raisins.
Home mulled wine acts as the main holiday drink.
2. Greece
The main Greek dish is a baked pig and there are a lot of recipes for its preparation. They also love chopped meat in Greece, which is mixed with rice and wrapped in cabbage or grape leaf.
The main Greek dessert is shortbread cookies, which in this country is called melomacaron. After baking, the cookies are additionally soaked in syrup and sprinkled with nuts and cinnamon. Also in the kitchen, pancakes are traditionally fried, which are stuffed with jam or honey.
In Greece, there is also its own traditional cake, called Christopsomo, it is very reminiscent of Russian Easter cake, but it does not have the usual glaze on it.
1. Japan
Japanese cuisine, of course, is different from European or American. Instead of hot dishes in Japan, they prefer cold snacks: beans with rice, rice cakes and a large number of vegetables.
At the festive table there are always products that, according to the Japanese, bring happiness. These are boiled fish, roasted chestnuts, seaweed and herring caviar.