Little Food

One of the most enduring—I would say endearing, too—of our family holiday traditions is to eat “little food” on Christmas eve.

The tradition has its roots in Jen’s childhood. When she was a kid, her mom would fix stuff like Vienna sausages and pigs-in-a-blanket on the night before Christmas. We’ve modified that some: our menu tends to be more like baby carrots, mini egg rolls, and kumquats, but the idea is the same.

We usually set out platters of the mini-comestables and huddle around like giants scarfing up trees and tunnels, (with broccoli as trees and pizza rolls as tunnels). The only things that aren't miniature sized are our drinks, although one year, we did pour from airline bottles.

What I like best about this tradition, even more than the cornichons, capers, and kappa maki, is the tradition itself. As “secular humanists,” we don’t have many built-in holiday themes—no midnight mass, no lighting of the menorah, no slaughtering of small animals—so it’s great to have at least one thing we can count on pretty much year after year.

Like all such traditions, it’s a bit of a pain in the ass: we’ve got to make special trips to the store to procure the requisite foodstuffs; there’s tension around making sure we’re all set up; we end up with half-eaten jars of stuff in the refrigerator that hangs around for eight months before it’s eventually tossed out, but ultimately, it’s worth it.

In some ways, I guess, that’s what holiday traditions are all about: setting yourself up to perform somewhat onerous tasks—decorating, gift-buying, party-hosting—that, afterwards, you get to sit back and look upon and say, “Yes! We survived another year. Let’s toast to that.”

Nobody, I think, knows this better than my sister, who starts baking cookies the day after Thanksgiving to send all over the country, including Seattle.

One of our other enduring holiday traditions is eating handfuls of them.