<p><strong>Fall</strong> (not so much what you asked but still, a seasonal food time for my family) - Mom made tomato bread. Ingredients available all year, but she only made it in the fall (even though we all loved it). Also, gingerbread cake - another "fall/before Christmas" food. </p>
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<p><strong>Thanksgiving</strong>: Standard stuff - Turkey and/or ham, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes (with marshmallows or with some other sweet topping), fresh cranberry sauce (cooked), homemade wheat and white rolls, our family's whipped cream fruit salad recipe, OLIVES and other pickled foods (cucumbers, asparagus, etc.), green salad, stuffing. Desserts: Pumpkin pie, apple pie, apple-cranberry pie, pumpkin roll (cake) ....</p>
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<p><strong>Winter Sostice</strong> - we have cupcakes with yellow frosting for dessert that evening. I'd like to expand this a bit more....</p>
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<p><strong>Christmas Eve</strong> - I've always thought that the traditional Italian Christmas Eve dinner (7 fishes) sounds so neat and fun. Except - I dislike all fish and seafood.

But I wish we had some awesome "fest" of food on Christmas Eve. Instead, Dad always has Oyster Stew. None of us like it, so he and a couple of the BILs eat it and everyone else has whatever Mom came up with for dinner that night (often chili or other soup). Then the platter of snacks (candies, cookies, sliced cheese, summer sausage, crackers) comes out (Oh! and popcorn too) .... and the munching commences while we visit and the kids nod off.</p>
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<p><strong>Christmas Morning</strong>:</p>
<p>Oatmeal Roll (Spiral of an oatmeal sweet dough with a glaze of honey and butter drizzled over it, very good). Scrambled eggs, sausage, bacon, toast, fresh fruit, EGGNOG .... And all the Christmas candy people want.

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<p><strong>Christmas Dinner</strong>:</p>
<p>See "Thanksgiving" above, except we also have Plum Pudding as one of our desserts --- and the other desserts also change (often a few more cake-like desserts). There's always an apple pie though, and usually a pumpkin one. </p>
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<p><strong>Christmas Treats</strong>: My Dad always makes a very hard chocolate fudge, it's his specialty. A sister makes divinity (plain, with nuts, and peppermint). Frosted sugar cookies (intricately so often). I always make my white chocolate peanut fudge. We always have lots of nuts/peanuts/dried fruit for snacks. And the cheese ball my sister makes is also a family tradition. For our own little family we always also make some cookie press cookies, sugar cookies, chocolate fudge, and peppermint bark (all egg-free as dd1 has an egg allergy). </p>
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<p>....We pretty much eat that food through <strong>New Years</strong>.

New Years Eve was usually the snacks all over again for us growing up (cheese, crackers, sausage, popcorn, apple slices, pear slices, homemade candies, cookies, etc., and chips and salsa).... And New Years was always much less of a deal growing up. I'd kind of like to make it into a bigger tradition for our own little nuclear family --- one of my sister's husbands grew up with New Years dinner a Very Big Deal. You could only have pork (they root forward, beef and chicken are out). And since he's from Western PA, a very "Pennsylvania Dutch" sort of meal - sauerbraten, sauerkraut, etc. type things. </p>
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<p>....So, someday I need to start establishing a "We always eat X" tradition for Christmas Eve, New Years Eve, and New Years.

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