Ah, how I love Boxing Day, the feast of St. Stephen. Cold turkey, the actual turkey type, warmed up sprouties, cold bread sauce, cold stuffing, cold sausages wrapped in bacon, all kinds of pickles and when my mum was alive, cold squashy peas. Love it all. Well, it's a bit different here, but we do have cold turkey, the actual turkey type, and spiced beef.
Pickles here aren't quite the same, 'pickles' here seems to mean pickled gherkins, whereas in Britain you would expect any or all of the following, Branston pickle, pickled onions (large) pickled cocktail onions (small and sweet)Piccalilli, chutney and pickled walnuts. Probably several I've forgotten too. We love our pickles.
I love the Christmas drinks that you wouldn't be inspired by at any other time of the year, Sherry, Port, well I'd drink Port at other times too, Snowballs, Whisky Mac, Baileys, used to be you'd only drink Baileys at Christmas, nowadays people drink it all year round. Oddly coloured liqueurs, mulled wine, Buck's Fizz.
Here we have eggnog, which is quite nice, I just can't drink too much of it, it's like a thin custard with rum and nutmeg.
Poor St.Stephen, like so many saints, suffered a violent death, stoned for his witness to Christ's teaching and resurrection, bet he wouldn't have turned down a cold turkey sarnie.
And nor would good King Wenceslas, born around 907 near Prague and King by the age of 18. You had to live fast in those days, Wenceslas died in 929 after a five year reign of beneficence and expansion of the Christian faith in his land of Bohemia.
Of course, there are ten more days of Christmas left and let us not forget that, Christmas ain't over til it's over.
2 comments:
This is also the time of year that the 'Homemade' pickle puts in an appearance!
Too Yummers!
OOh yes, and the smell of malt vinegar and pickling spices being heated up in the autumn always made me think of Christmas.
Post a Comment