For all preferring to expertise the Mediterranean via their tastebuds, celebrating Christmas within the area with seasonal culinary traditions presents an genuine European expertise. Of course, much better to be exploring the Mediterranean itself in the course of the festive season (and our year-round voyages mean you can just do that). There, between visiting Christmas markets and indulging in lengthy, lazy lunches ashore, you’ll be able to positively go immersive. Onboard menus, too, replicate the Mediterranean and Christmas Eve essences of Italy’s seafood focus, France’s meat inclination and Spain’s tapas.
But even when you’re not heading out to the Mediterranean this season, you’ll be able to nonetheless recreate the flavors, significantly of Spain, Italy and France, from this most joyful time of 12 months.
Here’s what we love in regards to the Christmas dishes of the Mediterranean.
Italy
Traditions: There’s nobody vacation custom in Italy, significantly relating to delicacies (20 completely different areas have fun in, properly, 20 completely different kinds). Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are exuberantly honored; the previous is named La Virgilia, and sometimes entails fish (Italian-Americans name it the Feast of the Seven Fishes). This behavior relies on an outdated Roman Catholic custom wherein worshippers would abstain from consuming meats on the day earlier than a holy day.
Christmas Food: On La Virgilia, seafood reigns supreme however which seafood varies by area. Among the choices: salted cod, often known as baccalà, together with calamari, salmon, tuna and swordfish. Acclaimed Italian chef Lidia Bastianich swears by striped bass with tomato pesto and clams oreganata. Christmas Day lunch is extra prone to embody meat and baked pasta dishes. The celebration begins with antipasti — artichokes, salami, native cheeses and olives. The first course is stuffed or baked pasta; the second is a meat course, akin to ballito misto (boiled meats like rooster, beef, veal, some sliced salami and even a pâté). Roast lamb can be widespread for Christmas lunch.
For sweets? While these conventional desserts additionally differ, anticipate panettone, cannoli and biscotti to be among the many choices.
Christmas Market Noshing: Vin bruléis the Italian model of heat spiced wine. And we love cioccolata calda, which is a wealthy scorching chocolate. Sweet treats you’ll discover embody panettone, a candy bread loaf crammed with candied fruits; struffoli (fried dough balls drizzled with honey); and pizzelles (delicate waffle sugar cookies).
France
Traditions: Le réveillon de Noël is well known on Christmas Eve, sometimes earlier than or after late evening Mass, and is the splashiest meal of the 12 months in France.
Christmas Food: The delicacies served on Le réveillon de Noël varies throughout France, however widespread dishes embody oysters, roast goose, escargot, foie gras, gratin dauphinois (a particularly scrumptious tackle scalloped potatoes utilizing Gruyère cheese). And then you’ve the regional variations; in Alsace, as an example, which shares German influences, choucroute garnie is a standard dish of sausages, meats and sauerkraut. In Normandy, apple-based tarts are a most well-liked candy. In Provence, search for les treize desserts (a set of 13 completely different desserts honoring Jesus and his 12 disciples).
Almost in every single place, bûche de Noël, a log cake made with genoise sponge, and topped with chocolate buttercream, is on the dessert menu.
We’re at all times interested by how notable cooks have fun the vacation meal, so we checked in with Michelin-starred, third-generation chef Anne-Sophie Pic. The chef, who runs eating places in France (Paris, Valence) and overseas (Lausanne, London, Dubai and Hong Kong), marries French and household traditions, cooking dishes akin to a basic gratin dauphinois and, for dessert, bûche de Noël. She makes her grandfather’s crayfish gratin and her father’s Le Bar Caviar, sea bass that she updates utilizing elements akin to sake, caviar and rose petals.
Christmas Market Noshing: In addition to oysters and Champagne, you can even anticipate chestnuts, artisan candies, and, as a result of it’s France, crêpes. Provencal nougat famously is available in quite a lot of flavors and is laced with almonds or fruit.
Spain
Traditions: In Spain, Christmas Eve is the evening of the massive celebration nevertheless it’s certainly not the one time for a celebration. On New Year’s Eve, consuming “the 12 most festive grapes of the year,” is a practice that bodes properly for good luck within the new 12 months; you eat one grape for every chime of the clock that leads into 2025 (the chimes are literally lined dwell on tv). Children obtain their items on the evening of the Epiphany (Jan. 6), which marks the twelfth day of Christmas.
Christmas Food: Even on Christmas Eve, the celebratory meal begins with tapas, or small plates of cheeses, seafood, preserves and Iberian ham. The principal course, primarily based on the area, options Andalusian stew (rooster and bacon with chickpeas, port and pumpkin), garlic soup, and rotisserie meat, like lamb, stuffed turkey or suckling pig. For dessert, turrón is prized; it’s a nougat manufactured from honey, almonds and egg whites.
At Jaleo, a recent Spanish restaurant with areas in Washington, D.C., Chicago, Las Vegas, Disney Springs and Dubai, Spanish-American chef José Andrés has ready Christmas dishes akin to “canelones stuffed with foie gras, pork and chicken and stopped with creamy bechamel sauce, or our tuxleton, a giant Spanish ribeye with confit piquillo peppers.”
Christmas Market Noshing: The Spanish model of nougat is turrón, which could possibly be both smooth and fluffy or brittle, relying on the recipe. Because Christmas markets (and festivals normally) are finest loved whereas consuming fried dough, pestiños are the Spanish choice of that to search for. You’ll possible additionally see fried or roasted potatoes or candy potatoes (patatas bravas) bought in paper cones, typically together with roasted chestnuts. Vino calienteis the mulled wine of the season, however don’t miss out on chocolate caliente, Spain’s pudding-like scorching chocolate. Churros, sugary donut-like concoctions that you just dip into wealthy chocolate, are a should to benefit from the full expertise.