What's for X-Mas Eve Dinner?

[Crystal824]

Christmas Eve is Olive Garden lasagna and fettuccini alfredo (my cousin and I can't have the lasagna for different reasons) with salad and bread sticks. This way no one has to cook since we get together not only our way too big family, but also my cousin's husband's family.

The Christmas Day (eve) we will do a traditional turkey dinner.

We host Christmas Eve. We generally do take out Olive Garden too. We generally get soup, salad, Lasagna, and eggplant parmesan (the inlaws don't eat meat on Christmas Eve). We will make a few apps. to go with it. I'm following this closely too to see if there is something I would prefer to do. DH and I have talked about making a vegetarian lasagna this year instead but....I don't know. Christmas Eve is a workday for DH. I take off work because daycare is closed, but is such a hectic day that I don't know if I want to add cooking a meal to it.

 

[twinnersmama]

We also do the Slovak meatless dishes for Christmas Eve like another poster said ... fish, shrimp, pierogies, veggies, etc.

Christmas day is the traditional, ham, potato casserole, ...

 

[LilyWDW]

We host Christmas Eve. We generally do take out Olive Garden too. We generally get soup, salad, Lasagna, and eggplant parmesan (the inlaws don't eat meat on Christmas Eve). We will make a few apps. to go with it. I'm following this closely too to see if there is something I would prefer to do. DH and I have talked about making a vegetarian lasagna this year instead but....I don't know. Christmas Eve is a workday for DH. I take off work because daycare is closed, but is such a hectic day that I don't know if I want to add cooking a meal to it.

If it was a vegetable lasagna with no tomatoes, I would be all over it! I can't have tomatoes as they will make me very ill (not an allergy, but a food sensitive medical condition). Like, stuck in bed in pain ill. Thus the alfredo for me plus my cousin also can't have the lasagna for medical reasons. We don't do soup, but we do get lots of salad and bread sticks!

Sort of nice that I don't have to worry about what to make/serve at all this Christmas. Been working on what I want to have New Years Eve and Day instead!

 

[3boymthr]

Christmas eve is a pot luck at my cousin's house. Everyone makes a dish or two or three. Usually everyone makes the same dishes every year, but this year my mom is taking it easy on herself and only making two instead of her usual 5 and I'm sooo glad. Things we usually have are tortellini and proscuitto soup, lasagna, meatballs, spicy maple glazed chicken, rice pilaf, bread, salad, and on and on. It just depends. There are also deserts of cookies and a trifle and sometimes a cake or two. If my SIL shows up we have some traditional polish deserts like poppy roll and ginger pigs. We also have home brewed mead and beer (my brother's contribution).

 

[verleniahall]

For us, it depends on the year.

Every other year, my oldest brother will be here for christmas or thankgiving. The years that he is here for Christmas, we do pizza (they are a family of 5, plus me and Dh and my parents) the years that they are not here, we do a the true traditional christmas eve dinner

 

[dalmatian7]

When I was a kid it was that horrible oyster stew. I like the crackers.

As we were older we did a few different seafood dinners. It became a rush once the masses around here got earlier and earlier. For a few years it was just DH and I because my sister lived away so my mum would travel to be with her grandkids for christmas eve. Now that everyone lives in this area I have claimed christmas eve for my house. For the past few years we have eated after the children's mass so by 6pm or so. This year we are having salad, buttered noodles (for the kiddos), clams, cold shrimp, crab legs and a soup of some sort I think. I am trying a variation of a key lime pie for dessert I heard about on NPR. The crust is made with saltines. Last year I had a major dessert problem when my tiramisu fell off the counter and the dish smashed into a million pieces. Thank god for a supply of christmas cookies.

Christmas morning we are having bacon and an apple strata that I make the night before and just pop in the oven. super easy. Both our families eat a traditional dinner on christmas day. Something I wish we could get away from because it makes so much work and by the time we get to my moms we are ready to burst, but I am out voted.

Most restaurants around here close a little after lunch, I guess maybe the chains don't be we are 25 minutes from those.

I am curious as to what the wife saver is also

 

[bas71873]

We've decided to do an early dinner at Outback (just me, DH, DD and my dad) and for later that evening, we've invited our friends, about 5 or 6 families with kids, ranging in age from 6 to 21, to come over with kids all in their PJs so they can gather in our den to watch Rudolph and have popcorn and cookies while the adults have cocktails! My group of friends are like family to me and I'm hoping this becomes a yearly tradition!