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What makes tradition?
By Aunt Matilda
Dear Aunt Matilda –
My husband and I are having a disagreement about what constitutes a “traditional” Southern Christmas dinner. We’re both Southerners but our versions of “traditional” are very different. Growing up, holidays were very important to both of us. We now have three children of our own — ages 2, 3, and 6 — and we want to raise them with the same sense of their Southern heritage that we were given.
When I was growing up, my Mother and Grandmother always cooked the Christmas meal for our entire family— cousins, aunts and uncles, sisters and brothers, and the like. Our traditional Christmas dinner was turkey and ham, sweet potato casserole, green beans, scalloped potatoes, pecan and pumpkin pies, fresh rolls, and baklava (my Father’s Mother is of Middle Eastern descent). My biggest Christmas dinner memories are of everyone sitting around the living room after eating pie, stuffed to the gills, drinking coffee, and chatting. It’s a wonderful holiday memory for me.
My husband’s family, on the other hand, grilled steaks every Christmas, along with pole beans, mashed potatoes and gravy, and apple and mincemeat pies. What he remembers is that all his aunts, uncles, and cousins came around for dinner, chatted with his Dad out by the grill or with his Mom in the kitchen. After the meal, they’d watch football or sit outside under a big oak tree, drink iced tea, and talk.
To both of us, our “traditional” Christmas meals are wonderful memories and very important to us. We want to give our kids the same kind of good memories, along with a sense of their traditional Southern heritage.
This year, we’re inviting my two sisters (and their families), my husband’s brother and sister (and their families), and our parents over for Christmas dinner. Our question is this: what exactly constitutes a true “traditional” Southern Christmas dinner?
Signed,
Steaks ain’t right
Dear Steaks,
It sounds like you both come from wonderful, loving, Southern families. As you well know, one of the greatest Southern traditions is sittin’ and visitin’. (For any northerners reading, please note I said “visitin’,” not, “visiting.” Visiting means going from one place to another for a short period of time. Visitin’, on the other hand, means sitting and talking with someone, giving them the most valuable gift each of us has to give: time.) From my time up north, the thing I missed most was time spent with folks, just visitin’.
Over my many years, our “traditional” Christmas meal has varied. During the lean years, our menu consisted of whatever Daddy could shoot and Momma could grow in the garden. During better times, we’d cook up a whole pig, a couple of turkeys, even giant roast beefs that had to be cooked in two ovens.
The South has always been about surviving and adapting. Sometimes things are good and folks celebrated. Other times, things are lean and they had to improvise. Good times or lean, though, traditional Southern cookin’ has always been about taking whatever bounty the Good Lord gave us and making it a glorious celebration of Him, our families, and our friends. Sometimes that meant steaks and hams; other times that meant duck, quail, venison, or rabbit.
What is important in Southern tradition, however, doesn’t change with the menu. Look at the menu you described for your family: even though your Daddy’s family came from a culture different from your Mama’s, your parents included the “traditional” Christmas baklava into the meal. Ever stop to think how many “ t r a d i t i o n a l ” Southern Christmas dinners include middle Eastern pastries?
Both your husband’s family and your family understood what holiday meals were all about. They both invited their friends and families to share the bounty. They both put
forth the effort to make wonderful, memorable meals. And they both took the gift of time they were given by their Creator and gave it to each other.
Regardless of what you and your husband decide to serve for the Christmas dinner, it sounds like the two of you have already agreed on the most important elements of a perfect “traditional” Southern Christmas dinner:
1. God’s bounty, 2. Family and friends, and 3. Time together.
And that, my dear, is what constitutes a true traditional Southern Christmas dinner.
Love,
Tildie
P.S. I would like to take this time to wish all my faithful readers a glorious holiday season. Whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, or any combination thereof, may God’s blessings be with all of you.
You can email Aunt Matilda at DearAuntMatilda@mchsi.com.
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