Christmas traditions

It's almost Christmas and time to honor Jesus and our own families. Family traditions and especially favorite foods are a part of the holiday celebration where memories get better with practice.

One of our family folk tales goes back to the depression era in the Stone Church community. Everybody was poor and no one knew it. They often gathered at the Church for worship, even had an orchestra, and they shared meals together, home made food carried in. Mom's cousin Lynn Wallen vowed to marry the gal that brought his favorite, a "sour cream raisin" pie. He did too! The pie maker was Alice Confer and they made a long wonderful life together. Sour cream raisin pie also known as "Swedish Raisin" is a favorite and to this day my sister Margaret, the eldest, makes the best! For me mince meat pie, the original recipe using real meat, is a close second better even than pecan pie.

Dian makes a steamed pudding using beef and suet that has become a special tradition. A slab of that topped with her tart sweet lemon sauce definitely isn't on our weight watcher's menu but one sometimes has to make sacrifices at Christmas!

Fruitcake is a long time favorite, not the bought kind either, the one made at home with dates, whole nuts and citron is the best. Actually Ann made several kinds, white ones, dark ones and the best were wrapped in an old cotton cloth and kept moist with rum for a month. Now I am not knocking the Grandma's Fruitcakes brand, the largest user of rum in Nebraska. It is a treat just to walk down the street in Beatrice and inhale the delicious smell when they are baking each fall.

I think the best Christmas Stollen bread in the world comes from Matt Sehnert's Bieroc bakery. A tad pricy but well worth the coin and the calories.

With kids (ours, grands or neighbors) in the house Ann baked candy cane cookies. A great kid's project made by rolling out long snakes of dough, red or green and white, twisted together and laid on a cookie sheet in the shape of a shepherd's crook. Sprinkle them with ground up peppermint candy and bake. Decorated gingerbread cookies were another delightfully messy kid involved project.

Several years we lived in Merced, Calif., in a house built in an old almond orchard. From our 11 trees we would knock, gather, hull and shell several gunny sacks full of nuts each year. Ann roasted, candied and flavored those nuts in a variety of ways to share with friends. Now peanut brittle is good but we love the kind made with almonds or even better the Oklahoma native pecans that daughter Moira, the illustrator, gleans for us.

Ann's Uncle Wayne loved divinity and she made it special for him. It had to be flavored with crushed black walnuts at least until he acquired false teeth. Then the little chunks under his plate would hurt so later iterations were sans nuts!

Ann's mom's specialty was popcorn balls. Sometimes made with red or green dyed syrup, along with the white ones, they were soft and delightful to bite into. Hers were the best.

A neighboring Polish friend taught Ann how to make "krantz" but I think "makowiec" is probably the more proper term. It is a pastry made with butter, sugar, flour, egg yolks, and yeast. Stuffed with beaten egg whites, maraschino cherries and chopped walnuts and then baked it is delightful. The very best, though, is made with Solo poppy seed filling. Caution: don't eat that just before a drug test!

My mom made fudge, penuche, peanut brittle and cookies too, especially spice cookies from a recipe handed down from Grandma Hoyt, the clan matriarch.

Now mom always seemed to be strapped for time in the culinary department so turned her oven up hotter than optimum to help hurry things along. The usual result was a few black bottoms, but no problem, those got packaged up along with the rest and off to the neighbors she went to spread the cheer!

My family roots go back to Protestant Scotland which may explain why booze has not been a part of our holiday tradition.

Now had we been Irish Catholic -- "Katie bar the door"! I always figured that they had more fun celebrating but that just wasn't us! Also, understand my mother was a life-long devout teetotaler! Out of respect for her, my dad also abstained. But mom also had a favorite cousin, "June" Bobinmeyer, one of my childhood heroes.

His name was actually John Jr. but never in my life did I hear him called anything other than "June." June was definitely not an admirer of Carrie Nation. Imagine my surprise when one Christmas Eve June stopped by with a gallon jug of Mogen David. When excited June yelled "Frannie I came to have 'communion' with Dick and Doane!" June knew full well mom's attitude about any use of alcohol, much less in her home, so I thought she would run him off with a stick! June was special in her heart though, and with just a giggle"Oh that June!" she stepped back to watch. I can't imagine that June knew anything about communion because the only time that I ever saw him in church was at his funeral. Gee I loved that guy!

That is the way I saw it.