In Italy, the Christmas Eve dinner is a big event. On the night of December 24th all family members meet and eat special meals together. Then, most Catholic families go to Church for midnight mass.
The atmosphere is enjoyable as Italians enjoy spending hours chatting over the most delicious of meals. The soup pictured above is so long and abundant that it is called cenone, which literally means "big dinner."
The traditional meals consumed vary across the country depending on the region. For example there are 20 regions in Italy and the differences in the cuisine between the North and the South is remarkable.
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10.Struffoli
This sweet comes from Naples and in the USA is known as Honey Fritters Drenched Christmas. It consists of fried dough balls with the addition of honey and candied fruit.
The tradition explains that all the women of the house should gather together the day before Christmas to cook struffoli. It is simply delicious and reflects the tendency of the South Italy kitchen where fried food is a must.
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9.Panettone
The most famous Italian cake is panettone, as it comes from Milan and has ancient origins. The cake has a dome shape consisting of dough and candied fruits. The best panettone takes a while to make because of it's slow nature in the dough rising.
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8.Scallops (Capesante)
Scallops are the typical starter of a chic dinner. Scallops in Italy are usually served with the whole shell, cooked with a mixture of persil, crumped bread, garlic and parmesan and then roasted into the oven. The persil confers to the delicious fish as an astonishing perfume.
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7.Linguine agli scampi
For the Christmas Eve dinner, Italians avoid meat due to Catholic tradition, therefore all dishes are based on fish or vegetables. And linguine agli scampi is a typical example. It is a first course meal. Linguine is a type of pasta similar to spaghetti, but wider and scampi is Norway Lobster, which might be substituted with shrimps or prawns. Usually, there is also tomato sauce, which make the dish even tastier.
pasta with the fish is undoubtedly a must of Christmas Eve.
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6.Clams
Clams and other molluscous are always welcomed in an Italian Christmas Eve dinner. A typical recipe involves cooking clams with tomato sauce. You eat with pleasure with this kind of dish because everyone enjoys dipping bread into the tomato sauce flavored with fish.
The clams are left to soak, then cooked with garlic, parsley and cherry tomatoes. The water released by the clams and the juice of the tomato forms a delicious broth.
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5.Polenta e baccalà
Polenta and salt cod is the translation of Polenta e baccalà. It is a traditional recipe of Veneto , which is the region of Venice. This dish consists of cod laid on slices of Polenta, which is a kind of cream of corn flour. The flavor is a bit spicy and is definitely a particular dish, but simple at the same time.
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4.Risotto with Saffron
Risotto with saffron derives from the North and is a poor dish, because it is composed of few ingredients. However, it is at the same rich, as it contains the valuable saffron zafferanno, a colored spice that is used sparingly.
The result is spectacular despite the use of only few ingredients such as rice, onion and saffron.
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3.Cacciucco
Cacciucco is a fish soup, and a typical dish of Livorno, a Tuscan town on the sea. Some say that it goes back to the Phoenician period, so it is a recipe for millennia ago. Tradition describes this dish as a poor preparation because it was created with scraps of various types of fish put into tomato sauce, served with slices of toasted bread. Nowadays, the dish is made rigorously with fresh fish.
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2.Panforte and Ricciarelli
Ricciarelli biscuits instead is precious almond paste covered with icing sugar.
Panforte and Ricciarelli are both sweets from Siena, and real specialties over the Holidays.
Panforte is similar to gingerbread and is a very spicy sweet. Raisins, candied fruits, almonds, dried figs and honey are the basic ingredients that delight the palate.
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1.Pandoro
Pandoro is typical for Italian Christmas, along with Panettone. It has ancient origins as manuscripts dating back to year 100 After Christ recalling this delicatessen were found. Pandoro comes from Verona and it seems to be the evolution of an Austrian pastry called the “bread of Vienna”.
The Pandoro is a soft sweet, similar to French brioche. Its baking process requires many hours. Pandoro is even tastier if accompanied by cream or chocolate.
--Do you want to do something different this Christmas Eve dinner? If so, take inspiration from the long Italian tradition and start to cook. Your guests will be delighted from all these natural and healthy ingredients.
Make sure to start cooking with plenty of time in mind as in Italy people begin to cook from morning to evening to ensure that everything is perfect and no guests can criticize the food. And finally, if something gets burned, you then will have enough time to redo your delicious masterpiece.
Image Courtesy of INFPhoto.com