12 Dishes For Catholic Christmas

The hostesses will have to work hard, but this is the evening when we give our loved ones the best - time, love, care. And - 12 delicious homemade dishes.

 

On Christmas Eve, there should be 12 dishes on the table - for each hearty month of the year, Christmas wafers on a pillow of hay, symbolizing the birth of baby Jesus, a set of dishes for those who are not with us. Unlike the noisy and riotous Christmas, Christmas Eve is celebrated in the family circle, relatives say a prayer or words of thanksgiving, holding hands, share a wafer, while saying wishes to each other. This is the last day of fasting and, according to tradition, dishes are prepared from fish, mushrooms, vegetables, jelly is boiled and pastries are served with poppy seeds.

The hostesses will have to work hard, but this is the evening when we give our loved ones the best - time, love, care. And - 12 delicious homemade dishes.

So, the festive menu. For cold - two salads: with herring, crab sticks and cheese; chic snack sandwich cake; bright beetroot mousse with fish; lavash roll with mushrooms; gentle herring oil; stuffed prunes and an appetizer with baked champignons.

Serve hot in portioned pots with fish and baked cucumbers.

And for dessert - poppy-coconut cake, jelly and jelly with berries.

Snacks

Our "cold table" will be very bright and festive. Half of the offered dishes contain herring, but you can choose any lightly salted fish to your taste and budget. Among other ingredients - potatoes, carrots, cheese and eggs, all that is in every home. 

 

Snack sandwich cake with cheese

The cake turns out to be very tender, besides, it will taste great on the second day. Store in refrigerator until serving. The recipe is this. Boil carrots and two eggs, cool, cut the eggs into rings. Peel one herring from skin and bones, chop finely (or use ready-made fillets), season with mayonnaise (a tablespoon is enough). Place half a loaf of bread cut side down, cut off the crust on one side and cut off a large square layer. Cut two layers off half of the white bread. Lubricate the white “chunk” of bread with butter, put chopped herring on it. Cover with black bread, also brush with butter and lay out the eggs. Then - again white bread. Grease the top and sides of the cake with a mixture of 2 tbsp. l. mayonnaise, 100 g of grated hard cheese and 50 g of butter. We decorate the cake with greenery and flowers from boiled carrots.

 

Beetroot mousse with herring

It's just a bomb! Looks great on the table! It is important to choose beautiful molds in which the mousse will solidify. Children's forms for "grandmothers" are also suitable. And we prepare mousse like this. Small beets (400 g) bake in the oven in foil, cool and peel. Dissolve 10 g of gelatin in a small amount of boiling water. 200 g herring fillet, beets, 3 tbsp. spoons of mayonnaise, a tablespoon of horseradish beat in a chopper until smooth. Add gelatin and scroll again. Put the finished mousse in silicone or metal molds and refrigerate until completely solidified. Serve beetroot mousse on lettuce, crackers, or bread.

 

Salad "Gentle" with crab sticks

This is a light and easy to prepare salad for crab stick lovers. It can be laid out in layers in stemmed glass goblets, it will look amazing. Boil three eggs, cool, separate the whites and yolks. Separately, grate an apple, 100 g crab sticks, 80 g yellow cheese, whites, yolks. Sprinkle the apple with lemon juice. Put the salad on the dish in layers from the bottom, each spreading with mayonnaise: proteins, cheese, crab sticks (leave a little for decoration), apple, yolks. Garnish with herbs and crab sticks.

 

Roll with mushrooms and cheese

An appetizer for any table - budget, easy to prepare, delicious. You can use any mushrooms - boiled and frozen, pickled or salted. The recipe calls for mushrooms. Finely chop the onion and 250 g of champignons and fry in vegetable oil. Unfold pita bread, grease on one side with mayonnaise, wrap in one layer with a book (with mayonnaise inside) and grease with mayonnaise again. Mix the frying with 100 g of grated processed cheese, chopped herbs, spread over pita bread and roll up. Wrap in cling film and refrigerate for a couple of hours. Cut into rings before serving.

 

Salad with herring "Favorite" 

The "nail" of this salad is nuts. Use your favorites, crush in a mortar so that larger pieces come across. For salad, boil two carrots, a large potato, two eggs. Cool and clean. Finely chop the blue onion, grate the potatoes and carrots, you can leave part of the whole carrot for decoration. Herring must be cleaned of skin and bones and cut into small cubes. You can use ready-made fillets, but a herring with a head is always tastier. Mix the fish separately with apple cider vinegar, mustard and mayonnaise (a teaspoon each). We collect the puff salad in a bowl, bowls, glasses, or put it on a flat dish in a round cake pan (without a bottom). We start from the bottom layer and move up, coat each layer with mayonnaise: onions, herring, potatoes, eggs, carrots. We remove the form, grease the top and sides of the salad with mayonnaise, sprinkle with chopped walnuts (a third of a glass). Decorate with herbs and put in the refrigerator for 20 minutes.

 

herring oil

Such butter can simply be served in a resealable jar for guests to take and spread on bread or crackers. And you can cook small sandwiches - on bread, chips, a mug of boiled potatoes. This is how we prepare the oil. Put the fillet of one herring (or other fish), 200 g of softened butter, a teaspoon of mustard, and a boiled egg into the chopper bowl. Beat on pulse mode. Add a couple of tablespoons of lemon juice, chopped dill or a couple of capers, scroll again. It is better when the mass is heterogeneous, with pieces. Pour into a jar with a lid and chill. 

 

Buyurdi with champignons

This is a hot appetizer of baked champignons with feta. Simple and satisfying! 300 g of feta or cheese crumble with your hands into a small baking dish. 4-5 champignons, a small onion and a clove of garlic, cut into slices and put on top of the cheese. Pour a tablespoon of olive oil and balsamic vinegar into a bowl, add 1.5 tsp to them. honey, mix, pour over mushrooms with cheese. Sprinkle with nutmeg, cover with foil and send to the oven preheated to 200 degrees for 10 minutes. Remove the foil after 10 minutes and bake for another 10 minutes.

 

"Mussels" from prunes

This appetizer is prepared in minutes and looks very impressive on the table. Lightly toast 50 g of peeled walnuts in a dry, hot frying pan. Soak 300 g of dried prunes for five minutes in hot water, then drain the water and dry the plums with a paper towel and cut with a sharp knife along from one side to the middle. For the filling, mix 100 g of grated yellow cheese, crushed nuts in a mortar, a clove of garlic passed through a press, two boiled egg yolks and chopped parsley. Stuff prunes and refrigerate before serving.

Main course

Pots of fish and baked cucumbers

Yes, we will bake pickles! The taste will be amazing! Cut two onions into large half rings, fry in oil until soft. Peel six potatoes, cut into four parts and boil until boiling, then drain the water. Cut 500 g of fish fillet into pieces (so that it is convenient to put in your mouth), salt, pepper and fry for several minutes, putting it in the pan where the onion was fried, and adding another spoon or two of oil. Cut two pickled cucumbers into half rings. We lay out our blanks in pots in layers. At the bottom - onions, then potatoes and fish. Dilute three tablespoons of tomato paste with boiled water or broth, pour half into pots. Put cucumbers on top and put in the oven at a temperature of 220-240 degrees for 50 minutes. Serve directly in pots with herbs and sour cream. 

 

sweet table

Instead of the pie offered on the menu, you can bake poppy seed roll, yeast buns or crumbly poppy seed biscuits according to your favorite recipe. We recommend sour kissel - on cranberries, lingonberries, raspberries. It is not necessary to cook it yourself. You can use ready-made powder mix. The same can be said about jelly. Just add berries, fruits to a cold treat, or fill in layers.

 

Poppy Coconut Pie

Juicy, beautiful, very tasty - this cake will please anyone! Let's start with the biscuit. In a deep bowl, beat three eggs with half a cup of sugar until stiff peaks. Add a glass of poppy seeds, a glass of coconut flakes, mix. Melt 150 g of butter in a saucepan and cool, add to the dough. Whisk. Continuing to beat, pour in 200 ml of sour cream. A glass of flour and 10 g loosen, sift into the dough, stirring occasionally. Bake in a parchment-lined pan for 25-30 minutes at 180 degrees. Check readiness with a toothpick. For custard with a mixer, beat two eggs, a glass of sugar, 4 tbsp. flour and half a glass of milk. The mass must be homogeneous. Add another 1.5 cups of warm milk (400 ml is needed for the cream in total) and bring the cream to a thickening over low heat - in a steam bath or in a saucepan with a double bottom. Stir constantly! Cool the cream and add 200 g of butter at room temperature, beat until fluffy. Cover a large plate with two sheets of paper, the joint should fall in the center. We do this so that when the cake is assembled, pull the sheets from different sides and enjoy a clean plate. Cut the cooled biscuit into three cakes. Grease each cake, top and sides of the cake with custard. Garnish with coconut flakes and refrigerate for 2-3 hours.

Yogurt and grape jelly

Jelly with grapes is rarely cooked, admit it! And we want to surprise! Let's get started. Rinse 150 g of grapes, dry, cut the berries in half lengthwise. Better take seedless varieties! Heat 70 ml of grape juice (out of the required 200 ml) and combine with 1.5 tsp. gelatin. Stir, leave until dissolved. Then combine half of the gelatin with the remaining juice. Arrange the grapes in bowls and pour a mixture of juice and gelatin, refrigerate for an hour until the jelly hardens. If the remaining gelatin has cooled, warm it up and mix with 150 ml of room temperature yogurt and a tablespoon of sugar. Gently pour the yogurt mixture over the first layer and refrigerate again until completely set. Remember that you can always dilute the finished jelly and reward yourself with a cup of coffee!

 

Kissel from frozen cranberries

Put 200 g of frozen cranberries in a saucepan, add a couple of tablespoons of water and heat for a couple of minutes. Then rub the berries through a sieve. Pour the cake with two liters of water and cook after boiling for five minutes, add 70 g of sugar and mix. Dissolve a tablespoon of potato starch in 150 ml of water and pour into a saucepan, warm up, but in no case boil! Remove from heat and add squeezed juice. Cool and serve in a pitcher.

Have a great Christmas! Be happy, calm, rich and smile more often!