A Brand New Year

Happy New Year to all!!!

New Year's Day is one of my favorite days of the year.  It's the start of a new year of course but also I always make my traditional food for the day and somehow folks always show up to get their yearly dose of luck!  My menu always includes the following:

Ham - Pork symbolizes rooting into the new year (chicken is not to be eaten on new year's day, it symbolizes going backward to the old year because of chickens scratching backward... pigs root forward... get it?)  this year we are having honey ham with pineapple

Black Eyed Peas - for luck of course!  I cook mine with hog something or other usually a piece of something we have cooked on the smoker or country ham... something with flavor.

Cabbage - symbolizing good fortune or wealth.  I don't know about the wealth part but I eat it anyway.  I make my cabbage in the crock pot with broth and caraway seeds.

Cinnamon Apples - I usually open up canned apples either grocery store bought or canned by me, add some brown sugar and a tiny handful of red hots.  This symbolizes "red hot love" and sweetness for the year and I made it up.  Either way, apples go good with the meal.

Cornbread - So that our home will not know hunger.  Sounds good doesn't it.  Bread is a traditional gift of a new home for folks along with wine so the new house never knows hunger or thirst.

Pie - In case you didn't get enough to eat. 

I am getting hungry thinking about the smells of my kitchen on new year's day. 

I also read another superstition that says:  Using a knife during the first days of the New Year "cuts off" all the good luck for the coming year.   And that all knives must be put away.  I wonder if this means before or after you eat the black eyed peas?!?!  This one is a Chinese tradition.  I'm not Chinese but I may try this one just for fun.  That means that I'll have to chop my cabbage and onion early and make the pie and cut it early.... use forks to cut the ham... sounds like too much trouble to me.  I think I will start the knife tradition after my black eyed peas are eaten. 

What are some of your traditions and superstitions associated with the new year??










These are journals that I made for my guests a few years back.  So easy to do.... HERE.

A New Year

The first day of the year is one of my favorite days.  I always make a big lunch that includes all the traditional dishes of cabbage, black eyed peas, pork, apples and cornbread.  I am a country gal and I do cook with lard and am very proud of it.  This year our lunch included country ham (pork) from our pigs symbolizing rooting in to the new year, cabbage cooked in the crock pot in broth with onions and caraway seeds for money, black eyed peas with hog fat for luck and cinnamon apples for spicy love.  I made the last one up and it usually is made with red hots for "red hot love" but sadly I was lacking in the red hot department in the pantry so I made do with spices.  Still fantastic.  My New Year's lunch is always accompanied by guests because I also believe that the luck and such must be shared and somehow a different crowd is here every year.  I am just glad to share.

After lunch, I put my coveralls and rain boots on and Molly and I took a walk in the woods. We checked on the garden, looked for flint rocks and walked down the old trail on the edge of the woods. I also had to take care of chores outside myself because I have given my nasty cold to my darling husband.  If you can't share with the ones you love who can you share with?

I have thought about resolutions and actually thought about not making any.  However, I have come up with a couple of things that I love to do but with busy-ness have fallen short in doing.  So my two resolutions so far are to walk in the woods once a week and  make suet this winter for the birds.  I have done both today so I am off to a good start.  I also believe that what you do on New Year's day is what you will be doing all year.  So no fretting, no kicking myself for no reason and lots of love for what I have been given in life. 

What resolutions have you made for yourself so far?