...beloved recipes of the Gugel family
classic family favorites...
Christmas dinner is the same dinner we have at Thanksgiving. And it’s the same Christmas dinner we’ve always had every year since 1960, and probably before that even.
Every family has a “signature dish”, a unique tradition that no one else has. In our case, it's "green jello salad" with canned pear halves and maraschino cherries. It wouldn’t be Christmas without Mom’s green jello salad. Mom says it looks like Christmas with the green and red colors. (That doesn’t explain why it shows up at Thanksgiving too.)
There’ll be a twenty-five pound turkey in the oven – enough for leftovers for turkey sandwiches, everyone’s favorite. Other leftover dishes might be Turkey Croquettes or hot turkey sandwiches smothered in gravy. Of course, we’ll have Dad’s Turkey Soup the next day.
Every year, Dad cleans the turkey after dinner. Then he takes the turkey bones, and throws them all together in a giant pot of water to boil for about three hours on the stove. He boils it with onions, carrots, celery, parsley, salt, and pepper. He puts in thyme, a bay leaf, and a few cloves.
In the morning, Dad drains it into another pot and throws the bones away. He boils some of it with egg noodles, and we have soup for lunch. This is Dad’s recipe, not Mom’s, and it’s the only holiday recipe from his family, not hers.
All the other recipes are from our mother’s mother, particularly the Turkey Stuffing and the Green Pear Jello Salad.