A Christmas Tradition
Every Christmas Eve we eat the same meal. There is never the question “what do we want to eat?”. We do a fondue. You may think it would be monotonous to eat the same thing year after year. Well it is not! With fonduing there is endless variety. We have our favorite combinations but we also try new foods every year.
My mom and dad started the tradition some time in the 1960s when Fondue was pretty popular. I never knew a Christmas without it. If you have done one you know how brave my mom and dad were to have their young children cook their own food in a pot of really hot oil. We all survived so when I got married I knew we would carry on the tradition.
When I was a kid it felt like the prep for fondue took all day. In reality it is an easy prep meal. I think when you’re a kid everything feels like it takes forever when you are anxiously waiting for Christmas morning to come. I would help do anything to speed up the process, we all would. Add the leaves to the dining room table, gather chairs from the kitchen, help set the table and decide what fondue fork each person would get. You see on the end of the fondue fork there is a plastic half circle, all different colors so you wouldn’t confuse your fork with someone else’s. I always wanted the yellow one. Aside from the food for the fondue my mom would always have one of us make a salad and she baked potatoes. We would also have something “fizzy” to drink, as my mom would say.
The table was scattered with small bowls of bite sized morsels to dip in the batter and then into the hot oil. We had steak, chicken, shrimp, mini sausage, mushrooms, zucchini, onion, different kinds of cheeses with a variety of condiments to go with. This dinner takes a long time to eat, one bite at a time. Our conversation was simple. We would tell each other what combination of foods and condiments we were eating. We talked all about how yummy our last bite was and we talked about potential additions we would make next year. Over the years my siblings and their families have added things like, broccoli, banana, sweet potato and tons more!
Fondue pots of the past needed a Sterno underneath to heat the oil. Now we have electric ones which are much better. The Sterno was sometimes finicky. My mom and dad would often heat the oil on the stove and then add it to the pot with the flame underneath to maintain the temperature.
The Year I got married we came home for Christmas and it was Ryan’s first time doing a fondue. At the end of our meal my mom said “we need to put out the Sterno”. Ryan being unfamiliar with it but also eager to help out thought “okay we just blow them out like a candle”. So he did and the flame blew forward right towards my mom. She let out a little squeal! We all laughed once the threat of fire was gone and everyone joked Ryan was trying to “take out” his new mother in law.
There is so much more I could write about our traditions but it is Christmas Eve and the fondue prep will start soon. I can’t wait! Merry Christmas everyone!!
KIERSTA BAILEY 