Tag Archives: christmas

Traditional Arabic Dessert – Ka’ak

Text/Context

EM – Ka’ak is a traditional Arabic pastry that is usually a cookie. However there is a version that is more like a sweet bread that is traditionally made for Easter. This is the version that’s been baked in my family for generations. My mom would watch her grandmother make it (she wasn’t allowed to touch it until it was done). It’s always a special time of year and a special day when it’s made. It takes most of the day and the whole house smells delightful.
Also in my family, we usually make a quadruple batch.
First, the heat in the house is turned up to at least 70°F (this is the one day a year the heat is turned up above 64° in my house). The dough, using specifically King Arthur flour (no other brand is allowed) whole milk, sugar, and a bunch of spices including anise and mahlab (crushed cherry seeds) is made early in the morning. Then it’s covered in every extra blanket, quilt, and wool coat in the house, because if the dough catches cold, it’s ruined.
After the first rise, it’s rolled into balls, and set on baking sheets for the second rise. After that, the balls are padded onto a special homemade ka’ak press made of chicken wire, then set to rise again. They’re baked and cooled, and then they’re glazed in a milk, sugar, and rose water mixture, dried, and enjoyed. We distribute it to everyone in our family and community.
Interviewer – You said the sweet bread version is usually just for Easter. Does your family make it just for easter? Or is there some other cause for celebration with ka’ak? Is “special time of year and a special day” a particular day each year, or an arbitrary day and it is just the recipe that makes the time special?
EM – The ka’ak we make is traditionally the Easter version but we usually make it at Christmas because mom had more time. We don’t make it on a specific day but because we really only make it once a year that day becomes special.
Interviewer – Why a quadruple batch?
EM – We make a quadruple batch because we give it to a lot of people. We even ship some out to family in California (From Massachusetts).
Interviewer – Since even the kind of flour is so strict, and your mother was not allowed to touch the dough as a child, does that mean there is no change allowed to the recipe?
EM – The only change to the recipe is that my great grandmother always used ghee but we use regular unsalted butter.
Interviewer – Have you learned the recipe, or done it on your own?
EM – I’ve learned the recipe, though I don’t know it by heart yet, and have made it with my mom and then with my aunt in California, when I visited and brought the spices with me from home.I got pulled aside at the airport because of them. They didn’t believe me when I said they were spices.
Interviewer – Who counts as community, when it comes to distributing the ka’ak?
EM – We give ka’ak to neighbors, some people at our church, and like I said, family, including those in California.
Interviewer – Do you feel that the recipe is part of your Arab heritage?
EM – Yes this recipe and experience is absolutely part of my heritage. All of my family’s recipes are either in our heads, or in the case of ka’ak and other desserts, the recipe is written down but no directions are given, so the only way to learn to make them is to observe and learn from our elders, making special bonds and memories.

Analysis

This dessert is made only once a year and I did not collect this story during that time. The story was not performed with the actual food but rather in a context of discussing favorite foods.
Ka’ak is an example of food connecting a person to their family and their heritage. The informant has never travelled to Lebanon, and knows only a few words in Arabic, but is proud of their heritage and feels connected when they learn the recipes that are passed down through family, learned by memory, and made with and for their family. The informant is also excited to share the dessert—and part of their heritage—with people outside of their family.
It is also an interesting case when the food itself becomes cause for celebration, because it is very labor-intensive and time-consuming, so the dessert becomes very, very special.

Reindeer Food

Content: On Christmas Eve, when her kids were young, D mixed up glitter and oats and called it “reindeer food.” Her children would sprinkle the mixture on the front yard, and repeat the following: “Sprinkle on the lawn at night. The moon’s light will make it sparkle bright. As Santa’s sleigh flies and roams, this will guide the reindeer to your home.” 

Background: D was born in Richmond, Virginia in 1963. She moved to Atlanta, Georgia in 1981. She raised three daughters in Atlanta in the 1990s and 2000s. 

Context: This story was told to me over a phone call. I found the variations online. 

Analysis: After I spoke to D, I found several different variations of the saying that goes with reindeer food. Below are a few examples.

  1. Make a wish and close your eyes tight. Then sprinkle it on your lawn tonight. As Santa’s reindeer fly and roam, this food will guide them to your home.
  2. Come December 24th as Santa flies here from the North, here’s what you do, it isn’t hard ~ just sprinkle this stuff in your yard…the sparkles draw old Santa near and oats attract his reindeer…then you just wait ~ they’re on their way.
  3. Sprinkle this reindeer food outside tonight. The moonlight will make it sparkle bright. As the reindeer fly and roam, this will guide them to your home.

I found it interesting that all the different poems that go along with the reindeer food use some of the same words: sprinkle, sparkle, flies. Additionally, I found that some websites called it “reindeer dust” instead of “reindeer food.” The recipe seemed to be about the same, although some substituted sprinkles for glitter.

PICKLE IN THE CHRISTMAS TREE

Nationality: German-American
Age: 22
Occupation: Graduate Student
Residence: Vail, CO
Performance Date: April 27, 2021
Primary Language: English

MAIN PIECE: 

Informant: So like a German tradition is you hide like a pickle––or, the parents hide a pickle––like, in the Christmas tree… And then like all the kids have to find it in the tree. And like, whoever wins––like in the olden days, they used to get like an orange. Or they might get an ornament. But that was in like the 1800s. 

INFORMANT’S RELATIONSHIP TO THE PIECE:

Informant: Um… But so my grandma was like, “That’s gross.” So my uncle was like, “We have to do it!” And so then they got a pickle ornament instead. So they hide the ornament in the tree, and a lot of people do that now instead of getting like a real pickle.  And we like don’t give an orange cause that’s like… Boring. So it’s more like… You get like a little extra sweet or something, but it’s more like bragging rights… And I know that my German family does it too, but I don’t know if we’ve like Americanized it at all though. 

Interviewer: Did you like it as a kid?

Informant: Yeeeeah! You know, what’s a little competition on Christmas? It spices things up! Cause it’s like, “Who’s gonna win?” So it was always me and my cousin, ‘cause my sister and my little cousins were like babies. But then they started hiding it like lower down. Like that was annoying ‘cause then the little ones had a better chance of winning. 

REFLECTION:

The informant expressed that the pickle tradition has been modernized, with her family replacing an orange with a sweet, and a real pickle with a pickle ornament. The tradition has undergone variation over time. However, the fun it brings to the children remains the same, allowing the tradition to continue. Engaging in a tradition will always be a contemporary activity; traditions happen and are upheld in the present moment. The informant’s family is engaging in the tradition in the modern day, and so adjusts it to modern sensibilities. Tradition does not replicate the past, it just connects us to the past.

Chinese Food & Jewish Christmas + a Joke

Nationality: United States of America
Age: 56
Occupation: Microbiologist
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 04/25/2020
Primary Language: English

Main Piece:

How would you describe this tradition?

“For American Jewry, frequently if they don’t have friends or family to spend Christmas with, they needed somewhere to go on Christmas when everything was closed, and one thing that seemed to be open was Chinese food restaurants, which were not closed on Christmas. And there’s a joke that goes along with this: If it’s the Jewish year 5749 and the Chinese year 4257, what did the Jews do for 1276 years? All my numbers are wrong, but it works because the Jewish calendar is older than the Chinese calendar. And this tradition is national.”

Context/Background:

The informant is my father. He was raised culturally Jewish, and his career is within the science field. This information was collected during a family zoom call where we were checking in with each other. Jewish people tend to not celebrate Christmas because anything related to the figure of Jesus isn’t a part of Jewish scripture. 

Analysis:

I have consumed Dim Sum (a category of Chinese food) every Christmas day for as long as I can remember. A tradition that emerged out of convenience became something to look forward to every year. If my family sees other non-Chinese people at the Dim Sum restaurant on Christmas, we probably know them because they’re members of our synagogue. The joke emphasizes how widespread this tradition is, and how reliant Jews have become on Chinese food to feed themselves every Christmas. Getting Chinese food on Christmas has become a stereotype, so much so that even some Jewish Channukah merchandise includes images of Chinese takeout. 

Christmas Present Map

Nationality: American
Age: 37
Occupation: Homemaker
Residence: Dana Point
Performance Date: 3/19/2021
Primary Language: English
Language: n/a

Main Piece:

The following conversation is transcribed from a conversation between me (HS) and my mother/informant (SW).

HS: When I was young, you would make a map of our home with presents marked as x’s scattered throughout the house. Where did you get this tradition from?

SW: From what I can remember, my mom would make Christmas maps for us when we were kids. Particularly for my brother, because he was always super adventurous. My mom may have gotten it from her family, but I’m not 100% sure. Anyways, I remember the first time I did it for you so well. You totally lit up and got super excited, and so I would make a map of our house every year and hide presents in obscure places. At first, I would hide the presents in pretty easy-to-find places, but as you got older I had to get a lot more creative so that you wouldn’t find them in 30 seconds.

Background:

My informant is my mother. She was raised in Huntington Beach, California, but she moved to Kansas with her family when she was 16 because a majority of her family was living there and in Missouri. She always dreamed of coming back to California and took the first opportunity she could get to come back. She now lives in Dana Point.

Context:

I was sitting at dinner with my parents and was talking to my mom about how she had gotten the idea to make a Christmas present map.

Thoughts:

I have always been curious about this tradition within my family, particularly because I often wonder whether it is unique to us or not. If there is one thing that I have learned from taking ANTH 333, it is that a lot of traditions that people think are unique to them are in fact not and in some cases actually very widespread.