Advent Calendar: Holiday Foods

It's the annual Advent Calendar of Christmas Memories!  I've participated the past three years (2009, 2010, and 2011), and rather than simply re-post, I'm going to link to the older posts, and - when applicable - post about something else that's somewhat related.

The prompt for today is: December 2 – Holiday Foods
Did your family or ancestors serve traditional dishes for the holidays? Was there one dish that was unusual?

In my post about this from the past three years, I talked about the German coffee cake (a Streuselkuchen) I make, from a recipe that was taught to me by my paternal grandmother, Elizabeth Massmann Pape, back in the 70s. She learned it from her mother or grandmother, I can't remember which.  I hadn't included a picture of the coffee cakes in past posts - but I have one this year!

The recipe calls for fresh cakes of yeast (not the dry "activated" stuff, although it's getting harder to find cake yeast) and the dough rises three times. The streusel is a mixture of brown sugar, granulated sugar, flour, and real butter, with either some grated orange and lemon rind or some cinnamon. It takes all day but generally makes 6-8 coffee cakes depending on the weather (sunny dry days produce more coffee cake). I'll probably bake these December 22, 23, or 24 this year.  My dad gets at least a couple for part of his Christmas present, and most of the rest go to the family gathering in Austin for snacking on Christmas Day and the day after.


© Amanda Pape - 2012 - click here to e-mail me.

The Advent Calendar of Christmas Memories (ACCM) allows you to share your family’s holiday history 24 different ways during 24 days in December! Learn more at http://adventcalendar.geneabloggers.com.