Good Luck Foods for 2007

[MakingSense]

I want to plan a New Year's Day Open House Buffet menu around foods that bring good luck for the coming year if you eat them on New Year's Day.

Like Black Eyed Peas or Hoppin'John in the South. My German Grandmother fixed cabbage - the leaves meant money in the New Year!
Lentils in Italy for coins.

Do you know any others? Where did the tradition originate? Is it found in the US as well?

[rworange]

There’s a few links at the end that discuss lucky food in various countries and why they are considered lucky.

The Pennsylvania Dutch eat pork and sauerkraut on New Year's Day.

As far as the South is concerned, there are two sayings for the traditions:

- "Peas for Pennies, Greens for Dollars, and Cornbread for Gold."
- "Eat poor on New Year's, eat fat the rest of the year."

Often the shape or color looks like money which is why cabbage or greens are so common in many traditions. Sometimes actual coins are incorporated into the dish for extra luck
- a penny placed under a bowl of black-eyed peas
- a washed dime placed in a pot of peas
- a coin baked in bread (Greece)

I wonder about that business of eating green veggies because it is the color of money. Not every country has green currency. However, the color green is symbolic of hope, so I wonder if that is where that started.

As to pork dishes being lucky, there are two reasons:
- a family that owned a pig would be eating well
- pigs root forward and symbolize moving forward

Along that line, lobsters are considered unlucky in Austria because they move backward.

Hungarians avoid two foods on New Years:
- chicken because you will be scratching around for money like a chicken scratches for food
- Fish because your money might swim away like a fish

Yet many cultures consider fish lucky though I didn’t read a reason why that is.

Rice and starches symbolize abundance, especially the many grains of rice. The color of rutabagas is lucky because it is golden.

Going back to pre-Christian days, ring-shaped food was considered lucky because it signified continuity the "coming full circle," and the belief that good luck will follow by eating foods in this shape. In Holland a special donut is eaten on New Years.

Some interesting stuff about the origins of Hoppin John and other Southern food.

One story dates the dish to the Civil War when a raid by the Northern soldiers left only black-eyed peas and salted pork to eat on New Years Day, so it was considered lucky.

Another theory says the name goes back to a tradition of children hopping once around a table for luck before eating the dish ... though WHY that was considered lucky, I have no clue.

In addition to black eyed peas looking like tiny coins, they swelled when cooked, a sign of increasing prosperity.

A summary of the lucky foods from the links at the end also includes some countries where New Years isn’t celebrated on January 1st.

ANCIENT ROMANS: nuts, dates, figs and round cakes.

ARMENIA: Special New Year’s bread kneaded with luck and good wishes pressed in the dough.

AUSTRIA: Pork dishes (pigs root forward). No unlucky lobster (they move backward)

BOSNIA & CROATIA (FORMERLY YUGOSLAVIA): "Sarma" or beef wrapped tightly in cabbage

CAMBODIA: (April) sticky rice cakes made with sweet beans.

CHINA: (lunar New Year). LOTS of symbolism Foods like dumplings,because they look like nuggets of gold, etc, etc ...(see links).
http://archives.thedaily.washington.edu/1998/012698/trad.12698.html
http://chinesefood.about.com/od/chinesenewyear/a/symbolicnewyear.htm

DENMARK: Boiled cod

FRANCE: pancakes for breakfast

GERMANY: Herring & carp... Germans put some of the fish's scales in their wallets to ensure financial good luck.

GREECE: Vassilopitta, a sweet bread baked with a coin.

The background: A Bishop recovered money lost through high Ottoman taxation, but who to give it back to? The legend says “Saint Basil asked the women to bake a large cake with the valuables inside. When he sliced the cake, the valuables miraculously found their way back to their rightful owners! Today, a cake is baked in honor of this miracle and one coin is baked inside of it. The person who bites into his piece of cake and finds the coin will be blessed with good luck in the coming New Year.”

HOLLAND: Olie Bollen or "oil balls" ... sweet, puffy, fritter-like donuts filled with diced apples, raisins, and currants. The ring shape symbolizes "coming full circle" and is believed to bring good luck.

HUNGARY: good luck - roast pig, with a four-leaf clover in its mouth
Bad luck - chicken (eating it will have you scratching for money), fish (it'll swim away with your money

)

INDIA (Southern): boiled rice

IRAN: (March) Grains of wheat and barley are sprouted in water to symbolize new life. Coins and colored eggs are placed on the table, which is set for a special meal of seven foods that begin with the letter “s”.

ITALY: Northern - lentils (coins)

Piedmont - risotto (signifies wealth with its abundance of small grains)

General: a good luck sweet – from a single raisin to almond-filled cake in the shape of a snake “As a snake sheds its old skin and leaves it behind, this cake symbolizes leaving the past behind as a new year begins.”

Cotechino con lenticchie (pork sausage over lentils). The fatty rich pork sausage symbolizes abundance, while the green coin-shaped lentils symbolize money.

JAPAN: Like China, lots of dishes. Most noted long soba noodles that are sucked up without breaking to ensure a long life. Red snapper because red is a lucky color in Japan. More foods in this link:
http://web-japan.org/nipponia/nipponia3/bon.html

JEWISH NEW YEAR (Sept – Oct): apples dipped in honey.

LATIN COUNTRIES (CUBA MEXICO, PORTUGUAL SPAIN, SOUTH AMERICA): Twelve grapes at the stroke of midnight, each grape signifying one month of the upcoming year. A sweet grape means that month will be good, a sour grape means the month will be bad.

This may have originated in Spain. From a link below: “At the turn of the century, Spain experienced a gigantic grape harvest. The harvest was so grandiose that the year is marked as a time of great luck. Every year since, Spanish people have brought in the New Year by eating 12 grapes as the clock strikes midnight. At each strike of the Plaza del Sol clock (which is broadcast to the entire country much like the United States broadcasts the Time's Square clock), another grape is eaten in celebration of lucky years past, and in hope of a lucky year to come.”

PHILIPPINES: A large amount of any type of food on the table at midnight to help encourage an abundance of food throughout the year.

POLAND: herring (but my Polish family never ate this

)

SWITZERLAND: whipped cream, which symbolizes riches, is dropped on the floor to demonstrate surplus wealth.

TIBET: guthok, which is made of nine special ingredients, including a piece of charcoal. The person who gets the charcoal is said to have an evil heart

Vietnam: (late January) carp - a fish thought to carry the god of good luck on its back.

While a whole lot might not be EXACTLY what you serve for your buffet, at least you have a idea of what is considered lucky ... or not ... and you can improvise.

My own lucky tradition based on nothing ... is two bottles of champagne ... one bottle to be opened in the New Year ... the best my money can buy in hopes that the rest of the year will go as well. The bottle to usher out the old year, depends on how well that year went ... there have been Andre years. I guess after reading all of this I could say the color of champagne is symbolic of gold.

Have a happy 2007. Here’s some of the better links I found on the subject.

http://www.thelancasternews.com/articles/2006/01/01/features/features01_newyears.txt

http://www.123newyear.com/newyears-food/

http://www.pioneerthinking.com/aicr_newyearfood.html

http://www.daytimer.com/E-Talk/Trivia-Time-New-Years-Food-Customs-Around-the-World/0/False

http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0768681.html

http://www.cookinglight.com/cooking/fd/features/article/0,13803,400241,00.html

http://weeklywire.com/ww/01-04-99/aus...

[Pei]

And what, pray tell, will this year's selections be? I've (finally!) hooked one or two friends on the beauty of bubbly and am hoping to convince them this is the year to start your version of New Year lucky food.

The Chinese always have a whole fish (whole is lucky, because all things should have a beginning and an end), because the Chinese word for fish is "yu," which sounds like another word that means good fortune or happiness. So the saying is "may there be 'yu' year after year."

[soupkitten]

wow i really like your post. thanks
even though a lot of countries don't have green money, greens are consdered lucky because green is a color associated with (natural) growth, new branches of a tree, etc. green being considered the color of prosperity concept predated traded currency. also many cultures make special cakes or sweets around new years, in shapes symbolizing coins--- they are often "oversweetened", the idea being an abundance of abundance in the coming year!

[MakingSense]

Although I'm grateful for all the ideas that are coming, I want to offer special thanks to you, rworange, for the time you took to put together that long report on New Year's Good Luck Food Traditions.
I should be able to organize a terrific variety of interesting foods for a buffet.
I'm thinking a roast suckling pig as a focal point but, if the guest list gets out of control, I might have to get a big one cooked and do a pig pull. So many of the peas, beans, greens, rice, cornbread, apple things might work with that.
Very much a work in progress...

[crlyhead11]

'Jewish' New Year foods (Sept/Oct) are more varied than just apples and honey, though both (especially the honey) are common in the Ashkenazi (Eastern European) tradition. Other 'good luck' foods served on this holiday include honey cake and round challah, often enriched with nuts, spices, sugar, and eggs (both especially Ashkenazi). Also featured: Pomegranates (prosperity, fecundity), figs, fish (whole), pumpkin, leeks, and rice. Since the Jewish diaspora spans the world, many 'good luck' foods of Italy, Tunisia, Morocco, Spain, Denmark, and the Middle East are also important in the pan-Jewish culinary culture. Many of these foods were prized in Biblical times, and remained so for the Jewish diaspora--wine, pomegranates, and so on. This gives me a great idea for a new tradition--a thick, pungent, high quality dessert wine.

Here's some of the symbolism behind the food, especially for Sephardi Jews (Spanish/North African tradition and heritage): http://tinyurl.com/ntgq3e

Happy eating!

[Karl S]

Btw, many of the customary New Year's meals are supposed to be eaten on New Year's *Day*, not New Year's Eve. They are supposed to be the first main meal of the year.

[isolaimage]

Hello! I'm writing from the very far away Island of Pantelleria between Sicily and Tunisia. On New Year's Day we use to start lunch or dinne with a glass of our sweet Passito wine with another glass of pomegranate (by pieces, of course). Then we have many many many typical food of our island and after the classical Pandoro or Panettone we close with another glass of Passito and another glass of pomegranate.
This means for us start and begin and restart always with Good Luck looking at us! Good Luck for 2007!

[thegolferbitch]

Isola, in our family (my father's side is from Naples we too have pomegranate for good luck on both New Years and on our Thanksgiving day, too. On Christmas Eve, we have the traditional seven fishes.
We toast after the meal with anisette with three coffee beans in it and "Mil an'" (I know most say cent' an'; perhaps it is a Naples custom to say "mil")

[isolaimage]

Mille Anni or Cento Anni...di lunga vita. A thousand or hundred years of long and strong life.

[Kelli2006]

I have always made sauerkraut with roast pork and all the traditional (spaetzel, potato salad and dumplings) on January 1st.

I celebrate Samhain with friends, but that meal has different traditions and spiritual connotations.

[soupkitten]

do you guys fast? 1 day? 3 days? 1 week? or just do 1 meal, or 3 meals without fasting?

[Kelli2006]

soupkitten, I'm not sure I understand your question. The kraut and pork on New Years is very heavy meal, and would probably allow someone to go for 3-4 days w/o wanting/needing to eat.

Samhain is a 3 day festival or or around Halloween that combines most of the western traditions of Thanksgiving/New Years and Memorial day. It has 1 group feast and many small meals/snacks between various activities.

I usually volunteer to cook at free meal programs on Thanksgiving and Christmas, so Christians and others who celebrate those holidays can spend them with their family.

[soupkitten]

right. i was wondering if you were fasters or whether you guys eat during the daylight hours of the 3 days of samhain, before the feasts. just wondering. some people just do one feast, some do the 3 days, and some fast the whole week prior-- it is hard to do this if you have a job. it appears that you guys do the 3 main meals, but that you snack during the day to get you through-- unlike my family, we fast. samhain feasts don't crop up on chowhound too very often, i was only curious. :)

[Peter Cherches]

Chinese and Koreans often eat rice cakes (the glutenous, noodly kind sliced into little ovals that look like a bit like scallops). In Chinese they're "nien gau" (new year cake) and in Korean "dduk."

I once had a very auspicious new year day: after eating some nien gau I stopped into a Chinese market and my total came out to $8.88, triple-8 being considered a sign of luck. To tell the truth, I can't remember how the year turned out.

http://petercherches.blogspot.com

[kare_raisu]

2007 is year of the pig

[isolaimage]

Independently from lucky wine or food I would like to whish a very good-good year to you all! Ciao

[Will Owen]

Back home in Illinois we always had ham and cabbage; after I moved to Nashville I discovered Hoppin' John. It was also in Nashville that I was invited to a New Year's Day dinner cooked by a woman from Strasbourg, and that was my introduction to Choucroute Garni, the dish of braised kraut and pork products. Both of those dishes have been on the menu ever since then.

Holler at me if you want recipes...

[heidipie]

ooh yeah, send me choucroute a la mode de Will Owen!

[Will Owen]

Email me offline: [e-mail].

It's in my big new slow cooker as we speak...