Photo courtesy Keya Wingfield
’Tis the season of homes bedecked in festive decor, the search for the perfect gifts and the classic “Let’s touch base after the holidays” email. But what really make the holidays are traditions, those treasured experiences that only come once a year. We caught up with local industry professionals to talk about their favorite merry moments, from family rituals to special drinks and dishes.
Lester Johnson
Co-owner of Mama J’s
“Each year, the entire family would gather at Grandma’s house for the holidays, everyone grabbing a seat where they could, even using ironing boards as tables. We continue the tradition of family gatherings, and the entire menu at Mama J’s was inspired by these holiday traditions. Mac and cheese and collard greens are everyone’s favorite.”
Biscotti (Photo courtesy Barry Haneberg)
Barry Haneberg
Co-owner of Virago Spirits
“Vicki [Haneberg, sister-in-law and co-owner of Virago Spirits] bakes tons of amazing biscotti. She also prepares a special batch of eggnog during the holiday season. The recipe is passed down from her grandfather, although we now add Virago Four-Port Rum alongside the classic bourbon base. On my side of the family, we make this absolutely fantastic, horribly 1970s sausage roll every Christmas and eat it on Christmas morning. I’m pretty sure it came out of a Good Housekeeping magazine. There are no natural ingredients, but damn, it is so good.”
Maria Goethals
Baker and founder of Amusing Maria
“Our holidays are very simple, but the traditional Filipino holiday [celebrations are] grand with lots of food. One tradition I try to practice if my husband and I have a quiet New Year’s Eve is eating arroz caldo (chicken soup/rice porridge) and making sure there are round fruits for good luck such as grapes, pomelo, pongkan (mandarins) and cantaloupe on the table during media noche (midnight). In the Philippines, we turn on all the lights in every room, leave the front door open and put coins on the doorstep for good fortune. Once it’s midnight, we make as much noise as we can, including fireworks and banging pots and pans. It’s to get rid of all negative energy from the past year.”
Walnut roll (Photo courtesy Sergey Fayvusovich)
Sergey Fayvusovich
Owner of Europa Food Market
“For Christmas (and Easter and Thanksgiving), my wife makes the best walnut roll in the business because she uses the highest-quality ingredients in the business, mostly from Europe. This pastry is a historic tradition across pretty much all European regions, but named differently, of course. Almost nobody, even in New York, makes this pastry because of how labor intensive and costly it can be.”
Karina Benavides
Co-owner of Abuelita’s
“We, of course, decorate the restaurant, and our home, too. We also do the Nativity scene. When it comes to the Nativity scene, we don’t lay [down] the baby Jesus until 12 a.m. on Christmas Eve. We usually have a song and rock the baby to lay it down on the Nativity scene. For food, we cook sweet buñuelos (a dessert of fried dough dusted in cinnamon sugar) and ponche navideño (Mexican Christmas punch). At the restaurant, we focus more on the tamales and pozole.”
Photo courtesy Common House
Parker Girard
Bar manager at Common House and Birdie’s
“Genuinely the best combination of flavors, maybe ever, is the combination of green chartreuse and chocolate, specifically hot chocolate. Chartreuse is such a weird flavor, the fact that it works with hot chocolate doesn’t really make any sense until you try it, and then you think, ‘Oh, absolutely.’ The French have been doing this for a long time, [with a drink] called Verte Chaud, meaning green and hot. I had it for the first time in New York at the NoMad hotel a few years ago, and it just lived in our brains, and we try to drink a cup of it every year.”
Ari Augenbaum
Co-owner of Soul Taco and JewFro
“Every year on Christmas Day, when everything is closed and most people are celebrating the holiday, my very Jewish family goes ice skating at a nearby outdoor rink and follows that with a hibachi dinner. We’ve grown to love our little family tradition, and my kids look forward to it every year. Growing up, my mom always made latkes, [served with] store-bought apple sauce and sour cream.”
Keya Wingfield
Baker and owner of Keya & Co.
“We go to my mother-in-law’s house every Christmas morning, and since we open presents early, we make a big family brunch. My husband’s family is American, so we have ‘traditional’ American breakfast items. Since I’m vegetarian and grew up in India, I almost always make an Indian American version of baked potatoes, with tons of masala. A small thing that we do as a family of three is watch ‘Home Alone’ on Christmas Eve while making s’mores by the fireplace. And given what I do for a living, I make grahams and marshmallows from scratch.”
Nar Hovnanian
Co-owner of Soul Taco and JewFro
“Christmas is huge in my family. We have a lot of traditions, but my favorite one ever since I can remember is on Christmas morning, [when] we would have to wait to open presents until our grandparents came over. We would start the morning off with the same breakfast, a Middle Eastern hot breakfast cereal (my grandfather’s favorite), and then we would gather around the fireplace and all open presents. While my grandfather is no longer with us, the tradition continues, and now my young nieces are in on it, too.”
Hamid Noori
Chef-owner of The Mantu
Oplatki (Photo via Getty Images)
“Mutton (lamb), the most popular meat in Afghanistan, is what we typically serve around the holidays. Chicken is also on the table; both usually served with long grain rice and lots of fruits and vegetables. Other popular Afghan dishes made during the holidays/festival time include mastawa, a winter dish made with rice, chickpeas and salted mutton (lahndi); mantu and aushak dumplings; kabuli palaw (rice with raisins, carrots, nuts and lamb); and Afghan kebab.”
Andrea Curry
Co-owner of Ryba’s
“A Polish/Eastern European holiday tradition that we celebrate with [husband and co-owner] Ned’s family on Christmas Eve, Wigilia is usually celebrated with a meatless feast. We have tons of Ryba’s pierogi, pelmeni [dumplings], mushroom soup and fish snacks like salmon mousse and herring. Before dinner, everyone is given a thin cracker called an oplatki. You walk around the room with your oplatki, breaking off little pieces and sharing them with your loved ones. With each piece, you share a wish for them for the year to come, like good health, success, fun travels, etc.”
Responses have been edited for length and clarity.
