Foods that become family traditions for no reason - what are yours?

[IHeartKingThistle]

DS is 16 today, and I’m in the kitchen making the three things he always asks for on his birthday - Nigella’s Nutella cheesecake, feta and herb mini filo pies from the Good Food website (random) and Betty Crocker Devil’s Food cake mix made into cupcakes with chocolate icing and topped with those Aero mint bubble things.

I can’t remember how any of them became his traditional ‘birthday foods’ but they’re what he wants and I only ever make them on his birthday! (I am not such an attentive mother the rest of the year, I’ll be honest ).

Are there random foods that you always end up making for certain occasions in your family?

Buffet/concoction tea on Xmas eve with smoked salmon, kir royales and roasted ham.
every sat morning - bacon, egg, baked beans, black pudding and toast

Cheese and onion toasties made in a frying pan when we are feeling a bit under the weather. Known as "Nanny's toasties" by adult DD even though she was a baby when my mum died.
Every Boxing Day has to include egg vol au vents, prawn vol au vents and pickled walnuts.
We go to the same restaurant for every major family celebration. We've been going for over 30 years, I don't know that we even really like it that much anymore but it would be wrong to go anywhere else.

Not really a tradition but we all really enjoy calamari - after my fussiest eater developed a thing for it. I could never stand it on my travels to Spain etc when younger but dont mind it now since we buy it several times a week 😁

Chilli on Christmas Eve. It has to be chilli. It wouldn’t be Christmas without it!

@OhDorWheresthesalad thank you for reminding me about vol au vents! My mother used to make them back in the 70s but I haven't had them for decades. That is an injustice that must be rectified asap!

Beef dripping samwich s

Home made sausage rolls (shortcrust pastry and Lincolnshire sausage meat from the butcher) and home made deep fried chips on Christmas Eve. Never any other time!

We have accidentally set a tradition of getting McDonald's breakfast when we set off on holiday. Did it once because there was no food in the house, and then they asked the next time and there seemed no reason to argue. We are about ten years into this - and I never buy them McDonald's breakfast any other time!

Birthday meals:
DD1 - Coronation chicken, salad, noodle salad, baked potatoes, usually orange drizzle cake
DD2 - Lasagne, salad, garlic bread, chocolate orange cake
Son-out-law - Sugared pork, salad, jacket potatoes, lemon drizzle cake

Christmas Eve meal - Fish pie and peas

Nigel Slater’s Thai Pork Rissoles here I make every New Year’s Eve, when we have people over for a party or for dinner - I make them like small marbles and put them out with cocktail sticks, and put the dipping sauce in small ramekins, so people can snack on them like an amuse bouche.

Cheese balls. We need them at every family party.

Indian before Yom Kippur. Exactly the opposite of what you need before a 25 hr fast...

Always magic tea and toast when I'm poorly - started by DM and carried on by DH

Colin Caterpillar for everyone's birthdays

Takeaway (usually Chinese) the night before we go on holiday

I think I might take up some of these lovely breakfast ones on this thread

Pastries (with a candle) for breakfast in bed on all birthdays (usually cut in half so we can have at least 2 different ones - pecan Danish, almond croissant, apple turnover, pain au chocolat etc).

Ham, turkey and lentil soup made with the ham broth for boxing day lunch.

Growing up we always had cauliflower cheese and jacket potatoes in front of the TV (Blind date!) on Sat night. It was the only TV dinner we had in the week. My mum made it very saucy with a lot of cheese, delicious!

@Arlanymor just to save you disappointment, the Jus Rol croissants aren’t nearly as good as the Pillsbury croissants. Signed, an American.

ETA: That said, I’d definitely try them to see if they can scratch that particular nostalgic itch for you.

@kiddywinkleyeee I would absolutely love a good recipe for stuffing if you’re willing to share?

My mother used to make something she called brandy cake. It came from a recipe in her much-used BeRo cookbook and was meant to be cooked in a Bundt tin but we didn’t have one. It was my favourite treat as a child and came out at events, and I make it now as comfort food. I have the cookbook still but follow her in ignoring the specifics and it’s basically a vanilla sponge soaked in whatever mixture of booze and coffee you’re inspired by, covered entirely in whipped cream (with more booze added if you feel like it) and then left in the fridge overnight.

For once I have RTFT. I love all these stories!

We often do this too if we're leaving at the right time. It's part of the holiday fun.

When we go camping, we always have 'Mexican' on the first night.

I've put it in quotation marks because our Old El Paso wraps, salsa, grated Cathedral City, mince, and mashed avo is about as Mexican as Coronation Street. Might seem like a faff, but there's only one pot to heat up in the gas cooker and everything else is picky bits really.

There would be uproar if I ever changed this.

Love this thread. Food is HUGE in our family.

DS14 is keeping a log of best burgers, in an app on his phone, complete with photos, marks for presentation, flavour and accompaniments. So far one eaten on a restaurant in the mountains in France 3 years ago is winning.

Baked gammon with dauphinoise potatoes for Christmas eve, called 'hot ham and gratin' couldn't countenance anything else.

Mini sausage rolls made with ready-roll puff pastry and frankfurters, all through the festive season.

DH buys brandy butter as soon as it comes into the shops in December and at every shopping trip till NY. He creates a stockpile that lasts until Easter and has it on all the winter puddings I make yo follow Sunday roast. There is a sacred shelf in the fridge for the brandy butter stores and a day of mourning when he has the last bit.

Making Easter nests at the end of April with cornflakes and the last of the Easter egg glut

'Sundowners' on weekend or holiday evenings: a cocktail of your choice, mocktails for the DC, with 3 bowls of nibbles like nuts, pretzels, those love corn things, olives etc, and 30 mins to sit together, eat them and chat before supper

Like a PP, we also do weekend pancakes with the initials made from the last of the batter!

Birthday person gets to choose dinner on their birthday, literally anything goes from a restaurant crammed between after school clubs to a take-away or special home-cooked meal. When DS was 9, in the middle of lockdown, I made on his request seafood and baked Alaska for his birthday dinner!

Apples cut into 8 segments, arranged in a flower shape, with a handful of peanuts in the centre and a raisin balanced on each segment, for a mid-afternoon snack at the WE.

Sunday roast all through the winter with all the trimmings and a rib-sticking pudding; Sunday afternoon BBQ all through the summer.

Honey cocktail sausages always a winner at our get together !

Bruce Bogtrotter cake for DS birthday and Nigellas Guinness cake for my birthday

Ooh and a Greggs breakfast buttie at the start of all road trips!

Corned beef hash on Xmas Eve

Chocolate Yule Log. At Christmas obviously. My family combust if it isn’t served. At every meal. My father’s partner doesn’t understand this (it’s not something her family do) so every year I’m forced to undermine her by turning up with a chocolate Yule Log and my father and I demolish it while simultaneously turning up our noses at the (extensive) selection of desserts she tries to offer us.