What’s happening when and where in the world of food.
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Some foods are seen as lucky to eat at New Year. The foods, though, vary by culture: Austria: pork Brazil and Italy: lentils Denmark: boiled cod Dutch: doughnuts (Olie Bollen) Southern US: black-eyed peas Spain, Cuba, Mexico, Venezuela: 12 grapes at midnight, one for each of the upcoming months Pennsylvania: sauerkraut Most North Americans, in...
Oats The 2nd of January is Oatmeal Day, at least according to The Kansas Foundation for Agriculture in the Classroom. The Quaker Oats Company backs them up somewhat, in saying that all of January is Oatmeal Month. Quaker Oats Company started promoting Oatmeal Month in the early 1980s. January is the top-selling month for oatmeal...
The 2nd of January is the Feast Day of St Macarius of Alexandria. He is the Patron saint of cooks, candy makers and pastry chefs. He is sometimes referred to as St Macarius the Younger. As well, because of his association with sweets, he is sometimes dubbed St. Macaroon, which might be less irreverent than...
© Denzil GreenThe 4th of January is Spaghetti Day, according to many bloggers on the Internet. Enjoy a bowl of spaghetti; meatballs or no meatballs, it’s your choice! You might even want to try spaghetti squash. You should be aware, however, that there appears to be some disagreement or uncertainty as to when Spaghetti Day...
Traditionally, people thought of Christmas as being a 12 day festival. The 12 days of Christmas began on what is now Boxing Day, the day after Christmas. They were the time for merry-making, which is why they began after the religious observances of Christmas were over. Six of the days fall in the year that...
The 5th of January is National Whipped Cream Day! At first blush, it’s understandable if your first reaction is — umm, the yearly pig-out high holidays just ended four days ago, and already you’re saying let’s eat whipped fat now? There’s actually a reason for it, though. On this day in 1914, Aaron “Bunny” Lapin...
If you're in a rush today, you could mark Bean Day by having some plain but honourable baked beans on toast from your favourite tin.
Traditionally, people thought of Christmas as having 12 days. Epiphany marks the end of the twelve days of Christmas.
You won’t want to miss Shortbread Day! This is a good day to dispose of the last of the Christmas Shortbread still hanging around by unloading it on friends and neighbours, or by cramming into the lunchboxes of your unsuspecting loved ones. If you’re a fan of Shortbread and happen to have spent the holidays...
The 7th of January commemorates the 1896 publication of the Boston Cooking School Cookbook, now simply referred to as the Fannie Farmer Cookbook after its author.
Plough Monday was usually determined to be the first Monday after Twelfth Night. It was also called “Plough Bullock Night.” It was observed by field workers who would dress up, decorate a plough and drag it behind them through villages. The men who pulled the plough were called the “Plough Bullocks.” At least one of...
The American singer Elvis Presley was born on this day, 8th January, in 1935, in Tupelo, Mississippi. Elvis loved food the way his momma loved the roses, and especially good ole’ southern American cooking. His cook for 20 years at his home, Graceland, was a Mary Jenkins Langston, a short woman who only came to 157...
Milk Day © Denzil Green The 11th of January is Milk Day. This day was chosen because, reputedly, milk was delivered in glass bottles for the first time in 1878 on this day. Glass bottles allowed milk to be delivered in sanitary conditions to customers. Before that, it was brought round in large milk cans,...
Marzipan Day © Denzil Green The 12th of January is Marzipan Day. Okay, who dreamed this one up? People have just spent a whole month picking Marizpan off their fruit cakes, and now someone has proclaimed this Marzipan Day. Perhaps the idea is that Marzipan enthusiasts want to be able to use up their leftover...
The 14th of January is Hot Pastrami Sandwich Day. Hot means warm, not spicy, as in layers and layers of heated pastrami, often on warmed rye bread as well. Ask yourself when’s the last time you had a good Pastrami sandwich, or had one period? Sure, maybe purists would say that good Pastrami sandwiches are...
The 14th of March is an unofficial Japanese holiday. Valentine’s Day started in Japan around 1958. In Japan, on Valentine’s Day, the women give chocolate to both their sweethearts, and to other men in their lives such as co-workers, etc. Chocolate that you give to friends and co-workers is called “giri-choko.” Chocolate that you give...
When’s the last time you had Strawberry Ice Cream? It used to be part of the triumvirate of flavours that ruled supreme — vanilla, chocolate and strawberry — that even appeared altogether in some versions of what North Americans called Neapolitan ice cream. Now, though, Strawberry Ice Cream has been relegated to the attic where...
Wassailing the Apple Trees. Richard Gillin / flickr.com / 2009 / CC BY-SA 2.0 Apple Trees will be wassailed tonight in Carhampton, Somerset, as part of a centuries if not millennia old tradition of wassailing across England. Wassailing provided a fun evening and a time for revelry after Christmas and New Year were over and...
The 17th of January is the Feast Day of St Anthony of Egypt (aka Anthony the Great, c. 250 to 356), the Patron Saint of Butchers. He was born at Coma, near Heracleopolis Magna in Fayum, and died at Mount Colzim. He gave all his property away and lived as a hermit to the ripe...
Popcorn Day © mconnors / morguefile.com / 2003 The 19th of January is Popcorn Day — even though the American Popcorn Board hasn’t got a clue who said that it was, and even though National Popcorn Poppin’ Month is in October. The Popcorn Month was actually officially proclaimed in 1999, by the American Secretary of...
What a day for cheese lovers. Treat yourself to an old favourite cheese, or fall in love with a new one!
Blonde Brownie Day falls handily in the third week of January, just in case you didn't already have a delicious reason to fall off your New Year's Resolution diet.
The 23rd of January is National Pie Day in America, sponsored by the American Pie Council, to encourage people to make and eat pies. They hold a pie contest at each year (though not in January, it seems: in 2006, it was in April.) Today, you could treat a friend to a piece of pie...