A Christmas Ritual

A holiday dinner last year was so comfortable and enjoyable that seems to have turned into a yearly ritual.

Five souls, some related, some not, all decent human beings spending five hours a year together.

And every year, each leaves with a unique ornament as a memory of the lovely evening.

But that's about the company. This is a food blog, so let's start raving about the food.

The meal is a traditional Christmas dinner, with some surprises.

The surprise this year was delicious spicy green beans with bacon.

So the plate was piled - perfectly cooked turkey breasts, mashed potatoes with rich home made gravy, stuffing that is irresistible, corn, greens and green beans.

And a second plate was piled (was there a third?)

And if 3 plates were not enough, there layers of home made desserts were piled up to be sampled.

Now I realize I did not try the coconut cupcakes. But all else was delicious.

To burn some calories, Christmas crackers were popped and popped and popped.

The prizes were bad, but the crowns looked great on the emperor and the empress along with the princes and princesses.

A lovely evening for sure and a great start of the holiday festivities and feasting.