Traditions for the new year

I am sure you have heard this several times already, but welcome to 2014. Just when I got used to writing 2013 on my checks, now I have to shift gears and write 2014. It is amazing how force of habit can cause us to make simple administrative errors such as writing the wrong year on checks for a few days, but eventually we learn to adapt and all is well.

Many of us find New Year's Day to be somewhat magical and transformative. It is a time for rebirth, for planning and for goals and for moving forward instead of backward. There are some interesting New Year's traditions people follow to celebrate this holiday. I remember as a child my father being invited next door to our neighbor's house soon after midnight because he was a dark haired man. Our neighbor believed a dark-haired man needed to cross the threshold first and eat certain foods to bring good luck. If I remember correctly, my dad had to eat some pickled herring.

My family has always made seafood as the last meal of New Year's Eve. I was not sure why we eat fish on that night but after some research I found a note explaining that fish are eaten on NYE because it represents a symbol of prosperity. Fish have scales which are shaped like coins and they travel in schools together for the most part. The scales represent prosperity while the school behavior represents abundance so by eating fish we are trying to bless ourselves with prosperity and abundance.

After having seafood on New Year's Eve, the meal traditions continued on New Year's Day with a meal of pork and sauerkraut. I asked my grandmother many years ago why we eat pork on New Year's and she told me it was because pigs were the one farm animal that never backs up. Pigs push forward, they forage forward and they are stubborn in that respect. One cannot make a pig walk backward so by eating pork we are symbolically looking forward into the New Year.

I learned a different tradition a few years ago when my father-in-law brought black-eyed peas to our family gathering with my in-laws. He said we should all eat some of these peas as they bring prosperity into the new year. While some of my in-laws were hesitant to eat them, we all eventually tried them. I actually enjoyed them. The year for me was uneventful, but my father-in-law won a large Cash 5 jackpot the following Independence Day so maybe there was something to the tradition. In Italy, lentils have similar significance to good fortune because they also remind one of coins.

Those are some of my personal family food traditions for New Year's Day.

I did a little digging to see what I could find out about other New Year's traditions. Parade magazine's website lists different foods which are supposed to ring in the new year. On the list is the black-eyed peas, which are good luck for prosperity because they look like coins. The explanation for pork was quite similar to my grandmother's although it explained that in the barnyard, pigs are the only ones to forage forward. Cows stand still and chickens scratch backward in their search for grubs which adds a little more perspective to the barnyard ideas.

I expected the list to contain unusual foods but many of them are rather common if not surprising. One is buttered bread. Apparently in Ireland it is the tradition to leave a piece of buttered bread outside the front door to show the lack of hunger in the house, an indication of abundance. I'm not exactly sure what happens to the bread, but the neighborhood animals probably have bad cholesterol from eating all those slices on New Year's Day.

While it is a little late to do this year, in Spain 12 grapes or raisins are eaten as the clock chimes midnight. One must finish all of them in order to bring good fortune to yourself for the year. I never heard of this tradition, but it occurs to me that the glass of champagne or wine that I typically drink at the stroke of midnight may handle this for me. It may not bring me good fortune, but it does make the first moments of the new year feel much better.

In Asian cultures, long noodles and fish are traditional good luck foods. The long noodles must be cooked and unbroken in a stir fry and when consumed one should refrain from chewing or biting a noodle to enjoy a long and lucky life. In China, serving the fish with the head and tail intact also brings good luck since the fish in that culture symbolizes prosperity, abundance and fortune. The head and tail represent the start and end of the year so the fish brings luck the entire year.

Those seem to be the most significant unusual food traditions. Also making the list are cornbread which has a gold color and round foods like cakes, pastries and cookies. The latter foods are circular and supposedly reminds us that the old year is completed and the new year is beginning and we need to embrace the fresh start that comes with January first. I suppose too many round foods on New Year's also makes your waistline rounder as well, but I don't think the proponents of this tradition were thinking about that.

Regardless of what foods you had on New Year's Day, the one thing we all should do is make the best of each day because they are unique gifts to us and we should not squander them. Best of luck for a Happy New Year everyone.

'Til next time …