Christmas in TexasWhy do people kiss under the mistletoe? Is Santa Claus actually Turkish? And just what is lutefisk anyway? The answers to those questions and more lie between the covers of this beautiful volume. Christmas in Texas shows how Texans have celebrated Christmas over four centuries, during good times and bad. The Texas holiday season is steeped in the rich legacy of the different ethnic groups represented here. The music, the food, the decorations, the secular fun and frolic have been imported to Texas by land and by sea, often as the nostalgic efforts of homesick immigrants to recreate memories of past Christmases in their homelands. Elizabeth Silverthorne paints pictures of the different ethnic groups that have settled in Texas, showing what they kept uniquely theirs as well as what they changed to adapt to their new home. Walnuts had to be replaced in holiday cooking by Texas pecans, and the traditional fir Christmas tree gave way to the abundant Hill Country cedar. We follow Las Posadas along the Riverwalk in San Antonio, predict the future with Poles and Czechs, shoot the anvil on the frontier, and go first-footing with the Scots. Recipes throughout add ethnic flavors, from Wendish coffee cake to Yugoslavian Christmas bread, from well-known buttermilk pie to exotic zabaglione. Families today will look to this beautiful volume annually as they enjoy holiday traditions passed down to them. Ideal for reading and giving, it also will appeal to those who want to reminisce about the old ways, and those who want to learn more about their heritage and the holidays. |
Contents
Texas Celebrates Christmas across Four Centuries | 2 |
Posadas Pastores and Piñatas The SpanishMexican Heritage | 20 |
Hardscrabble Christmas The Frontier Heritage | 32 |
Keeping the Faith The AfricanAmerican Heritage | 51 |
O Tannenbaum The German Heritage | 59 |
A Dickens of a Christmas The Heritage from the British Isles | 75 |
Kolaches Polkas and Blessed Chalk The Czech Heritage | 91 |
Bamfests and Lutefisk The Scandinavian Heritage | 103 |
A Good Witch The Italian Heritage | 125 |
Festival of the Stars The Polish Heritage | 131 |
Rumpliche and Noodles The Wendish Heritage | 139 |
A Harmonious Diversity The Orthodox Heritage | 145 |
Notes | 153 |
Bibliography | 159 |
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Common terms and phrases
½ cup almonds apples Austin baking Bethlehem boiling bowl bread brought to Texas buñuelos cake candles candy Castroville cedar celebrations century cheese chopped Christ Child Christmas Carols Christmas Day Christmas Eve Christmas season Christmas tree church cinnamon coffee colored cook cookies Cowboys cream cup sugar cups flour custom Czech dances December 24 December 25 decorated dish dough eggnog Ervendberg favorite feast Festival filled flavoring Fort Concho French fruit Galveston German gifts groups Heritage Holy homemade homes immigrants Jesus kolache lemon Let rise light Lutefisk manger Mary meal melted butter Mexican midnight milk minutes mistletoe mixture night nuts Panna Maria paper pepper pierogi Polish popular pudding raisins ranch recipes Rumpliche Saint Nicholas Saint Nicholas Day salt San Antonio Santa Claus sauerkraut scene served settlers shepherds sing star sweet Texans Today town traditional turkey vanilla wassail Wendish Wigilia yeast Yule log