Author: Zoe Ackah
Published on: Holiday Life Magazine-Travel Ontario, Winter 2013
我的加拿大聖誕節 （节选）
By Zoe Ackah
In China, Christmas is relatively new. Since Christmas has had hundreds of years to spread around the world, it takes on quite a bit of local flavor in each country it is celebrated in.
The variety of Christmas activity globally is staggering, and because Toronto is a multicultural city, the way Torontonians celebrate Christmas actually varies a lot.
But for the sake of simplicity, I’d like to offer a brief introduction to the highlights of my family Christmas.
在中國，聖誕節還是相當新鮮的節日。聖誕節在幾百年的時間裏傳遍了全球，每個國家的慶祝方式也因此加入了地方風味。
世界各地聖誕活動的差異之大讓人驚訝，多倫多是一個多元文化城市，這裏的市民們慶聖誕的方式也是形形色色各不相同。
不過這裏為了簡明扼要，我想介紹一下我家中的聖誕亮點。
聖誕節的主要配方
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At 8 am on the morning of December 25, with everyone, including me, still in there pyjamas, I take a picture of all of us in front of the tree loaded with presents. I will look just like the ones of my Christmases at grandma’s in the 1970s—the place where Christmas was born for me—only instead of Polaroid print, my pictures will go straight to Facebook.
After my coffee, its time to start Christmas dinner.
12月25日的早晨8點，家裏的所有人，也包括我自己，都還穿著睡衣，拍照的時間到了，我們抱著滿懷的禮物，在聖誕樹前留影。照片裏的我，還是70年代在祖母家過聖誕時的樣子。唯一的區別就是，照片不再被沖洗出來，而是直接放到了Facebook上。
喝過了清晨的咖啡，就該開始準備聖誕晚餐了。
Christmas Dinner—Let’s call this the main event.
My grandmother was the absolute master of Christmas dinner, and so I model mine after hers.
She would start at 10 am after the kids opened all the presents. There were at least 15 different things on the menu and, thought she would put them in the oven or on the stove at different times, they would all miraculously come out of the oven right before we ate.
I realize now she was “reverse engineering” dinner. In her day, young women were schooled in “domestic science” and keeping house was an art form. Christmas dinner was grandma’s annual masterpiece.
First in the oven were the main courses. Grandma would make both a roasted turkey and a ham because our family is large.
It is very, very hard to mess up a ham, but turkey requires accurate timing in order to ensure it is not overcooked [dry] or undercooked [bloody!].
For me, turkey stuffing is the best part of the meal. There are so many kinds of stuffing, but generally it is made of stale bread and the browned giblets of the turkey mixed with onions and savory spices.
The stuffing is a substance with great potential for personal expression. Each cooks add nuts, raisins, bits of apple—actually there are recipes to stuff turkey with pretty much everything.
The turkey is stuffed with the mixture of your choice and put in the oven to cook. During cooking the dry bread is softened by the delicious turkey juices. What comes out of the turkey in the end is the soft, savory and magical fluff we call stuffing. Ah, so good!
Side dishes at grandma’s house include mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes or some other root vegetables, brussel sprouts (children hate them but they are the only healthy thing on the menu), at least three kinds of salad, one of which must include marshmallows (yes, really, salad with marshmallows, write in to our office if you want the mysterious recipe), and cranberry sauce of course.
Possibly more important than everything but the turkey is the gravy that you pour over everything on your plate [except salads containing marshmallows]. 1950s housewives like my grandmother obsessed over gravy quality. Was it smooth [good] or lumpy [bad]? Was it too salty, too peppery, or too bland?
I possess the great, esoteric gravy knowledge of my foremothers, but even I have been known to throw out entire pans of gravy and start again. It just can’t go wrong or the meal is spoiled.
Men are shocked as food magically fills the table around 4pm. Grandpa or Uncle Chuck would carve the turkey and the ham up, which was the man’s honor after the women’s hard work. It’s time to eat dinner. Please pass the gravy.
It is important to pace yourself when eating because afterwards there will be pies…lots of pies. In fact, no matter how many pies you make, there are never enough. All of these should be served with whipping cream—another thing there is never enough of at Christmas.
In my mind pumpkin pie is absolutely mandatory [because it is my favorite] with optional apple pie and mincemeat pie.
Mincemeat is a true Christmas standby. Around since the times of the Crusades, it has evolved so much it no longer contains any meat. It’s mostly diced apples, raisins, and spices. I hate mincemeat. Sorry, I just do!!
What I love is Christmas cake. It’s basically a heavy cake filled with candied fruit of all kinds. The cake is then wrapped in a tea cloth and stuck in a tin and drizzled with alcohol.
June is when my grandmother would make a Christmas fruitcake and start pouring liquor on it. The ¼ cup of hard liquor you pour on it every couple of weeks slowly evaporates leaving nothing but brandy, rum or even vodka flavor in the cake. You “get this cake drunk” periodically right up until a week before Christmas.
Once I asked grandma, “What kind of liquor do you put on the Christmas cake?” She shrugged and said, “Whatever your grandfather is drinking.”
聖誕晚餐—一天的重中之重
我的祖母絕對是聖誕晚宴的大師級人物，所以我的晚餐也就以她的為範本了。
早上10點，孩子們打開了所有的禮物，祖母也開始著手烹制大餐了。菜單上至少有15種不同的菜品，祖母會在不同的時間把他們放進烤箱，但是在晚餐開始前，他們會奇跡般的同時出爐。
我現在才發現，她用的是“逆向工程學”原理。在祖母的年代，年輕姑娘必讀的科目是“家政學”，持家是一門藝術。而聖誕大餐則是祖母的年度傑作。
首先被送進烤箱的是主菜。祖母會做一只烤火雞和一只火腿，因為我們家中人口眾多。
火腿要烤失敗很不容易，但是火雞就要求精確的烤制時間，烤過了肉會幹，火候不到則會鮮血淋淋！
整個大餐中我最喜歡的就是火雞肚子裏的餡料。餡料的種類繁多，通常是幹面包，棕色的火雞內臟，混合著洋蔥和調味作料。
火雞餡料可以盡顯廚師個人風格。每個大廚都會加入的作料是堅果、葡萄幹、蘋果粒---事實上專門用於火雞餡料的食譜可以說是包羅萬象。
依照個人愛好填滿了餡料之後，火雞就被送進了烤箱。在烤制的過程中，幹面包被美味的火雞汁水浸透而變得柔軟。最終，我們會在出爐的火雞腹中發現軟軟的，松松的，滋味十足的魔力餡料。嗯，味道好極了。
祖母家餐桌上的配菜包括土豆泥，紅薯泥，和其他壓成泥狀的根莖植物，小洋白菜（孩子們討厭這道菜，盡管這是菜單上唯一的健康食品），至少三種沙拉，其中一種必須有棉花糖在裏面（沒錯，棉花糖沙拉耶，如果你想知道秘方，請給我們的報社寫信索取），當然少不了小紅梅果醬。
除了火雞之外，第二重要的恐怕就是澆在你盤中各種食物上的鹵汁了（棉花糖沙拉用不著）。像我祖母這樣的1950年代的家庭主婦對鹵汁的質量如癡如醉。是滑爽可口，還是疙疙瘩瘩味道糟糕？ 是不是太鹹，胡椒放的太多，還是平淡無味？
我從我的祖母那裏繼承了家傳鹵汁秘方，但即便如此，我也會倒掉一整盤做好的鹵汁在重新來過。鹵汁千萬馬虎不得，否則整頓大餐都會被毀掉。
下午4點左右，食物們魔法般地布滿了餐桌，這讓家中的男人們大吃一驚。祖父和叔叔會切開火雞和火腿 -- 這是女士們忙碌了一天後，男士享有的殊榮。開吃吧諸位，勞駕請把鹵汁遞給我。
用餐要有節奏哦，吃過主菜還有派呢…好多的派。實際上，不管你做了多少派，永遠覺得不夠。配著派一起吃的還有泡沫鮮奶油--- 又一個聖誕時節永遠吃不夠的美味。
我個人覺得南瓜派是必須的（因為我自己最喜歡），蘋果派和碎肉派備選。
碎肉派是真正的聖誕備用食品。從十字軍東征開始，碎肉派不斷改良，到如今已經肉跡全無。主料變成了蘋果丁，葡萄幹和香料。我討厭碎肉 。不好意思，說實話啦。
我愛聖誕蛋糕。這是一種混有各種水果蜜餞的黃油蛋糕。蛋糕烤好後用茶巾裹好，放到罐子中，然後開始向罐中淋酒。
我的祖母在6月份就做好了聖誕果脯蛋糕，並開始在上面澆酒。每兩周向蛋糕上澆1/4杯的烈性酒，酒精蒸發後，就在蛋糕中滲入了朗姆酒，白蘭地，甚至是伏特加的酒香。你會讓這只蛋糕定期的“喝醉”，直到聖誕前一周。
我曾經問祖母，“您在蛋糕上澆的是什麽酒？”她聳聳肩說，“你祖父喝什麽我就用什麽。”
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