Ukrainians pride themselves on baking the best tortes, and Walnut Torte is one of the most traditional
Torte preparation requires time and patience, but as with any other recipe made from scratch, it is a labor of love and well worth the effort.
Saint Nicholas, was the “gift giver” I was familiar with during my childhood. He had a white beard, was dressed in bishop’s garbs, carried a crozier, and arrived on a white horse. On December 6th, he was visiting well-behaved children, and placing candy and cookies under their pillows. If you were really good, then he would drop off more goodies on Christmas Eve. You also were expected to know your Catechism, in case he decided to quiz you, before leaving you a gift. We recited prayers and songs dedicated to St. Nicholas, instead of leaving him milk and cookies.
On January 6th, a Christmas Eve is observed by many Ukrainians, Greeks, Orthodox Christians, and others, who follow the Julian calendar.
I would like to share links to some of my previous posts about Ukrainian Christmas traditions, as well as few recipes for Ukrainian Traditional Christmas Eve dishes.
I was lucky to have been invited to a Multicultural Evening, at a local Elementary School.
There were beautiful displays of artifacts and ethnic foods from several countries such as: Ukraine, Poland, Ireland, Australia, South America, India, China, Philippines, Scotland, and Africa. Everyone enjoyed a wonderful ethnic dance performance by Irish, India and Philippines dancers.
It was fascinating to sample the different ethnic foods, and admire the artifacts.