desilu

Our xmas was always a combo of Danish and "American" -- we celebrated on Christmas eve at my grandparents with our main Christmas meal but only opened our gifts from our grandparents -- Santa presents came on Christmas morning. We had a more casual dinner on Christmas Day. My grandma tried to get us interested in julenisser but we much more focused on what Santa would bring. Dinner is roast pork with red cabbage and rice pudding or a caramel ring for dessert (of course with almond hidden in it). My husband is from England so now we blend Danish and English -- mostly meaning that we wear silly paper crowns during Christmas Eve dinner :o) Actually, that's also added mashed carrots and turnips and roast potatoes to the meal. We open all our gifts on xmas eve but sometimes have a small gift exchange on xmas morning. Christmas day meal is a juelbord - basically a cold table with pickled herring, curried shrimp, salmon, meats, cheeses, etc. Oh, and some aquavit... Here's a question for all of you: We traditionally eat roast pork with red cabbage and every year I ask for the cracklings left on. Apparently this is very difficult for American butchers -- last year I convinced the butchers at Bristol Farms to tie cracklings onto the pork loin and that worked okay but it still wasn't the same. Any suggestions?

when I worked in a fish market we would occasionally be given white King by the wholesaler or fishermen -- my boss would split it up among us -- There was no market for it, so no point to trying to sell it. We also occasionally got wild steelhead in this way -- the best fish I have ever had. Farmed salmon is bad for several reasons: they can escape from pens and compete with wild salmon as well as introduce disease to wild salmon; they produce more pollution; they reduce pressure on preserving wild salmon (for example, removing or redesigning dams that block 80 to 90 percent of salmon migration so that salmon aren't killed or blocked from spawning); they require the use of additives (color); they taste bad compared to wild salmon. Farmed fish isn't bad in itself; if they are completely isolated from wild stock -- meaning not raised within wild waters but in isolated tanks -- there's nothing horribly wrong with it. Look at the success of fish like tilapia... That said, the flavor of good salmon comes from its fat reserves, which are based on how far an animal must swim to lay its eggs -- for this reason, farmed salmon can never taste as good as wild salmon.