New Year's Eve: What are You Eating or Serving?

[ScorchedPalate]

Wow, glad I picked the prosperous choice!

We made the Pork Shoulder Roast (Porchetta) from Judy Roger's Zuni cookbook.

←

So did we. Man, that is one of my favorite recipes of all time.

~Anita

[docsconz]

I roasted some nice Flying Pigs Farm rib roasts and my sister-in-law made black-eyed peas. I went south for the weekend - to New Jersey!

[Genny]

I'm curious what everyone is planning for the New Year's celebration.

Our own tradition is to share New Year's with my parents. I've made a conscious effort to do this every year for the past 15 or so years, since I was in college. We've only missed one or two when we lived in Colorado and then we were on the phone at midnight wishing each other a Happy New Year. Going out or staying in has varied year to year.

This year my father's official first day of RETIREMENT is on 12/31/05 so we let hime choose what he wants to do for the occassion. We are going out to a lovely festive dinner at the Capital Grill in Phoenix and we will consume fine fresh seafood and properly melt-in-your-mouth dry-aged beef along with a couple bottles of delicious wine.

Since dinner reservations are going to be late I think I will put together a filling brunch buffet for the four of us to enjoy through the morning and afternoon.

One prevailing thought for me is that I think that whatever my New Year's celebration embrases, so will the coming year reflect that. I intend to smile and laugh and have a great time enjoying my three most favorite people on the planet in hopes that the coming year will be filled with the same.

So, what are your plans? Do you have any special traditions?

[Allura]

A friend of ours always hosts a party. When we were in college, it was at her parent's house (with their friends and her sibling's friends); now it's at her & her husband's new house. and some of the "kids" will be bringing kids! I have no idea what she'll make; usually a lot of hors d'ouvres, and also a buffet-style dinner - ham might be likely. She's Thai, and makes wonderful Thai food, but she doesn't usually do that for big parties. I should actually think about bringing something.

New Year's Day is usually spent with my parents (and Mom & I call each other at midnight). Dinner is frequently roast pork loin, as it "walks forward."

[pamjsa]

One prevailing thought for me is that I think that whatever my New Year's celebration embrases, so will the coming year reflect that. I intend to smile and laugh and have a great time enjoying my three most favorite people on the planet in hopes that the coming year will be filled with the same.

New Year's Eve is our wedding anniversary (17 this year), and for the first few years of our marriage we celebrated by going out with my sister and brother-in-law. Usually we visited a restaurant we'd been wanting to try, or something too expensive to try without an occasion to warrant the splurge. But I've always hated the NYE crowds, so after a few years we made the meal a stay-at-home affair and alternated who would host. Then my husband and I moved away from our extended families, and it became a smaller, more personal occasion for just the two of us. I remember those years very fondly.

Now, post-kids, we have a family dinner at home--usually, heavy appetizers that everyone can snack on throughout the evening and some sort of ridiculously caloric dessert--play games until midnight, and ring in the new year with paper hats, noisemakers, the works. Champagne for the grownups, sparkling juice for the wee ones. The kids' delight in getting to stay up until midnight makes the occasion much more festive than any NYE of my youth.

[ruthcooks]

This year we are having a special dinner honoring New Orleans and featuring LA products: boudin and smoked sausage, perhaps a seafood pasta with tasso, sweet potato casserole with Satsumas, and a Praline Cheesecake. The sweet potatoes don't go too well, so maybe that will become a green salad with Satsumas.

I've never liked to be out with all the boisterous, desperate people on New Year's Eve, so family gatherings are fine with me. On New Year's Day we'll early brunch and then heavy apps late afternoon and evening so all the football fans can have their fill.

[mizducky]

My NYE practices have varied wildly--and in my youth, my practice was to party wildly. In more recent years, though, I've grown more risk-adverse--nothing against going out and putting on a nice buzz, but as far as I'm concerned NYE is pretty much "Amateur Hour" drinking-wise, where people who normally never drink that much and thus have no idea how to handle it, get way the hell out of control and then get behind the wheel. Real buzz-kill as far as I'm concerned.

I am going to do one of my LA runs on December 30th a.k.a. NYE Eve, as my favorite band is playing once again at The Baked Potato--only this time I'm going to try to avoid actually having dinner there, for reasons well-known to followers of the Gallery of Regrettable Foods topic. But while I'll be staying in LA overnight that night, I'm going to make damn sure I'm back home in San Diego again well before nightfall on the 31st. And then I'm going to stay home, probably make a really nice dinner just for myself, have a little drink, and watch other people get wild in the streets on TV. What can I say? I'm getting boring in my old age.

[Kim Shook]

We have done various things throughout the years - going out, having a party, etc. But I've never been able to have a great time with all of the build up and expectations, so we toned it down a few years ago. Our daughter was young and another couple who are close friends had little ones and with the dearth of babysitters on NYE, we just decided to have a quiet evening at home. We go to their house relax, play cards, watch the ball,maybe shoot off some fireworks and have a good old white trash pig out (not sure that the other couple realizes that its a white trash pig out ). The menu always includes: crab meltaways, Bisquick sausage balls, Knorr spinach dip, Velveeta/Salsa/Sausage dip and leftover Christmas sweets. I usually try to make a few interesting things (potstickers one year, a huge antipasto another year), but they don't usually get much attention .

This year the added sparkle will be me and Mr. Kim freaking out because our 22 year old daughter has decided to drive to NYC (we live in Richmond, VA) with a friend for NYE in Times Square ! Don't know how relaxed this year will be with us on the cell phones every 3 minutes !

Happy New Year, everyone!

[suzilightning]

this is when johnnybird and i actually celebrate our christmas. good bottle of champagne, little bites and presents. usually a dip in the jacuzzi then the next day we pick a spot to go birding. last year was oberly road and scott's mountain hawkwatch. don't know where this year - maybe along the delaware river and the lackawaxen for eagles or possibly round valley reservoir for long eared owls.

[Sandra Levine]

We almost always stay home, and drink champagne with a late supper of something like lox, onions and eggs or baked macaroni.

This year we will be spending a long weekend on Cape Cod and going to my sister-in-law's party, at which she will no doubt serve a baked ham and pommes anna.

[Chufi]

I met my husband on a NYE party.. so it is kind of a special night for us. We have done all sorts of different things the past years, from quiet evenings at home, to dinnerparties with friends, to really big parties thrown by other people.

It has become sort of customary in Amsterdam to attend more than one party.. many people are giving parties at their homes, and no-one wants to commit to going to just one, so you end up cycling criss-cross through the city going from one to the other This year we'll probably do 2.. first go to friends for a drink, and then on to another party for dinner.

This dinner party will be mixed company of Dutch and Japanese. The Japanese host will make some Japanese food, and I will make the quintessential Dutch NY treat: oliebollen!! Deep fried pastry with rasins and apple, served with powdered sugar. Very fatty, very delicious.

they will make an appearance on the Dutch Cooking thread soon

[Ling]

The Japanese host will make some Japanese food, and I will make the quintessential Dutch NY treat: oliebollen!! Deep fried pastry with rasins and apple, served with powdered sugar. Very fatty, very delicious.

they will make an appearance on the Dutch Cooking thread soon 

←

Ooh! Can't wait! Fried pastry always makes me happy!

From the age of 17-22, I spent NYE with my ex. We usually went to a house party, got drunk on shot after shot of alcohol, and ate bad food. We always ALMOST miss the countdown!

I don't have any definite plans for this year yet. If the guy I'm dating doesn't ask me to do something, then I'll probably hit a club with some friends.

[Ktepi]

I'm hoping this becomes a tradition:

A few days before NYE, my ex and her husband -- at whose 2002 Halloween party I met my girlfriend -- are coming to visit for a week, and we'll do a belated Christmas. It's the first year since we moved out of New Orleans that all four of us have lived in the same country, had the money to travel, and been free during the break between semesters (the three who are not me are all academics). Hopefully those things will continue to be true now. They're even bringing their cats, one of whom we cat-sat while they were living in China for a year, so it feels kind of like a family reunion.

I'm making duck confit by request, and I'm going to try to sell them on grits since we have just enough left of the good stone-ground grits we bought this summer. A crudo appetizer if I can get good fresh fish, some kind of sweet-tangy-spicy sauce for the duck (I'm leaning towards a vinagrette-ish thing with harissa and chopped up bits of a mysterious citrus fruit I bought a few weeks ago and glaceed), the last of the fruitcake for dessert, Campari cocktails of some sort for drinks after. Probably Campari and champagne, or else we'll just have the champagne separately.

(I told them that when they visit, I'm going to show them that grits, fruitcake, and Campari are all terrific. Next year, sweetbreads and tongue.)

New Year's Day, the current plan is to go into Indianapolis, do a little shopping, and get lunch at Gray Brothers Cafeteria.

[little ms foodie]

This year we will be with 8 other friends in St Petersberg Russia, we are very excited! We like to travel for NYE when it is possible, a few years ago we met up with 3 other friends in Paris. Years we are at home we sometimes host a party or have gone to a nice late dinner with friends- watched the fireworks from the Seattle Space Needle and toasted much prosperity for the new year!

I'm one of those people who LOVE to celebrate!!

[Genny]

Wow, what great plans everyone seems to have!

Suzi- I especially love the tradition of going out birding on NYD. It seems a lovely quiet juxtaposition after the traditional loud celebrations of the night before. Peaceful.

Ling- Are you waiting for him to ask you out??

Ktepi- What a wonderful reunion. Good luck in converting the tastebuds

Happy Holidays everyone...and a joyful New Year!

Genny

[Ling]

Ling- Are you waiting for him to ask you out??

←

Yes...still waiting. We're having dinner at Villa del Lupo on the 23rd, though.

I neglected to mention much about the food my family eats on NYE. Usually, we have turkey on Christmas, and prime rib on NYE. This year, we're having prime rib on Christmas Eve, turkey (and another roast or two) at my aunt's on Christmas. NYE will probably be Chinese hot pot (like shabu shabu), which comes up sometimes instead of the traditional prime rib.

[mikeycook]

NYE is the night my wife and I first got together (we had met once before, very briefly), so until we got married we considered this our anniversary (now it's Bastille Day). We used to always go out in NYC until the millenium, when the prices leaned heavily towards gouging and we haven't been out to a restaurant on NYE since. However, this is the 10th anniversay of our first NYE, so we are going out to L'Impero (one of our favorites) for a four-course tasting menu.

[Vancitygirl]

Hello fellow Westcoast diners. I am wondering what you are all doing for the big countdown to 2006.

I'll confess if you will!

1) Fairly quick Dinner & Drinks at my place with my girlfriends:

Appies:

raw oysters with mignonette

tuna tartare with crostini

wild mushroom risotto with seared scallops and white truffle oil.

2) Stop in at a house party.

3) Off to the Jet Set Party at the Stanley Park Pavillion via the Hotel Vancouver Hotel on a double decker bus.

DJ's, 8 cocktail bars, go go dancers, hors d'oevres at midnight, bubbly champagne lounge.

4) Bed (at some point)

[srhcb]

Babysitting for somebody's third New years Eve!

SB

[makanmakan]

we're off to pender harbour for the weekend!

picked up a couple of buffalo steaks to be thrown on the barbie and a bottle of guado al tasso 2000 to go with it. (on the recommendation of the former owner of coco pazzo who was standing next to us at the store. thank you, if you lurk here!!)

i also have a chunk of vacherin, a chunk of blue cheese soaked in port to nibble on during the weekend.

*edited to add name of wine*

Edited December 31, 2005 by makanmakan (log)

[nwyles]

This will be my first New Year's off since I was 15 years old. ( I am 39 ! )

I used to play in a dance band so we always had a job on New Years. It was hard to justify being out of my own restaurant so I let the band go by the way side for the past eight New Years.

We decided that we would close this year. People come to use as a stepping stone on their New Years plans, but not usually the final destination to ring it in. I have had a wedding and booked the entire Canucks team for a couple of years, but other than that, by the time 9:30 rolls around, it is usually all over for us.

I think we will be off to some friends for some cocktails and snacks and back home with the kids fairly early. I have a bottle of Champage in the fridge for the stroke of midnight, if we stay up that long.

Happy New Years to all -

Let's see if the events lived up to the hype.

[kurtisk]

We decided that we would close this year.

←

SO envious! Really? Isn't it nonetheless one of your biggest sales nights of the year, private party or not?

Just wonderin',

k

[Kim Shook]

OK, the trashy menu is all set. As predicted, the Knorr Spinach dip and Crab Meltaways will make an appearance. I forgot about the meatballs (in the obligatory bbq sauce and apricot preserves), artichoke dip and the pigs in a blanket that I was specifically requested to make. I spent the afternoon rolling up a gazillion of those little cocktail weinies - I did use puff pastry instead of whomp biscuits - do I get any credit for that?? My additions will be raw veg (to soak up some grease) and this really good yogurt cheese dip I make with labne, herbs, olives and cukes. Probably won't be touched . I am sounding snooty, but I will actually enjoy that trashy stuff, too.

Happy New Year, everyone!

[Kris]

I'm making broiled porterhouse steaks, creamed spinach, garlic mashed potatoes, fried jumbo shrimp, chocolate dipped strawberries & creme brulee - with Moet et Chandon champagne to wash it all down!

Hubby and I are staying home this year, so it's NYE pour deux.

Happy New Year everyone.

Edited December 31, 2005 by Kris (log)

[SBonner]

A nice dinner at home with Helen and a bottle of Krug at midnight. Menu still in the works but most likely some oysters, venison rack, and chocolate mousse. Happy 2006 everyone.