It's always advisable to meal prep before Christmas Day and even the New Year to reduce pressure and save time to spend time with family and friends.
For me, cooking for Christmas started on Christmas Eve. Let's take a look at some of the Christmas Meals.
Christmas Meals
On Christmas Eve, I prepared a traditional soup called Ofe Owerri (Owerri soup from the people of Owerri, Imo state, Nigeria). It's a soup made with two important vegetables: pumpkin leaf and Okazi leaf (also known as wild spinach).
When the leaves are fresh, they are green, and when they are dried (to preserve them for a longer period), they are dull green or brown. The look when cooked with the fresh leaves and dried leaves is different, but still delicious.
It's a spicy soup cooked with the following major ingredients: a variety of proteins (Meat and dried fish), traditional spices, palm oil, and thickened with cocoyam (cooked and blended).
It was so delicious, and I enjoyed it with the regular swallow, eba. It was Christmas Eve dinner.
Christmas Day Breakfast: I had Watermelon, which was so juicy and sweet. I wanted something light that morning, and for me, the watermelon was perfect.
I didn't bother snapping because I have a couple of Watermelon images as red as the one I had. So, here is one from my gallery.
For Lunch: I had a sandwich made with whole wheat bread, smeared with honey and peanut butter and filled with boiled egg and sardines. It was yummy, and I took a strawberry-flavoured soymilk drink to go with.
Dinner time: I thought of having vegetable fried rice, turkey and live chicken because of their fresh, delicious taste. At first, I wanted to use minced beef for it, but I didn't bring the beef out of the freezer on time to defrost to be able to mince it, and so, I had to use only vegetables, which are: carrots, green bell peppers, onions, spring onions, green beans, green peas, and sweet corn.
I used the chicken and turkey stock, which contained bay leaf and other herbs and seasonings.
For the Turkey, I wanted something crispy, so I coated them with butter first, then followed with ground cornflakes, and finally oven-baked them. I wanted something different from the usual crispy chicken process.
You can observe that one is missing from the baked set. I had already served a plate before snapping. Haha.
The Chicken parts were oven-baked directly with the turkey after simmering them. They were full chickens, so they had all the parts, except for the intestines. Can you spot the 2 heads and the chicken feet?
Anyway, here they are, all looking good and inviting.
The aroma from the vegetable fried rice and proteins was heavenly. I dished out the food for everyone, and this is how it looked. I had the vegetable fried rice and the crispy turkey with cabbage and cucumber.
The food was delicious, with the turkey being slightly crispy.
New Year Meals
On the first day of the year, I had two meals. The first one was taken at noon. I made Toasted bread smeared with honey and peanut butter and filled with eggs and sardines. The filling is the same as the one I had in the sandwich on Christmas Day.
I enjoyed the crunchy edges. Do you also like the crunchy edges of toasted bread?
Dinner time: So, I thought of making pasta for everyone, but I also wished someone else could cook it. Then my wish was fulfilled without even asking anyone. My younger brother was like, "Guys, I want to make spaghetti, who's in?" We gave a positive response, and he got to it.
It was a bit spicy and, yeah, delicious too. It was cooked with Chicken tomato-mix stew, carrots, sausage, habanero pepper, green bell pepper, and some seasoning.
Finally, on December 28th, I baked some traditional fruit cake and banana cake loaves both orders and gifts. Each bite sends a striking blend of flavours, an irresistible taste and feeling, pulling you in for more.
So, yeah, nothing much, but spending these days at home with my siblings was fun.
Let me know in the comments what you had during the holidays, or if you had something similar, or if you prefer to make these meals differently. I would love to know.
Thank you for stopping by and taking the time to read my blog post. I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments.
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Love from @winanda. Stay connected. 🧡
All images are mine.
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About Winanda
 | Winanda (Ikwuoma Winifred Diala) holds a Bachelor's degree in Petroleum Engineering. She embraced her passion and became a baker, recipe developer, creative writer, and food content creator. Composing songs, listening to music, and seeing movies are a few of her hobbies. |
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