The Feast of the Seven Fishes

What is the feast of the seven fishes?  It is Italian and is celebrated as a Christmas Even tradition.  Mario Batali says that it is what Italians do when they say they're fasting.  Course after course of luxurious seafood dishes - often as many as seven, ten or even thirteen.  Some do seven for the sacraments, some do ten for the stations of the cross and then there are the 13 for the apostles and Christ.  Seven is a number well-known in the Bible.  One article says that the number seven occurs more than 700 times in the Bible.  Can you imagine that in every region of Itality - 20 regions - there is a different culinary tradition for Christmas Eve dinner.  So much diversity.  This is an ancient tradition of eating fish on Christmas Eve - dating from the Roman Catholic custom of abstinence from meat and dairy products on the eve of some holidays.  The tradition is now considered an Italian-American one with people sitting down to La Vigilia - "The Vigil".  There is a long list of what Central and Norther European Cultures eat for Christmas Eve, with many traditions. This tradition commonly has 12 meatless dishes representing the twelve months of the year. The variety of the dishes is fascinating - some start with sauerkraut soup and finish with poppy seed desserts. Sauerkraut Christmas shows up in a lot of European cultures.  There's Swedish, Slovak, Polish, Bulgarian, Ukrainian, and even a Christmas Kraut with a bit of cinnamon or cloves. Christmas Eve in the U.K.  This is considered a free-for-all without culinary traditions dating from ancient times.  Why is that?  Take the example of Christmas in Scotland - it was banned after the Reformation, and Presbyterian ministers visited their 'flock' to check that they had no festive foods in the house.  Christmas wasn't a public holiday in Scotland until 1958.  So close geographically, but so distant culturally from European customs. This is last Saturday's picture of the ancient apple trees in front of the Daniel Lenko winery in Beamsville.  I finally stopped to get some pictures.  Today, the scene will be the winter orchard with the apples will be covered in soft, fluffy snow.