.

Home page

Text size

E-mail this page

LIIDLII KUE/FORT SIMPSON - The holiday season is a time for family and friends, but it's also a time for carrying out traditions.

For many people in the Deh Cho, Christmas just wouldn't be the same if they didn't follow family traditions, many of which involve food. Christmas cookies are a part of the holiday plans for a lot of families.

Visiting with Santa Claus is one Christmas tradition that Jamie Nahanni-Deneyoua, 4, hopes to continue. Santa made an appearance at the Open Doors Society's Christmas party on Dec. 17 in Fort Simpson. - Roxanna Thompson/NNSL photo

"We always have to bake Christmas cookies together with the kids," said Anyes Fabre-Dimsdale

The family of six eats some of the cookies, along with eggnog, as snacks as they decorate their Christmas tree. Sucre a la creme, a candy similar to maple fudge which is a Christmas tradition in Quebec, is also always part of the family's holiday, said Fabre-Dimsdale.

For Tracy Brown the holiday season isn't complete without cheese cookies.

Brown got the recipe from her grandmother who always held a soiree on Christmas Eve. The party always included baked beans, sausage rolls and cheese cookies, said Brown.

Brown, who now holds her own Christmas Eve get-togethers with family and friends in Fort Simpson, makes sure there are lots of cheese cookies to go around.

The cookies contain a number of odd ingredients including MacLaren's Imperial Cheese, Worcestershire sauce, hot pepper sauce, mustard, paprika and Rice Krispies.

"It's a bizarre mix," she said.

Combined with some more normal ingredients such as flour, butter and salt, Brown swears the cookies are incredibly good.

"They're addictive," she said.

Traditional foods that may seem odd for people who weren't raised in a family with Dutch heritage were also part of Lara Genesis' Christmases as she grew up in southern Alberta.

Genesis' family would open all their presents on Christmas Eve and then have their extended family over on Christmas Day Recipes that were always on the table included butter cake and boerenjongens, a desert made from raisins soaked in brandy.

"It's an acquired taste," said Genesis.

For Dahti Tsetso, Christmas eating is done with family.

"We always do a really big Christmas brunch," said Tsetso.

The brunch, which all her sisters and brothers and their families attend, always has to include crepes or waffles and good coffee, said Tsetso.

For Karen Simon, Christmas traditions are a mix of both old and new. To celebrate her Norwegian heritage, Simon hangs tiny Norwegian flags around her Christmas tree. It's something that a lot of Scandinavian people do, she said.

For the past five years her Christmas tree decorations have also included moose hide ornaments made by children in Fort Liard. It's a nice mix, said Simon.