Christmas with the Cousins- Danish Style

We celebrated Christmas with the Cousins on the 23rd because Christmas Eve can be rather hectic.  The kids had a great time.  We had a traditional Danish dinner- frikadeller, potatoes, gravy, veggies, crescent rolls and "baby rats." They are a danish dish that are actually known better as boneless birds, but once my grandpa served them to a few missionaries and teased them about being baby rats (because they are rolled up and kind of look like a rat or birds body).  Anyways, my grandpa tells a great story about how worried his guests looked and he still laughs to this day when he shares the story.    The same missionaries would return on a regular basis for "baby rats" and well, the name just stuck and that is what we have always called them.  The name is not very appetizing, but they are delicious!  The recipe for the link says to simmer them for about 2-3 hours but we always use a pressure cooker and cook them at pressure for twenty minutes.  (we also grate the onion)  So the kids ate dinner and then we had dessert.  Traditional Rice pudding with Strawberry sauce. (recipe is for cherry sauce, but we always had strawberry)  Traditionally one whole almond is placed in the pudding and who ever finds it is suppose to have good luck for the next year and usually receives an extra gift.  The kids love looking for the almond and most of them enjoy the pudding as well.  I love it!

The kids were frantically eating their dessert, hoping to find the almond. Chris found his first, but it turned out they all had an almond. Not usually the case, but they were excited about it.  Below is Chris holding the almond and Nadya showing off the prizes.  Smencils and candy cane M&M's. (Thanks for supplying the gifts Heather!)  I decided they would all get an almond because I remember my Grandpa doing the same thing when I was a kid and how surprised we all were! We received m&m candy canes too!

All The Cousins With Their Prizes-

Next we exchanged gifts.  We draw names so we each get one gift and give one gift.  It works out well.

 We had a great night!  One to be remembered!  I love, love making these kinds of memories!