Feast of the Seven Fishes

I recently posted a picture of the first ornaments to go on our tree to Facebook, as a Christmas family tradition of ours and asked for other's traditions. This is a picture of my 67 year old baby rattle.  Yes, our baby rattles are the first ornaments on our tree.  Our family tradition.

 A friend, Karen Hess of Karen's Monday Musings Blog, posted that her family does the Feast of Seven Fishes every Christmas Eve.  I asked what it was and she said, "It's an Italian tradition we celebrate on Christmas Eve, Helen.  Seven fish dishes are served.  No meat or dairy is eaten, so the fish is baked or fried in olive oil. We've always remembered the 7 Sacraments through this tradition, but there are other interpretations as well."  

I didn't grow up with many Christmas traditions, but I have always treasured the ones that I did.  When I married, Ron and I took our family traditions and blended them.  That meant some got changed, but that was okay too.  They were now our family traditions.  

In our family, going to Mass was and is an important part. We tried Christmas Eve, Midnight Mass, over the years and some years it worked and some it didn't.  Before children, it was something we loved.  Especially, our first two years in Pittsburgh, as we walked to our church in the cold, snowy night.  As the children came along, Midnight Mass was not at all the thing to do, until they were older and it became a tradition again.  As the kids have moved onto adulthood and grandchildren have come along, the 4:30 PM Children's Christmas Eve Mass has become our tradition, with dinner at our house afterwards.  Shrimp is always on our menu, but we have never had seven fish or seafood dishes.  This Seven Fishes idea kind of tickled an interest in me.

I did some research on my own and from what I can figure out, Karen is right on with the Seven Sacraments as a connection to the seven fishes. However, some think it has to do with the seven days of creation or the seven days it took Mary and Joseph to travel to Bethlehem (I don't think I ever knew it took them seven days).  I read that some people talked to people in Italy and they knew nothing of this tradition, so it seems maybe it was the Italian immigrants who came here wanting to create a new tradition that would somehow link them to their roots in Italy.  Italy is a long and narrow country, where most are not far from the sea.  Seafood must have been a staple to them.  It makes sense to me, that this would be something that was a common Christmas Eve meal. Why not have Christmas Eve, a time when fasting from meats as a Catholic was a faith tradition, a time for feasting on fish or seafood after celebrating the birth of Christ.  

So, here I am 12 days before Christmas thinking of how I can bring this tradition into our 47 year old family.  We already serve shrimp. I only need to add six more.  Unfortunately, I am not sure the entire family will be as enamored with the idea as I am.  One son dearly loves anything from the sea. I am not sure his lovely wife does.  I am also not sure the other son and his wife would want only seafood on the table. But, the love the sea, so maybe. Our daughter and family will not be home for Christmas this year, so I have another whole year to find out about her. I know the hubby and I would be fine with it.  We love just about anything of or from the sea. 

So, what do you think?  Should I go for it?  I might stir up the water of this family a bit.  Maybe the fun of sharing the legend behind this would be as much fun as the food would be delicious.  But then again, we don't have a drop of Italian blood in us.  Does that matter?