What Holiday Food Taditions Do You NOT Like?

[Spoder]

Okay, I have to ask - what the heck is green bean casserole? I love green beans, but here they're usually just lightly steamed. I need to know what is done to them in a casserole to make them so vile!

This 'candied' business also sounds odd. Here, sweet potatoes and pumpkin are roasted along with the other veggies, usually in the same pan as the meat. Sweet potato casserole with marshmallow on top is a million kinds of wrong, IMO - marshmallow should not be part of any savoury dish  - and how do you candy a yam?

[Wonderflonium]

Green bean casserole (at least here) is green beans and mushroom soup with a crunchy onion topping.

http://www.campbellkitchen.com/recipedetail.aspx?recipeId=24099&fbid=BpV9M3InHMT

Candied yams/sweet potatoes involve loads of brown sugar and butter.

[Spoder]

Green bean casserole (at least here) is green beans and mushroom soup with a crunchy onion topping.

http://www.campbellkitchen.com/recipedetail.aspx?recipeId=24099&fbid=BpV9M3InHMT

Candied yams/sweet potatoes involve loads of brown sugar and butter.

Thanks! And, umm, ugh. I don't want to offend anyone, but that casserole looks horrific. And I really don't get the idea of cooking sweet potatoes with sugar, they've got enough natural sugar in them!

That said, I come from a country where we happily scarf back Vegemite, so I can't talk. 

[Elfmama]

Green bean casserole (at least here) is green beans and mushroom soup with a crunchy onion topping.

http://www.campbellkitchen.com/recipedetail.aspx?recipeId=24099&fbid=BpV9M3InHMT

Candied yams/sweet potatoes involve loads of brown sugar and butter.

Green beans for this casserole are usually canned. The beans by themselves, with the crunchy onion topping, might be marvelous. However, the mushroom soup concentrate looks and tastes like barf, IMO. 

Candied yams (in the US 'yam' and 'sweet potato' are synonymous) also start out canned in my experience, in heavy syrup like many canned fruits.  They're baked with MORE sugar and miniature marshmallows on top.  This renders them into a nasty cloying sweetness that can fell a diabetic who is just in the same ROOM with them.  I avoided sweet potatoes for years, until I had DD#2's version -  fresh sweet potatoes, with just a touch of cinnamon and brown sugar and pecans topping them.

[Zilla]

I made a fresh green bean casserole one year that everyone loved except my mom and her dad who prefer the canned beans with canned soup and topped with soggy french onions (they bake it all together)


So if you attempt to make it, use fresh green beans julienned in the french style, lightly steamed.  I made a light mushroom sauce, tossed the greens in it and topped it all with bacon bits mixed with french onions. 

[camlan]

Our family never did the green bean casserole, as we always had green beans from our garden that had been frozen, just so we could eat them on Thanksgiving.

So last year I decided to make a green bean casserole, just to see what it was like. While it wasn't the worst thing I've ever eaten, I will not be making it again. Plain ol' steamed green beans are fine by me.

[Glaceon]

I like green bean casserole.  I'm told I have a bland and immature palate, though.

[Wonderflonium]

I like both green bean casserole and fresh steamed green beans. They are 2 very different foods to me. I prefer the latter, but I won't turn down the former. 

[Nibsey]

So if you attempt to make it, use fresh green beans julienned in the french style, lightly steamed.  I made a light mushroom sauce, tossed the greens in it and topped it all with bacon bits mixed with french onions.

I didn't even know about this casserole until I read this thread and I thought it looked vile when I googled it but your version sounds delicious and I might try and make it for dinner this week(maybe topped with goats cheese). 

[Sharnita]

I love green bean casserole - though we make it with fresh or at worst frozen beans. Canned green beans don't even make it into the house.

[Animala]

Since my family is from the midwest there is a strange fascination with Jello.  The worst is some sort of "salad" the has pretzels and whipped cream.  It is really much more like a dessert.  Then there are the veggies.  Whoever thought veggies should go in Jello is a sick and twisted person.  The one that appears most often has grated carrots in it.  And we always have a Crudités platter or two.  I've never understood that because we have all the family favs on the table and then veggies we could eat any day.

[PrincessInPink]

Since my family is from the midwest there is a strange fascination with Jello.  The worst is some sort of "salad" the has pretzels and whipped cream.  It is really much more like a dessert.  Then there are the veggies.  Whoever thought veggies should go in Jello is a sick and twisted person.  The one that appears most often has grated carrots in it.  And we always have a Crudités platter or two.  I've never understood that because we have all the family favs on the table and then veggies we could eat any day.

POD all of this.

Although, in my family, we call that dish Strawberry Pretzel Dessert. I've never heard it referred to as a salad. But you're right, anything with Jello and whipped cream should not be called salad!

That's another holiday food tradition I don't like. I don't eat whipped cream.

[Luci45]

I am opening my home for Thanksgiving dinner for 40 people to bring in food and I am coordinating the food.  I am doing the place settings, turkeys and potatoes. (Note: I didn't say 'hosting'.)

One couple is bringing Jello with pineapple and celery and nuts in it. It could be a salad or a dessert. I don't think I'll eat much of that. (Woman is 70, so learned to cook in the 50's.)

[Ruelz]

I love jello, but not with veggies in it...and not on the main plate...to me jello is a dessert.  Who decided it's a main plate dish?

I also don't like sweets with meat...so no cranberry sauce with my turkey please, and for me...because I really really dislike mint as well...no mint jelly with my lamb. 

We just 'had' to have mint jelly for a friend once, when I had him over for leg of lamb...he ate a spoonful...and then the jar sat in the fridge for several years until I tossed it.  I wish he had taken it home with him.

[Luci45]

The leftover mint jelly is dabbed on cream cheese covered club crackers as an appetizer for your next party. (I love it.)