Our Christmas Traditions

As in many Cuban families we celebrate Christmas Eve, or Noche Buena. For Latin families, it often involves a big feast and the gathering of family and friends. Noche Buena is celebrated throughout most of Latin America, Spain and the Philipines.

In my family we usually open gifts at midnight on Noche Buena, but many Cuban families give gifts on Jan. 6th—ThreeKing's Day—which celebrates the three wise men’s visit to baby Jesus and is the traditional day Cuban children get their gifts.

This year Noche Buena was celebrated at my home. I was blessed to be joined by my mother, brother, grandma and grandpa, my daughter and my cousin. The traditional meal at a Cuban Noche Buena celebration is lechon (roast pork), black beans, white rice, yucca with mojo, fried plantains, salad and flan for dessert. I chose to switch it up a bit and didn’t make the “traditional” Cuban Noche Buena dinner—primarily because we don’t eat pork—so we had beef ribs, roasted chicken instead.

And although my grandparents can no longer stay up until midnight to open gifts, we still had a great time and I feel incredibly blessed to be able to celebrate another Christmas with my family and keep our Noche Buena traditions going. 

Wishing you all a blessed Christmas!

Source: amazon.com via Ondina on Pinterest