Hi guys! 😀 I hope you all had an amazing Christmas.
I always get a little sad when evening time rolls around on Christmas Day – all that anticipation and preparation, and it seems to be over in the blink of an eye. Still, I guess I shouldn’t complain, because Christmas was pretty awesome this year. I spent both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day at my parents’ place and enjoyed lots of love, laughter, and, of course, good food…
Now, you guys are probably going to laugh at me, but my Christmas morning breakfast was the same old thing…
I really wish I could say that we have a tradition of making cinnamon buns on Christmas morning, buuuuuut our Christmas mornings/afternoons tend to look a little bit more like this…
Polish salatka (potato and veggie salad)
Karkówka (pork roast)
Rypa po Grecku (fish à la Greek)
Borscht (beetroot soup)
Hearty grain bread
… and while I can handle foods like that later in the day, my mornings have to be sweet. There’s definitely a part of me that longs for the doughy, cinnamon-sugar goodness that I see so many people enjoying on Christmas morning, but I can’t deny that traditional meals like this are part of what make things feel so Christmassy; and while it’s not exactly my cup of tea, there’s always time to turn to old favorites while waiting for dinner to cook…
Ezekiel English muffin with almond butter and honey.
At-home cappuccino with a side of snickerdoodle.
And speaking of dinner…
The big bird and roasted vegetables.
Whipped mashed potatoes with fresh dill.
… it was simple and delicious 😀 Since there were only three of us, and Mom was getting over the tail end of a flu, we didn’t go all our with feasting or festivities this year, but everyone agreed that it was still a pretty darned amazing Christmas, and I hope it was for you as well.
You may have noticed that I completely skipped over any mention of desserts and presents, but don’t you worry – there was definitely no shortage of those… I’m just saving the good stuff for tomorrow. For now I’m finishing up my breakfast, and then it’s off to get ready for a day on the town. Today is Boxing Day up here in Canada, which is basically like our version of Black Friday – there are tonnes of sales going on in the stores, so I might just brave the malls to see if there’s anything worth snagging. Other than that, I’m planning on seeing The Hobbit tonight and working on my stash of Christmas cookies so they don’t go bad…
Hope you guys have a wonderful day!
. – . – . – .
Do you have a special Christmas morning breakfast?
How the heck was your Christmas?!
What are your plans for today?
Glad you enjoyed Christmas with your family! I didn’t realise you were Polish, I’d love to know more about Polish food. Do you have any favourite recipes?
all the best to you
So much delicious food! I officially added Polish food to my must-try list, I’m not sure I ever tried authentic Polish dishes. After days of heavy eating, I tend to gravitate towards my usuals as well – waffles, oatmeal, buckwheat bakes. It keeps me balanced and prevents grogginess from food overload! Hope you had a great shopping day and I can’t wait to hear what you thought about the Hobbit. I keep hearing mixed reviews on it, but I still want to see it regardless.
looks like an awesome christmas to me !! and yeah we use to go to the only bagel place open wich also happens to be my favv xmas morning and get egg sandwiches and stuff like that but since im only child home now i make the cinnamon buns and look forward to it every xmas ! i make them 2 days in advance since im so busy with everything else then that am just take them out of fridge and let them rise for half hour n cook them its so much easier then having to get out of my pjs to go to bagel place haha
Looks like a wonderful Christmas, I love seeing other people’s traditions, they’re all so different! Have a great shopping day, I’ve never heard of Boxing Day before. Sounds awesome. I’m planning to do a little bit of online shopping today myself 🙂
wow!! you all had a feast! We had a great Christmas too!! Full of love, laughter, and food! 🙂
I forgot how good nut butter an honey is on toast! that may need to happen for breakfast.
Hope you found some good deals on Boxing Day!!
I totally feel ya on needing the sweet breakfast! Our traditional breakfast is a sausage and egg casserole (no idea why, it’s not Sicilian, but okay lol), which is delicious, but this year it wasn’t made because my sister and I can’t have gluten and the casserole contains bread :(. So we all just kind of did our own thing! Christmas night we have ravioli though, and mom and I tried our hand at gluten free ravs! Your christmas dinner looks amazing too! I totally know what you mean about the post-Christmas sadness – it’s like post-partum depression lol! I honestly think the season leading up to it – like the whole month of december – is almost better than the day itself. Hope you enjoyed your Boxing Day!!
My Christmas was great; thanks for asking. 🙂
I hope you enjoyed Boxing Day!
I know what you mean about the anticipation and then it’s over. 🙁 I always try to keep moving so I don’t get too bummed out. We actually do like to have some cinnamon rolls Christmas morning and I have gotten into the habit of finding new recipes 🙂
When I was growing up, my family always sat down for a special breakfast on Christmas morning. We’d open stockings, then eat eggs, sticky buns, cinnamon rolls, stolen, bacon, sausage – the works! While the food was delicious, waiting to open presents was less than desirable. I envied my friends who were able to tear into their packages first thing in the morning! Now that my brother and I are in our mid-late 20’s, things are a bit different. No more 5am wakeup calls, which means things move a bit slower. 🙂 Yesterday we were up and going at 9:00, drank coffee, ate a few cookies, did stockings, cooked brunch, then slowly opened presents while things baked in the oven. Around 1:00, we finally sat down for a real meal. It was low key and pretty wonderful. 🙂
Your Christmas day feast looks delicious! I tried beet root soup for the first time last week, and despite my skepticism (maybe it was the color?), really enjoyed it! I hope you had fun navigating the Boxing Day sales today…I had plans join in the frenzy too, but at the last second opted to wait until tomorrow, in hopes that things will be slightly calmer. We’ll see!
So glad you such a nice holiday, it’s definitely great to relax on Christmas Day since so much of your celebration happens the night before! I totally also went with one of my usual favorites for breakfast as well and stuck a jar of nut butter in my bag to hold me over until Christmas dinner. 😉
I also went for boxing day shopping as well this morning! I nearly died at Eatons Centre up here in Toronto – total chaos lol. I think the best way is to just go in, get what ya need, and get out asap to avoid injury haha.
Ugh it was absolute madness here as well. I hadn’t gone in a few years so I forgot how insane it gets. Can’t say I’ll be doing it again anytime soon 😆
Jealous of your Christmas meal!
We had steak, lobster, baked potatoes, rolls, salad, and roasted broccoli. It was delicious.
Just saw another fellow Polak on here! 😀 Anyway, we totally eat different things on Christmas! Haha. Wasn’t expecting that. The only thing that’s the same is the borscht. We have it with uszka my mom makes. We also have bigos (my favorite) and a different fish each time (depending on what we’re in the mood for — this time it was salmon). Our salatka looks a lot different too! haha. I think it’s because we use less mayo? Ours is more yellow 😀 For sweets, we have pierniki, makowiec, and orzechowiec 🙂 Very good food.
No special Christmas breakfast though 😉 It’s enough trying to prepare and then eat all of the other food!
We usually have uszka and bigos as well, but my mom was fighting off the flu and didn’t feel like cooking too much more 🙁 For dessert, the only Polish one we had was murzynek, and other than that it was all cookies.
lol! Never heard of murzynek! But that does not sound very PC! 😛
I’m glad you had such a great Christmas with your parents! I always hate when it’s over too – it puts me in a bit of a funk. 😛
Your meals look delicious! I need sweet food in the mornings too. This year my sister and I made a apple cinnamon baked French toast for Christmas breakfast and it was amazing!
You’re brave for going to the malls today – I avoided them at all costs haha. I went to see the Hobbit instead and spent the rest of the day hanging around the house. It’s been a lazy day!
Merry belated Christmas, Amanda! I’m sorry your mum wasn’t feeling all well but I think it’s fantastic you still got to spend a great holiday with your parents!
Funnily enough, there never was a special Christmas breakfast in my family. Had I thought of it – and if we’d celebrated at my family’s place rather than my aunt’s – I might have brought up the idea of cinnamon rolls. This way, though, I simply enjoyed my Cocoa-banana oat bran while the others ate rolls with marmelade and cheese. The fancyness of Christmas Eve dinner made up for it :).
All in all, Christmas was really nice and enjoyful this year. While I did struggle I had several accomplishments, still.
What did you end up giving to everybody? Sorry if I’m being nosey but seeing all of those giftbags in your last posts made me curious :D. Oh, and what did you get? Though, really, getting to spend time with the family is the greatest of all gifts, right?!
I’m really glad to hear that you had an enjoyable Christmas, Miss 🙂 As for what was in those gift bags… let’s see. I got my mom an infinity scarf from Aldo and some Pandora charms; I also got her and a few girlfriends things from Lush (creams, shampoos, bath bombs. The Michael Kors baggie had a rose gold watch for my best friend. David’s Tea was just some random teas for blogging friends, and Bath & Body Works was candles, creams, and body mists 🙂
Ooo! What a delicious-looking Christmas dinner! You actually got some really good pictures of yours! I hit the wine a little too hard to get good pics, I probably would have ended up dropping my camera into a plate of stuffing… Yummy looking Polish eats too!
Wow! Your Christmas feasting food looks impressive! I am definitely a bit jealous of some of it (the vegetarian dishes, of course)!
I totally know what you mean about Christmas evening/the day after Christmas being kind of sad. It all just goes by WAAAYYY too fast! 🙁
I gotta stick with the sweet stuff in the mornings too–I was planning on making a batch of hot cocoa-inspired cinnamon rolls for breakfast on Christmas but I got sick on Monday and haven’t been able to stomach much 🙁 But I did enjoy a homemade waffle so that was good!
Good luck with the shopping! I like going to the malls soon after Christmas when there are still good sales but the day after Christmas is always too intimidating for me to go out on!
Oh noes! Hope you feel better soon, hun! It’s probably a good thing that you avoid the malls on the 26th… they were absolutely crazy today.
I’m glad you had such a wonderful day! I am currently snowed in (I think you may have actually sent some snow our way! ;)) so there will be no mall shopping today, just lounging around, which is perfectly fine by me 😉
I probably would have preferred a day of lounging – the malls were absolute insanity today!
What a lovely Christmas feast! Glad you had a great time! My holidays were a little different then I thought they’d turn out, but surrounded by family is always the best regardless of what happens! So glad you had an awesome Christmas!
Strange how Boxing Day is just a Canadian/British thing…I wonder if they celebrate in Australia/New Zealand?
All of your food photography is always great, but for some reason that breakfast shot just makes me want to recreate the whole thing with GF cereal and coconut yoghurt right now. Too bad I don’t have any of either 🙁
So glad you had a wonderful Christmas!!!! Christmas here was awesome – I’m downloading photos from the festivities as I type this 😀
My Christmas was AWESOME! I don’t have a breakfast tradition, but I did get down on some cinnamon rolls. They were amazing and I am salivating just thinking about them. Good luck with your mall venture!
Everything looks great! I have to have something sweeter in the morning too! I can’t imagine eating meat in the morning! My Christmas was lots of fun and filled with family time!
Glad you had an awesome Christmas, Amanda…especially as I know how much you love the holiday :)! Your eats look delicious and I’m with you about breakfast! Although something like pancakes or cinnamon rolls sound great in theory, my yogurt bowls make me even happier! We had a Christmas lunch with the family and then just sat around for hours after which was lovely! Boxing day sales are huge in London too and as I was up early, I managed to venture to Zara just as it was opening. I’m glad I went early because by noon, the streets were manic! Hope you managed to find some nice stuff :)!
Oh and what did you end up getting the boy??
I ended up baking him some cookies and getting him a gift card to Starbucks, which I put inside a Bux mug with some other random treats 🙂
dude I am drooling. I am so interested in that veggie and potato salad, looks delicious. I am so glad your holiday was filled with lots of good people and of course good food. You deserved to have one amazing day.
The veggie salad is probably my favorite dish ever. We only have it around Christmas and Easter, so that makes it even more special.
Merry Christmas, it sounds like you had a good one! We have boxing day here too, but I’ve been online sales shopping today in my PJ’s and plan to hit the shops tomorrow too, gotta love the sales!
I probably should have done the online shopping thing as well, because the malls were absolute madness. Do they have the same kind of deals online though?
Gah, everything looks so delicious! I definitely want to eat at a Polish Christmas meal!
Every Christmas morning, my mom orchestrates a fantastic breakfast with frittata, cinnamon rolls, and a huge fruit salad. So good.
My family doesn’t do the big Christmas breakfast either…I had oatmeal! But we did the big turkey dinner, so it’s still celebratory. Looks like you had a fabulous Christmas!
That looks awesome!! I’m jealous of all the sales you guys are going to have today, too! We are hitting some stores in a bit (once the rain turns to snow so we can safely walk over), but nothing will quite compare to your stuff! Enjoy The Hobbit, too! Still have to see it and love hearing what other people think about it 🙂
The Hobbit ended up being just okay. I love the book and the story, so I hate to say anything bad about it, but the movie was waaaaay too drawn out, and he added in a lot of random things that weren’t in the book.
oh boo 🙁 That’s a shame…I hate it when they do that. I”m glad you warned me ahead of time, so I had some idea going into it
Looks like you had a pretty tasty x-mas. Mine wasn’t quite as tasty, but my husband & I did go see the new movie Django Unchained. So good!! Other than that, it was basically just another day… which is fine by me. Enjoy the Boxing Day shopping! 🙂
Oh yes, I can’t imagine eating pork roast too early in the morning! Very interesting, though 😀 Everything still looks absolutely delicious!!
Aah, all of the food looks so delicious!! I love to learn about food from other countries. Switzerland doesn’t have the tradition of christmas morning, we only celebrate the nights. I hope you find some pretty things out there today!!! Happy boxing Day!!
Yes, it certainly is delicious! I love tradition during the holidays- it makes it more fun. Chels just told me about Boxing Day… I wish we had that here! We’re boring instead and go back to work the day after Christmas… or some of us do 😉
Can’t wait to see all the desserts that made it into your bellyyyy 🙂
How did I not know that they don’t have Boxing Day down there?! It’s my favourite!!! Those poor things!! And if this is your definition of NOT going all out, my dear, let’s just say I’m not going to invite you over to our place, I think you’d be MAJORLY disappointed. Although, it seems like you really had fun!! After you’re out of your food hangover, drop a line!! I’d love to hear the insider version. 😉
Hey! I read your story and what you wrote about yourself and your disorders… I just wanted to say that I really admire you got through it. I know how horrible ED may be – it’s also a part of my past.
By the way – I’m from Poland. 😉
Anyway – I can see cappuccino, yummy breakfast (is it oatmeal?) and barszcz (probably my favourite Christmas Eve dish) and well… I’m getting hungry! 😉
I’;m glad I found your blog. It’s quite inspiring and I must say that your photos are really good.
Squee! It’s always so great to ‘meet’ other Polish people! Thanks for saying hi 😀 And my breakfast is actually yogurt with cereal and fruit.
Glad you had a wonderful holiday. I love seeing all of the traditional foods your family eats, and can’t wait to see the desserts. Yum.
Have fun shopping today! Hope to see your finds on the blog.