Craig's Blog of Destiny

The results are in! Thanks to the twelve folks that participated, there were certainly some trends. We sure like our treats at Christmas:

Regarding the main course, 92% ranked Ham as “must have” (a score of 4 or 5). Ham got no votes below 4. The next favorite choice was Turkey, Turkey got hurt because someone voted it “Shouldn’t Consider for Christmas.” That “shouldn’t consider” category was the most popular choice for Ebenezer Scrooge’s favorite, the Goose. The bottom choice turned out to be Salmon. Left off the list, but suggested was Cornish Game Hens… I haven’t every tried to fix those, may have to put it on my list.

No big surprises for the side dishes: 100% of respondents said that rolls are an “absolute must have.” Second and third choices are mashed potatoes and sweet potatoes. Save your BBQ wieners for the Superbowl, they came in last for side dishes. Suggestions for things that I left off the list included corn and Kathy Miller’s suggestion: “mom’s lemon jello.” Kathy, you may need to tell us more about that jello.

Ok, so I have a fondness for pie. I admit it. I know, I left some other choices off, put pie, as you all know, is natures perfect food. It seems that everyone has their favorite: when looking at the average rating for the pies, there is less than a half a point difference from first to last place. The most popular pies were apple and cherry, followed by lemon. I didn’t specify lemon meringue, as the favorite lemon pie in our household is a “mile high” version in which we fold the meringue into the filling of the pie. There were lots of comments, mostly pointing out that I left off pumpkin pie (sorry about that), and suggestions for other deserts, like cakes, “cookies and anything sweet other than pie” and Sam’s suggestion that we do cinnamon rolls.

There were lots of choices for Christmas treats, and lots of favorites. At the top of the list is Kristin’s Nanaimo Bars, with 91.7% ranking them as “must haves.” A little surprising, scoring just barely below at 91.6% is cinnamon rolls. Sam did vote for cinnamon rolls twice, once here and once as a write in on the dessert page. In the ratings by average score, cookies came next, both J’Neil’s chocolate chip cookies and sugar cookies, followed by pinwheel cookies and Grandma Cottle’s rolled chocolate cake. The lowest ranked choice was doughnuts, I assume because we seem to have those year round. Suggestions for things I missed included caramels, peanut clusters and Hello Dollies.

In the drinks category, hot chocolate scored best, 75% ranking it “must have”. Next was Christmas punch, which surprised me some as I didn’t define just what Christmas punch was. In our house, it’s red kool-aid mixed with sprite or 7-up instead of water. I also believe wassail would have scored higher if more folks had had it. It’s at the top of my personal list. Eggnog didn’t score so well, though lemonade was at the bottom of the list. Suggestions included ginger ail and… water.

Additional comments revolved around how much everyone enjoys eating during the holidays. Sam felt a little bad about not liking pie, but that’s ok, we’ll feed him cinnamon rolls. I also thought Grandpa Cottle hit the nail on the head with his suggestion: “How about favorite leftovers!” I hope to be enjoying Christmas foods for many, many days, right into the New Year.