On December 24th, Italian-Americans gather for the Feast of the Seven Fishes. This special feast is unknown to many native Italians although serving a boatload of fish on La Vigilia di Natale (the Christmas vigil) is not. In an article in Edible Manhattan, the author discusses that Carol Field wrote in ‘Celebrating Italy: The Tastes and Traditions of Italy as Revealed Through Its Feasts, Festivals and Sumptuous Foods’ that the tradition of eating fish on Christmas Eve started when the Church imposed the rule of ‘mangiare de magro’, (basically – feast of ‘no’ meat) which would allow the body to purify and get it ready for big feasts.

Continue reading A Food Blogger’s Feast of the Seven(+) Fishes!! at Our Italian Table.