- November 2020
- By Kim Caviness
- Recipe fromEverywhere Latino
Which Christmas Latino recipes do you turn to this and every holiday season to add tradition and sabor to your familia and friends celebrations? Every November, the Familia Kitchen team starts our annual debate: Which holiday dish we will we each make to cook our way home for the holidays this year? Because in Latino culture, comida choices are so importante to how we create homey connection and seasonal spirit, we decided to ask our homecooks for their most trusted Christmas recipes.
Our editorial team came back with these 9 holiday-favorite recipes. We kick things off with everyone’s favorite holiday punch: coquito! And then continue to iconic sides like Puerto Rico’s arroz con gandules and Dominican moro de gandules. Next up are beloved mains—Mexican red pozole and chicken enchiladas de mole, Puerto Rican pasteles, and an almost-vegan taco bowl. And we wrap things up sweetly and in style with a festive Puerto Rican dessert: delectable pumpkin flan made two ways: classic and dairy-free. All 9 Christmas Latin recipes are time-tested, traditional and authentically sabroso.
Does tradition dictate making your family-famous roast-pork lechón or your abuela’s tamales recipe every Noche Buena or Christmas Eve? Don’t forget: There are a total of 42 days (if you count from the Wednesday before Thanksgiving to Three Kings Day on Jan. 6). Which means there are a possible 42 dinners and 42 lunches to be cooked and served to familia and friends as we gather for the season’s festivities. That’s a whole lot of memorable meal-making and opportunities to make Latino Christmas recipes. Don’t worry—Familia Kitchen is here to help keep things delicioso and authentic.
So check out Familia Kitchen’s 9 most delicioso, trusted, abuela-approved family favorite recipes to inspire your Latino-style food celebrations this season.
Feliz cooking and happy holidays, homecooks!
Toast the Season with Puerto Rico’s Famoso Coquito
Hillary’s Christmas Coquito
First things first. Get yourself and your guests into the holiday spirit by whipping up a batch of that frothy coconut and rum concoction that has helped make the holidays happy for generations of Puerto Ricans—and increasingly, the rest of the world. It’s just what Santa Claus ordered for merrymakers everywhere. In her coquito recipe, Familia Kitchen co-founder Kim’s sister offers her go-to spin on this Christmas classic punch, which has become their official family recipe. Hillary makes it in large batches every December and it’s one of the memorable highlights of the season, says Kim.
Favorite Latino Holiday Side Dishes
Doña Felipa’s Puerto Rican Arroz con Gandules
Consider adding one of our favorite Latino Christmas recipes to your holiday mesa: the Puerto Rican classic arroz con gandules. It is sabroso with your pork lechón, jamón, mole or carne asada. Here, one of our favorite abuela cocineras, Doña Felipa Saez, offers a master class in making this favorite arroz dish.
Naihomy’s Healthy Dominican Moro de Gandules
For your vegetarian or vegan famila and friends, or if you just want to make your feast nutritious and delicious, we got you. In this popular Familia Kitchen recipe, one of our go-to Dominican cooks and wellness expert Naihomy Jerez flips this classic recipe with this healthy take on her mom’s classic moro de gandules. Naihomy ditches the pork and substitutes brown rice. It’s saludable and sabroso.
Favorite Latino Holiday Main Dishes
When I was growing up in Puerto Rico, ahead of every holiday season, families would place their pasteles orders with a talented cocinera who lived up on the monte or out in el campo. They’d be delivered just in time for Thanksgiving weekend or Christmas week feasting. Not so for Arizona-based Familia Kitchen go-to cocinera Michelle Ezratty Murphy, who makes them from from-scratch every year with her Puerto Rican mother in law and husband’s family. If you want to go big, her savory pork pasteles are the way to win the holidays.
Carmen’s Pozole Rojo with Pork and Guajillo
So many celebraciones in Mexican families are commemorated with a bowl of pozole, no matter if you make yours is red, green, white or vegetarian. Here’s Familia Kitchen editor Karina’s recipe for pozole rojo from her mom. Her mom Carmen’s cooking tip: Use canned hominy to spend more time with loved ones: eating and celebrating.
Abuelita Paz’s Secret Family Mole Recipe
”Abuelita only made this mole on special occasions, such asChristmas for the tamales, tortas de camarón (shrimp) con nopal con mole for Passover, and only when asked she would make her costillas de puerco con nopales en mole—mole with pork ribs with nopales,” says Naomi Rodriguez. ”Nonetheless, we make this mole once a year, since we continue with the tamal Christmas tradition. It makes me proud that my kids LOVE this tradition and have promised to continue it to assure my grandkids experience this. It gives me so much joy that my children and grandchildren will continue to smell the mole that brings me beautiful memories as a child and it will continue to imprint generations to come.”
Veronica’s Almost-Vegan Taco Bowl
Looking for a main dish that’s vegetarian and authentically Mexican? Check out Veronica’s almost-vegan updated taco bowl. Her dish uses jackfruit (or yaca) and mushrooms instead of meat and also leaves out dairy. Homecook and wellness coach Veronica Paige counts on these updated tacos to help her and her family “stay connected to our truth, our Mexican roots, and live a vital, healthy long life together”—during the holidays and into the año nuevo, ready for new year’s resolutions.
Latino Holiday Desserts
Is there a more traditional and delicioso way to end a Latino meal than with flan for dessert? We offer a traditional Dominican treat with a seasonal twist: pumpkin flan, in two versions by a mother/daughter duo. Mom Rosa shares her traditional recipe, and daughter Naihomy makes hers dairy free and replacing processed sugar with 100% maple syrup. Both versions are sabroso—and an inclusive way to make sure everyone at your table finishes their festive meal on a sweet note.
Happy and Delicioso Holidays, Todos!
We hope these 9 festive recipes help you get ready for your Christmas season cooking. Want more holiday inspiration? Search FamiliaKitchen.com for more abuela-approved, authentic Latino dishes. You’ll find favorite festive family fare from all the Spanish-speaking places we came from in Latin and Central America and the Caribbean.
We wish you, your familia and dearest amigos the merriest of holiday seasonal celebrations, as we cook our way home these holidays, deliciosamente. Familia Kitchen is with you in and out of the kitchen. Happy Thanksgiving, Hannukah, Christmas and Three Kings Day, everyone!
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Kim Caviness grew up in Santurce, Puerto Rico to a Puerto Rican mom and American dad. She loves feeding family and friends. Kim learned to cook watching her mom, Marisa, throw dinner parties on the island and later in the States. And from “El Libro”: the Puerto Rican cooking bible, Carmen Aboy Valldejuli’s Cocina Criolla.
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