The Dish: Can't skip the Christmas favourites
December 22, 2011
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Megan Ogilvie
HEALTH REPORTER
We asked for your Christmas treats, the must-have dishes you serve each year at your holiday feast.
You responded with enthusiasm — and many mouth-watering recipes.
There was stuffed mushrooms and savoury cornbread stuffing.
A red velvet layer cake spread with creamy cream cheese frosting.
A vegan tourtière, a veggie version of the traditional French Canadian pie, served with chili sauce alongside a crisp green salad.
A dreamy sounding caramel cake with a buttery shortbread crust.
Two recipes for turnip casserole with almost identical ingredient lists. Sort of amazing for such a modest vegetable.
A cookie or two, of course.
And numerous requests to find out the calorie count for old-fashioned fruit-filled Christmas cakes. It seems, from this unscientific call for Christmas favourites, that fruit cakes are neither going extinct nor being used as doorstoppers — despite all of those holiday jokes
In just about every case, you said curiosity, not guilt, drove you to writing in with your holiday recipe. You said knowing the calories would not deter you from having one (or maybe two) helpings of your Christmas favourite. Rather, having the facts might prevent you from eating several servings, or sneaking down to the fridge for a midnight snack.
In that light, we won’t tell you that you shouldn’t eat the following three holiday picks. And we have not compared them, as we would usually do, to fatty, fast food fare.
This time, it’s just the nutrition numbers. It’s up to you decide how many to pile on your plate.
The three picks:
Turnip casserole
Christmas cake
Oliebollen
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