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My family blended New Year's traditions. My dad grew up in the South, and he likes to have black-eyed peas on the table. My mom grew up in a heavily Easter European part of Ohio, and hasn't gone a single year without cooking up pork and sauerkraut on January 1. I don't know of anyone else who serves pork, sauerkraut, and black-eyed peas on New Year's Day, but we all think they go great together. And my family is super-duper lucky. We're all healthy and we eat fabulous food.
I can only wish the same for you. Here are foods that you can make to ring in the new year with good fortune and good eating. Happy New Year!
Hoppin' John
Black-eyed peas with rice, known as Hoppin' John, is the most Southern of Southern New Year's Eve foods. The reason black-eyed peas are considered lucky is disputed, but they're a nutritional powerhouse brought over from Africa by slaves that sustained Southerners after the Civil War. They're also darned tasty. Often Hoppin' John includes pork, another lucky food. This recipe uses bacon and its fat, but you could swap in a ham hock or make it vegetarian.
Cowboy Caviar
There are plenty of other ways to get our black-eyed peas on, including this beany relish/salsa that's begging for you to scoop it up with tortilla chips.
Southern Style Collard Greens
Why collard greens? The reason I've always heard is that they're green, resembling paper money. I'd like to think they're good luck because they're so dang good for you. Mustard or turnip greens fit the bill as well. Braised with a ham hock, they offer a luxurious potlikker for dunking your cornbread in. For a faster-cooking vegetarian version, try these easy collard greens.
Instant Pot Collard Greens
Your Instant Pot helps cut the braising time for collard greens making them tender in a flash. Smoked turkey wings give it a leaner profile without sacrificing depth.
Southern Cornbread
There's a Southern saying: "Peas for pennies, greens for dollars, and cornbread for gold." Bake this rustic cornbread to round out your Southern New Year's trifecta of black-eyed peas and collards. It makes a fine meal any time of year.
Pork Roast With Apples
Every New Year's Day my mom makes a big pork roast, a tradition in areas with many German immigrants. You'll even see it on buffets at big catered New Year's Eve parties in the Midwest. The saying goes that pigs root forward, symbolizing your year moving ahead into high gear. That feels like a stretch, but it's also notable that in some places, pigs were slaughtered in the early winter, creating an abundance of fresh pork meat.
Bavarian Sauerkraut
What's a must to serve with pork roast? Why, sauerkraut, of course! Mom's succulent pork roast was befouled (at least to my sensibility as a child) with the stink of cooking sauerkraut, a smell I now can't resist. I've heard kraut is lucky because its long shreds resemble paper money. No one in their right mind would think that. I surmise it's good luck because it goes so well with pork, and once again, it's likely a fluke of good timing: in the fall after the cabbage harvest, the crocks of kraut that everyone put up would have been good and ready by then.
Spareribs, Cabbage, and Sauerkraut
For the optimal pork and sauerkraut experience, cook them together. The mingling of the porky juices with the piquant kraut is a thing of beauty...flavor-wise. It's not very pretty, but so many of the best foods aren't.
Lentil Stew With Sausage
Round little lentils resemble coins, and in various cuisines they're considered harbingers of fortune. In some parts of Italy, the preference is to cook them with sliced sausages to echo the coin theme. The two ingredients have an affinity for each other in this hearty lentil stew.
Smoky Lentil Stew
Leave out the sausage for a plant-based New Year's luck. The smoky flavor here comes from smoked paprika.
Ham and Bean Soup
The practice of supping on ham and beans on New Year's Day is not as well documented as other regional American traditions, but here in the Midwest (where I live), I've had friends who wouldn't dream of skipping them on January 1. Once again, the theme of rich pork (ham) and coinage (beans) results in a pairing that's very lucky and very tasty.
Vasilopita
One of my favorite New Year's ever was at a house in West Virginia's remote Potomac Highlands. There were a dozen of us, and we had marathon board games and sessions of hide-and-seek. My friend's family was visiting from Greece, and they baked an orange-scented cake in a cast iron skillet (hey, it was handy) to share. Hiding in the cake was a coin, which happened to be in the slice that my daughter got, granting her luck for the year. There's no one definitive vasilopita recipe, and many families have their own cherished version. This moist clementine cake would make a fine host for that coin.
Golden Beet and Pomegranate Salad
In addition to the coin in the vasilopita, another Greek tradition is to smash a pomegranate on the floor at midnight, or after the church service on New Year's Day. It's also okay to break the pomegranate apart less dramatically. Once you've cleaned up, de-seed the rest of the pomegranate and make this salad with golden beets. The salad itself isn't Greek, but it's so colorful it would be welcome on any table.
Homemade Donuts
Round or ring-shaped sweets bode well for the year because they bring things full circle. And the use of an all-American donut for this tradition might be an adaptation of the Dutch practice of eating oliebollen to bring New Year's luck. In any case, no one turns down donuts, do they?
Steamed Whole Fish
The silvery scales of fish conjure up associations with good fortune in many cultures. In Scandinavia, pickled herring at midnight rings in the new year. In many Asian countries, whole fish symbolize abundance. You'll see whole fish on menus at Lunar New Year, but there's only good that can come of eating one early.
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