Christmas oysters galore

So while the 8 course Christmas Eve meals are being enjoyed by traditional French families, we singletons have adopted the oyster and champagne tradition.

For this holiday season, we are enjoying bottles of Bellefon with dozens of Belon oysters at home, then going to friends' homes for even bigger shellfish extravaganzas. 

One friend, who is married to a French woman, and therefore is imbued with the assumption that he knows the secrets to oyster selection, provided a dining room table covered with a yard-long plate of chipped ice, upon which sat dozens of oysters of four different varieties, including my favorite whose name means something like White Pearl.

No I didn't find any pearls inside, the the oysters were gems in and of themselves! We descended on the table and slurped nonstop. It's the first time I have ever really been able to say that I have had my fill of oysters. Yum. 

The parties jogged my memory a family tradition from when I was a child. My Midwestern Mom always made oyster stew on Christmas Eve. Far as I know, it was canned oysters that appeared in the grocery store only during the holidays, added to hot milk in a saucepan with a bit of butter. So delicious that even a kid would eat it.

What were your family holiday treats? Do you still make them?