CHRISTMAS
in
HUNGARY

A month before Christmas shopkeepers decorate the front doors of their shops in Hungary. In the bustling cities the streets are embellished with holiday decorations, while, on the street corners, you can buy hot fried or roasted chestnuts.

Hungarians celebrate Luca Napja or Luca's Day on the 13th of December. According to tradition, village people make a chair of seven different kinds of wood. This is part of an old superstition that claims you can stand on this chair at the Christmas Eve Mass and see all who are witches in the room.

Several weeks before Christmas wheat is soaked in a cup so that it will germinate in time for the Christmas celebrations. People usually use it to decorate the salad for their holiday dinner.

The Christmas dinner usually features fish, especially fried fish and a special Hungarian fish soup. For dessert there is always a wide variety of holiday cookies. One of these is Beiglie, a soft rolled cookie that contains walnuts and poppyseeds.