Festa dei sette pesci (The Feast of the Seven Fishes)

 

What is the Feast of the Seven Fishes? According to Mario Batali, "It's what Italians do when they say they're fasting."

There is nothing quite like an Italian Christmas Eve. For those who have never experienced it, I take pity on you! I consider myself to be extremely fortunate to be an Italian-American. Every fellow Italian-American, I imagine, has probably grown up with the “no meat on Christmas Eve” rule. I knew it has religious significance but didn’t know what it was entirely about.

The Feast of the Seven Fishes (Festa dei sette pesci) is an Italian Christmas Eve tradition built around fish of all kinds and prepared in as many different ways as possible.

This feast began as a southern Italian custom. The tradition was hugely popular in Italy’s most southern points, including the island of Sicily. In the ancient Catholic church, Christmas Eve was a vigilia di magro -- a sacred fasting day on which no meat could be consumed. This has since been lifted but many devout Italians still follow this tradition (and even most non-devout Italians!)

Some say it’s supposed to remind us of the seven deadly sins (wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, and gluttony). Some say it is an homage to the last seven commandments which prescribe rules of human interaction, as opposed to the first three. Others say it is because it took God seven days to create the universe.

Others say it is more simple; the long tradition of eating seafood on Christmas Eve is all about abstinence—in this case, refraining from the consumption of meat or milk products—on Fridays and specific holy days. As no meat or butter could be used on such days, observant Catholics would instead eat fish, typically fried in oil.

Yet another theory is that the number seven is a number representating perfection: the traditional Biblical number for divinity is three, and for Earth is four, and the combination of these numbers, seven, represents God on Earth, or Jesus Christ.

Shrimp parmigiana, scungili salad and baccalà are a few of my favorites but other dishes served include:

Crab stuffed mushrooms

Deep fried calamari, oysters, cod, shrimp and scallops

Fried smelts

Insalata di mare

Linguine with clam sauce

Marinated eel

Octopus salad

This is one tradition from my childhood I am very happy to carry on and one of my favorite things about Christmas!

Mangia! Buon Natale!