Nothing says Merry Christmas like Kentucky Fried Chicken and tons of sushi.
When I was reading up on Japan before my first visit 12 years ago to meet Aya’s parents, I learned that having KFC for Christmas dinner was a thing. Really? KFC is a thing in Japan!? Yes, it is. Something about a wonderful marketing campaign from 1974, but I won’t bore you with the details here.
Ever since I learned this about Japanese Christmas, I’ve always wanted to do it, and this year we got to! They have a special menu to choose which Christmas Set you want. We opted for a smaller one because we were going to have sushi too. We went and stood in line to pick up our pre-ordered meal and everything! I knew it was Christmas because the smell of fried chicken and cake was in there air. Yum!
The other thing that’s big here at Christmas is cake. Just about every bakery has special Christmas cakes that you can pre-order. To me it seemed like Fat Tuesday back in Detroit. It was just something you had to participate in no matter if you wanted to or not. Even 7/11 and the other convenience stores had display booths outside with employees dressed as Santa selling Christmas Cake. You could buy slices or a whole cake. We got to brave the crowd and stand in line to pick that up too. I was never so excited standing in line on Christmas Eve before.
The girls had a blast devouring sushi rolls and fried chicken. Ellie got to blow the Christmas candles out and we each had TWO pieces of cake. This was definitely a Christmas Eve for the books.
Now just to get to bed to see what Santa brings the girls!
Have a Merry Christmas!
I tried this sauce on turkey meatballs last night and served them to my very picky children and their even pickier cousins. What a HUGE hit! I cannot thank you enough – you’ve added a new staple to their diets .