Im in my 60s now and still put an apple, an orange and nuts in the shell in my children and grandchildrens stocking. Along with small gifts of course. Those big navel oranges that arrive in good stores that carry that lovely smell.

There was always an orange at the bottom of our stockings when I was a kid and we continue that to this day with our (now grown) daughters.

Oh my God, oranges were the most important and precious gift in my stocking! They were so expensive, and just cutting or peeling one filled our little house with the aroma of sunny Florida! And I’m not old, my family was just of modest means. And those days were the happiest of my life.

It's interesting to learn that the fruit in the stocking is much more common than I though. I'm only in my mid 20s and my parents have put an orange, apple, and assorted nuts in-shell in our stockings for as long as I can remember. Must've been something their parents did for them. Fascinating!

On the last day of school before Christmas break my school bus driver would give all the children a treat bag with an apple, an orange, a banana, a Hershey chocolate bar, and a candy cane...Memories!

I think the issue is that most persons have only been exposed to bad mass produced Fruit Cakes

Eggnog is something I definitely enjoy. I've already gone through a half-gallon of it this year. As for fruitcake, for the vast majority of my life, I just assumed it was godawful, even though I'd never had it. I mean, it's the butt of so many jokes. I had always known it as doorstops and bricks from cartoons. But then, about 5 years ago, I made one for myself (using Alton Brown's recipe) and despite me expecting to hate it... I actually loved it. And I've made it a point to try and share it with others in the hopes that maybe I don't entirely turn them around on fruitcake, but at least to try and get them to go, "Oh... hey, it's actually edible and not just something I could use as an emergency boat anchor." I've actually been thinking about getting the ingredients to make it again this year.

The bliss of youthfulness. It's a beautiful time of life.

Have you tried the eggnog recipe on this channel yet? I made it last year like 4 times.. So much better than the mass - produced stuff.

I have a great recipe for a chocolate fruit cake... its the fruit cake for people who don't eat fruit cake

Do they still announce who is leaving town for the holidays? I noticed that this issue did. (There is a column on the left hand side with a several postings.)

Especially since this video would probably have been shot a couple of months ago.

Into the early 80s 😒

Thats a beautiful memory

It's those great times that remind us of our heritage and traditions worth passing on to future generations...

My parents were born in the 1920s and getting an orange for Christmas was a big deal. I suspect that there wasn't a lot more . When I was a kid, we always got an orange in the bottom of our stockings. I continued the tradition and my kids still get an orange in the bottom of their stockings.

@@JimLambier same! I always got an orange, an apple…and some nuts in the shell….along with plenty cool “junky” toys (like a Slinky!). Those were the days…..

I live in Kentucky and getting kumquats is extremely difficult. For years,I’ve been trying to get a tree to keep in my house so I can have kumquats; no success there either. That was a wonderful gift to your dad. It’s the little things that means a lot.

It’s happening now. Inflation is rampant, went to Sams Club yesterday and there was no toilet paper, paper towels and plates.

My mom used to say it was a real treat to get an orange at Christmas and my dad had to play with tin cans crafted into cars.

@@seecanon5840 I have a metal car that was my fathers when he was a boy. There is also two wooden thread spools ties together that he also played with. You used what you had and were happy 😄 to have it. Thats not the way it is today.

My Dad told me when he was a kid in the 50's in the MidWest, Chicken was for Sundays or special occasions.

@@SCYTHE2525 When my kids were growing up, they had plenty of toys. Whenever I had time I'd play with them (being a single mom, I was often working more than I would've liked). Sometimes we made toys. They always liked the homemade toys more than the fancy store bought ones.

As a former Ft. Worth citizen, I remember very well Leonard's Department store. In fact, their bakery baked our wedding cake. Not only that, the Bakery manager delivered it to our church in Haltom City because we couldn't fit it into the car. It was huge. Also needless to say delicious. When I worked downtown, one of us from the office would run down to Leonard's to buy Hot Doughnuts....om my, what a memory that conjures up. Thanks for sharing your memory, it certainly brought back many great ones for me. This was November 1959.

I would not use the processor either.

We had suet pudding.

@brusselSprout I’m not sure grandma would have thought of food processors as anything more than a pretentious luxury. I, on the other hand, welcomed them into my kitchen decades ago. However, for fruit cake, I agree you need recognizable, larger chunks than a food processor would provide.

@@margaretbedwell58 if you’re ever back in the neighborhood, look up Leonard’s Museum and snack bar!

As a child in the 1980s we also got it for X-mass, but that was because we lived in an eastern European communist state. 😅 Oranges and lemons were mighty expansive and especially oranges were pretty terrible in quality. We got them from Cuba and they had almost no 'meat' in them, with a thick peel and lot of seeds. We called it: 'An orange without an orange'. Nowadays, imported oranges are sometimes cheaper than our locally produces apples.

@@littleblackcar Same in the UK into the early 90s

We did too! The reason why this started is long ago the orange was VERY rare and expensive. We also got hard candy. I have carried this on with my children.

My family still does that. It's the best way to fill out the toe of the stocking.

So did we when I was a kid in the 80s. I'm sure that started when my parents were kids, and maybe when my grandparents were kids. Today we still get oranges in our stockings but they're the little Clementine ones. I've called Clementines Christmas oranges for at least 25 years now. Goes to show how traditions start and get passed along and/or changed from one generation to the next.

We still include oranges or a grapefruit. 😊

I want to know the rest of the stories from the copy we saw, who was the star who died, and what were the guns at the border? Would your dad be able to find out. From a south of your border person. Also love the name Saskatoon, it has the same feel as Kalamazoo.

I still do that with the peels. It makes good extracts, teas and other delicious culinary concoctions

@@brusselsprout5851 I've never heard of drying peel but I'm going to start!

But, as I recall, Glen doesn't like coconut....

That sounds fabulous. Recipe?

I 2nd the recipe request.

There are lots and lots of different types of fruitcake; my grandmother used to make what was basically gingerbread but chock full of pecans, pineapple, raisins, and dried apple. It's a shame that only one type has become traditional.

Yes! Pomegranates were such an exotic fruit!

We always had oranges and apples too

Here in the US, I just paid $10 for a box of mandarins that were 3.99 just before the pandemic. Spent a moment being thankful that I could afford them bc I remember times when I would not have been able to.

We used to always have a bowl of mixed nuts around the holidays - filberts, almonds, pecans, brazil nuts. I remember just loving to use the nutcracker to get at them.

@@walterco7701 We, too, always had a big bowl of mixed nuts (and a smaller one for the shells) on the coffee table for the winter holidays, This was in Wisconsin/Minnesota; I think it was my Dad, from the Boston area, who brought this tradition to our family.

but when you got one to slip out of a half shell intact it was a moment!

Fascinating! I would just assume oranges in the south wouldnt have been a treat but yes..much like up here in canada we export a lot of our fruit,and our own fruit costs us more than other countries fruit LOL

A bag of oranges? As a child, I never saw a bag of fruit. One orange would be cut into quarters - one quarter for each of us. When bananas came back in the greengrocers after WW2, children didn't know they had to peel them first! As a child, I never had sweets as I was born in 1947 and sweets, chocolate etc were still "on the ration" until 1953, I think.

Saskatoon berries, aka Service berries, June berries. So good - planted 3 in the yard this year so we can have some of our own - hard to find outside of the occasional farmer's market.

I’d make the guess that you’d be correct. My grandmother was born in the depression. Her family’s cooking was such that a 1 inch cube of cake was considered a heaping helping.

@@wolfwarren6376 same here, my grandmother was also born in tge depression. I think she went the opposite way once times got better, because we'd be offered heaping plates and bowls of food. I say the scarcity of the depression really affected people in different ways. It really was a terrible time for so many people

@@applegal3058 Yeah my parents went through the depression and it sounded miserable. It was excessively hot in the 1930's and even everything was harder. Many still used icebox's and hand washed and wringed clothes etc. People burned more calories in those days and that is probably why your grandmother "heaped" plates at dinner. They made what food they could afford stretch and somehow made it. Not many overweight people in those days.

Easier to eat, as well.

So what exactly IS a citron? I assumed lemon as well, but apparently not.

I thought it was a French car.

@@laldagorth Citron is a citrus fruit that's got a thick rind without much juicy pulp, if any pulp. It's rind isn't as bitter as regular citrus fruits.

I was wondering what it was as well

@@laldagorth They’re more bitter than a lemon, have little flesh (or can even be dry inside) and a thick rind. The thick rind is candied, that is the peel as well as the white part. Where I live, and I assume in a lot of other places all over Europe as well, they’re a common ingredient of traditional Christmas cakes, breads and cookies. Around this time of year, they’re readily available in supermarkets alongside candied oranges (made from bitter oranges, which have similar properties to citrons), usually not shredded, but in small cubes, though.

I was thinking packed into silicon ice cube moulds for a festive shape.

My mom always put an orange, apple and candy in my Christmas Stocking. I still do it myself in my son's stocking when I send him one and in my mom and sisters stockings. In my family it's expected. Mom likes nuts in her stocking too. Mom was born in 1933, things were a lot different back then.

@LIM PEH KA LI KONG, the "food chopper" I remember using as a kid was a glass jar with a spring loaded 4-blade handle that you used by putting the item to be chopped into the jar, screwed the lid on and then punched away till the consistency you wanted. Still have ours up in the cupboard, bring it down occasionally for nostalgia, lol. This would indeed be a great family involved project for the holidays. There are some things that are just better at the holidays or certain times of the year... like turkey, I'll only fix one at Thanksgiving. It's a special time so we try to make our traditional foods only once or twice a year... something to look forward to. Anyway, thank you for the info on giving of Mandarins, or other oranges at Lunar/Chinese New Year. @LIM PEH KA LI KONG- God Bless you and Keep you Safe in HIS Loving Embrace. Have a GREAT week.