Posted on 12/26/2023 12:37:48 PM PST by Red Badger
The holiday tradition of eating Chinese food on Christmas is going strong, according to Yelp data shared with Axios.
The big picture: Yelp searches for Chinese restaurants spike every December. Last year, Christmas Day searches were 99% higher than any other day in the month, the platform told Axios.
It's not just Yelp. Google search interest for "Chinese food" has peaked on Christmas every year since the data became available (in 2004). Zoom in: A lack of restaurants open on Christmas has fueled the trend over the years, and the cuisine is a holiday favorite among many Jewish families.
Rabbi Joshua Plaut, author of the book "A Kosher Christmas: 'Tis the Season to be Jewish," told NPR in 2017 that the Chinese food tradition has been around at least since 1935 — but probably earlier. The first written citation of Jews eating Chinese on Christmas was published in the New York Times in 1935, Plaut said. "The Chinese restaurant was a safe haven for American Jews who felt like outsiders on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day," Plaut told NPR. Flashback: The Jewish tradition was even brought up during Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan's confirmation hearing in 2010 when Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) asked Kagan where she was on Christmas.
"Like all Jews, I was probably at a Chinese restaurant," Kagan said. "No other restaurants are open," Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) added.
There were times in the past I would have liked this. But there aren’t many decent Chinese restaurants around here anymore.
Do you know what they call Chinese food in China?
FOOD!
What else is open on Dec. 25th. About 20 years ago and I had leave for home around noon. I couldn’t wait too long or be picky to get gas because most stations were closed.
The irony is that a Chinese restaurant is about as unKosher a place as there is to dine. Pork fried rice is in everything. Dishes are NOT kept separate. Shellfish abounds. Beef and chicken is the cheapest available, and in some cases will not be beef or chicken. Not much dairy, but still an odd choice. These days, there are Brooklyn neighborhoods where everything is open, and Christmas doesn’t appear outside to be much different than president’s Day.
>The irony is that a Chinese restaurant is about as unKosher a place as there is to dine.<
True, but you’re only ceremonially ‘unclean’ for a day..........
#24??...................
We have one local buffet that has Chinese, Japanese, Mongolian and some American...................
I have a Jewish former colleague who now lives in Da Nang with his Vietnamese wife and their son (teaches business college). I asked him if he was doing Chinese for Christmas, and he said no, it was Portuguese fisherman’s stew at home, in any case all the restaurants were open anyway.
Just as in Canada, Canadian bacon is called bacon.
Fa Ra Ra Ra Ra Ra Ra Ra Ra
I just had Chinese food for St. Stephen’s Day—pork chow mein—from the restaurant at our local bowling alley, whose chef is Chinese. The pork is actually pork belly.
I had lo mein for lunch yesterday.
Chinese is kosher????
Only if you didn’t see it cooked...............😉
One Christmas I ate at the only open restaruant - a Chinese vegetarian place - with a bunch of other people who also couldn’t go home that year.
It's smiling at me!
I wonder what they call American Fries in America?
Fried potatoes, I guess.
I know one Christmas I was traveling all day and ended up at the Waffle House.
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