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By Mike Trask, Reading Eagle newspaper
Reading, Pennsylvania, Monday, January 5, 2003
A honey-glazed forehead comes with Christmas for one Exeter Township family.
Deanne L. Snelling and about 40 family members celebrated Sviata Vechera
Ukrainian Christmas Eve on Saturday afternoon.
The traditional feast includes being touched on the head by a wooden spoon
dipped in honey. Deanne's father, William J. Kesack of East Norriton,
Montgomery County, does most of the touching. He said the tradition is meant
to bring good luck. Kesack and his sister Helen Coulter of Bethlehem [PA]
have carried Ukrainian traditions to their children and grandchildren.
The meal includes three soups mushroom, sauerkraut and split pea and no meat
or dairy products. For years Coulter, 76, cooked the dishes, including
pierogies, cabbage and a large loaf of bread. "The bread cannot be cut
because that symbolizes breaking ties," Kesack, 65, said. Everyone pitches
in to make the dinner, but it can be a struggle.
Coulter never wrote down the ingredients to her dishes. So it's been up to
various family members to watch and try to scribble down the recipe. Nobody
seems to forget such traditions as setting places at the meal for the
deceased and trying to keep everyone in the same room for dinner. "Some of
the things we don't even know where they came from," Kesack said. "They just
evolved." The food that four generations shared has remained the same.
"Most of the kids don't eat the food," Snelling said. She admitted that when
she was a youngster, she didn't care for the food either. "When we were
little my cousin used to sneak us to McDonald's," she confessed. The family
members said some of the stricter traditions have deteriorated over the
years.
Coulter reflected on how she used to fast until the big dinner. "The only
thing we could eat during the day was pickled herring," she said. There was
no pickled herring to be found in the Snelling home Saturday but people had
no trouble finding snacks.
Kesack said everybody used to have to eat a clove of garlic when he was a
boy. Now garlic is placed on the table but nobody takes a mouthful.
William W. Snelling, Deanne's husband, has been part of the tradition for
more than 14 years. "My family doesn't have the strong traditions that her
family has," he said. "So it was something different for me. But I didn't
want to run away." The Snelling's son Brian, 9, enjoyed his crowded home. "I
get to see lots of friends and family," he said.
Contact reporter Mike Trask at 610-371-5030 or mtrask@readingeagle.com.
http://www.readingeagle.com/re/news/1203293.asp
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