The traditional French Christmas is all about family, food, and more food. Besides that, the holiday season might look a bit less extravagant here than in some other countries.
Sure, the French are into Christmas too! They like to visit Christmas markets, they have a Christmas tree in the house, and they decorate the dinner table nicely on Christmas Eve. But it doesn’t get much crazier than that – no ugly Christmas sweaters, no flashy decorations, and no sending Christmas cards.
Let’s have a closer look at what a traditional French Christmas is like!
Christmas Markets
In France, it all starts in late November. Streets light up with beautiful decorations, and cozy Christmas markets open to set the mood for Christmas.
The Christmas market is the ultimate place to be when you want to get that cozy Christmas feeling in France. Here you can find festive decorations, local products, and all kinds of delicacies. While enjoying the atmosphere, don’t forget to eat and drink! Try the mulled wine, oysters, snails, and all the other goodies – just like the French do.
Strasbourg in northeastern France has one of the oldest Christmas markets in Europe, and is considered to be the capital of Christmas. In Paris, it’s the popular Christmas market at the Tuileries Gardens that brings on the Christmas spirit. Get a sneak peak of what that looks like in this video. You’ll also see how the rest of Paris is preparing for the holiday season.
At the Christmas markets you can also get santons – small handcrafted clay figurines made for nativity scenes, crèches. People have nativity scenes in their homes, but they are also displayed publicly, seen more as a cultural thing than something religious.
The santons are made in Provence in the south of France. In a traditional crèche from this region, the figurines represent the traditional Provençal village life. And there are all kinds of figurines! More specifically, there are 55 different characters! Among them you can find the baker, the mayor, the tailor, and the farmer’s wife.
Christmas Eve
In France, Christmas revolves around food!
Here you enjoy the big Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve on the 24th of December. The name of this meal, Le réveillon de Noël, refers to staying up late, as you traditionally have this dinner after midnight mass.
The French truly invest in this Christmas Eve dinner. There are many luxury items on the menu, and they take their time to enjoy it – the meal can last several hours.
In France, you usually start the Christmas Eve dinner with a nice glass of champagne and appetizers, hors d’oeuvres. This is followed by seafood, such as oysters (kind of a must!), smoked salmon, shrimps, or lobster. Foie gras is also a common starter that can be eaten with toast and jam. Other typical things to enjoy are snails and boudin blanc, a white sausage.
Next up is either turkey with chestnuts or capon. You can also have this the next day, on the 25th, when you meet with the family for lunch.
Last but not least – dessert! La bûche de Noël is a Christmas cake that you can get at a boulangerie or make yourself. It’s shaped and decorated to look like a log, with small plastic Christmas decorations on top. The traditional flavor is chocolate and chestnuts, but you can find all kinds of flavors, such as fruit, caramel, vanilla, and berries.
Père Noël
Feeling happy and content after that lovely Christmas Eve dinner, you might start thinking about presents – when is it time for those? This varies. It can be either on Christmas Eve, or in the morning on Christmas Day. Leave your shoes by the fireplace or by the Christmas tree, and Père Noël will fill them with presents.
In the northeastern part of France it’s a bit different. There Saint Nicolas brings toys and treats to children on the 6th of December. He is accompanied by Père Fouettard, Father Whipper, who spanks children who have been misbehaving. Better make the nice list!
New Year’s Eve
We are skipping ahead a few days to New Year’s Eve. And guess what – there’s more food! To celebrate the New Year, you usually enjoy a nice, big meal with friends.
At midnight, it’s time for you and your friends to raise your champagne glasses and finally wish each other Happy New Year, bonne année! Saying bonne année to someone before the 1st of January is bad luck, so remember to wait until midnight.
And there are more rules! On the 1st of January, you have to remember to wish everyone you run into a Happy New Year – your neighbor, the postman, and the guy in the elevator.
From this day on, you say bonne année to your close friends, family, and colleagues when you see them for the first time in the new year. The New Year’s wishes are usually followed by French cheek kisses, and in this special case you might even do la bise with your boss!
You have until the end of January to wish your close ones bonne année, or else you may seem rude, and even have some bad luck coming your way!
Another way to wish your close ones a Happy New Year is by sending cards. In France, you send New Year’s cards rather than Christmas cards, and nowadays, a text message or email will also do.
La Fête des Rois
All good things come to an end, as do these cheerful holiday festivities. But there is still one occasion for friends and family to get together and celebrate, and that’s Epiphany on the 6th of January!
On this day, you eat a certain kind of cake called galette des rois. There are variations to this ‘king cake’, but it’s traditionally filled with almond paste. You can make it yourself or find it in a boulangerie, and when you buy it you usually get a paper crown with it.
Somewhere inside the cake there’s a fève hidden. This is a small porcelain figurine that brings luck and prosperity for the year ahead. The lucky one to get the piece with the fève is crowned king or queen of the day and gets to wear the paper crown. The lucky one also gets to choose a king or queen to share the day with!
This was the traditional French Christmas in a nutshell. As you can see, the French have plenty of wonderful holiday traditions (of which many are related to food – nothing wrong with that!).
Even though Christmas is a bit more toned down here than in some other countries, it’s still equally charming. So if you stay in France during the holiday season, prepare for these new traditions, and make space for lots of delicious food!
Happy Holidays!
