Name: Our Feast of Seven Fishes Menu for Christmas Eve
Yield: 10

This is our typical Feast of Seven Fishes Menu for Christmas Eve, with some honorable mentions. It's so fun to prepare this meal despite being chaotic and a lot of work. I'm going to give you some tips and tricks to make it doable!

Mussels Fra Diavolo with crusty Italian bread in a serving bowl.

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The Feast of Seven Fishes

Why is it 7? We don't know. There is no mention of "7" anywhere in the history of the feast that originated in Sicily, also known as La Vigilia. This feast of seafood comes from abstaining from meat until Christmas Day.

The seven happened somewhere in America. The Feast of "Seven" Fishes is an Italian-American tradition. Between appetizers and dinner, we try to get 7 different seafood dishes on the table, from baccala to branzino.

Our Seafood Menu for Christmas Eve

Our Feast of Seven Fishes changes every year, but we always manage to get seven fish on the table somehow. Here are some recipes you should try!

Seafood Appetizers

1 Italian Seafood Salad A Classic Italian Seafood Salad made with a bunch of different shellfish and seafood! Italian Seafood Salad 2 Seared Scallops Garlic sage seared scallops tossed in butter. A perfect easy appetizer done in under 15 minutes. Garlic Sage Seared Scallops 3 Italian Stuffed Baked Clams A classic Christmas Eve or Holiday appetizer. Stuffed baked clams are easy and flavorful, and are a perfect app for lovers of seafood! Italian Stuffed Baked Clams 4 Stuffed Calamari Tender braised calamari tubes stuffed with tentacles and a flavorful breadcrumb mixture. This dish is braised in a simple marinara sauce for over 45 minutes for a moist and soft seafood dish. Stuffed Calamari 5 Shrimp Cocktail You'll never find a store-bought shrimp cocktail as flavorful as homemade. Poaching the shrimp in this delicious combination of water, beer, and seasoning makes for an unbelievably tasty dish that just can't be matched with a pre-cooked frozen shrimp. Homemade Shrimp Cocktail 6 Steamed Mussels in White Wine A delicious mussels appetizer in a delicious white wine sauce. Enjoy this app with crusty Italian bread for dipping. Steamed Mussels in White Wine
Seafood Pasta
7 Mussels Fra Diavolo A spicy marinara sauce paired with mussels for a perfect Christmas Eve app. This steamed mussels dish is perfect to dip crostini or crusty Italian bread! Mussels Fra Diavolo 8 Pasta with Calamari Tender braised calamari in marinara sauce served over squid ink pasta. This delicious pasta with calamari is a delicious seafood salad to add to the Christmas Eve menu! Pasta with Calamari 9 Linguine with Red Clam Sauce Switch it up from the classic linguine with clams with this clam pasta with tomato sauce. It's easy and delicious topped with toasted breadcrumbs and made with fresh topneck clams. Linguine with Red Clam Sauce 10 Linguine with Clams This classic dish is served on every Christmas Eve in our family. It's a fresh and flavorful dish perfect for a pasta dish! Linguine with clams 11 Shrimp Fra Diavolo Shrimp Fra Diavolo served over linguine. A spicy seafood marinara sauce served with pan-fried shrimp and a classic spicy marinara. Tap for recipe!
Seafood Mains
12 Pan-Seared Vermillion Snapper An easy and quick pan-seared filet of snapper with the skin on. It's tossed in a lemon thyme and butter sauce with capers for a flavorful and buttery fish! Pan-Seared Vermillion Snapper 13 Pistachio Crusted Fish Black sea bass filet made with a pistachio-crusted topping. This filet is tender and moist with a delicious crusty topping. Pistachio Crusted Fish 14 Fried Flounder Oreganata A fried flounder oreganata style served with a lemon butter sauce. This is a classic fried Italian-American Seafood recipe that can be a delicious main dish on Christmas Eve. Fried Flounder Oreganata
Top Tips and Tricks for Feast of Seven Fishes
Prepare as much as you can the day before. Recipes like shrimp cocktail can be prepared a day in advance. Anything you can't do the day before, start in the morning. Clams can be stuffed in the morning, scallops can be cleaned and the muscle removed. All your breadcrumb mixtures can be combined.
Have plenty of Italian Bread. The best part of a lot of these dishes is soaking up the juices with a piece of Italian bread or crostini.
Know how to keep the seafood fresh. Filets can be kept in the fridge for a day in advance but live shellfish need to be able to breathe so they shouldn't be kept in closed plastic bags. They can be kept on ice overnight.
Purge shellfish in the morning. Start purging the shellfish first thing in the morning because if you get behind on this it can push dinner back an hour.
Shuck your clams. If you're not great at shucking clams just have the fishmonger at the seafood counter do it for you.
Other Vegetable Dishes and Appetizers for Christmas Eve
You may want to add some other little vegetable appetizers along the line on Christmas Eve. I suggest putting out some assortment of the following:
Eggplant Caponata
Easy Italian Stuffed Artichokes or Easy Steamed Artichokes
Veggie Stromboli
Marinated Eggplant and Onion
Although we love seafood, sometimes it's good to have options for everyone to have if they don't love all the seafood dishes!
You may also want to get some classic Italian Desserts on the table like Pignoli Cookies (Italian Pine Nut Cookies) andStruffoli (Italian Honey Balls).
FAQs
Where does the Feast of Seven Fishes come from?
The seafood feast originated in Sicily as a celebration the night before Christmas while abstaining from meat. The seven part was added somewhere along the line in the Italian Diaspora here in America.
What are some classic dishes served on Christmas Eve for Feast of Seven Fishes
Some classic seafood dishes are baccala, cioppino, frutti di mare, branzino, linguine with clams, and mussels.
Comment below and let us know what your favorite seafood dish to serve on Christmas Eve is!