Christmas traditions: Tree hunts and Christmas morning breakfasts

71 years of yuletide joy in Cordova with Swedish pancakes, pickled fish and Snappee Toms.

Much of the Christmas celebration is about traditions, and after 71 years of Yuletide Joy here in Cordova, we have quite a few.

For example, there’s the tree hunt. No fake trees in this house, regardless of how many days it takes to clean up all the needles come New Year’s Day.  The trip out the road to find the perfect tree is always a grand adventure, often of legendary proportions. We still laugh about the time the weather was so bad Dad and Harold Nordman got busted for chopping a tree down inside the city limits when they thought they were out by Mile 13

Then there’s Santa’s Helicopter, which Dad built in 1957. It took off from the carport rooftop many a windy Christmas, crashing across the street into the old hospital that is now the Ilanka Clinic and CEC headquarters.  Eventually Chopper One had so many 2x4s added for repairs that it took three guys to lift it into place.  This winter, I finally took it apart and reassembled a lighter, LED-lit version, for Year Number 60 of its all-important mission. It can now be seen under a 40-foot pine tree near our house on Forestry Way.

Indoors, my wife Sue does her typical incredible job of decorating the house. She can name the year and source of every item, including countless snowmen. A family favorite is three small Styrofoam ones, topped with little red knit caps.  The shortest of them is bare headed, with a tiny chewed-up hat sitting beside it.  This is in honor of Tigger, our family cat for many years. For some reason, she loved to chew on that hat, and it was an Xmas game to put the hat on the snowman, and see how long it would take her to sneak up to steal it when we weren’t watching.  Every morning we would find it among the “crunchies” in her food dish.

Christmas morning breakfast at our place is also a big tradition.  We were blessed to have both sets of parents living in Cordova for many years, so having them and all the rest of our clan down started back in 1972. How they all crammed into the tiny kitchen and living room of our original house is something we laugh about every year.

The first few years, we cooked on an old oil-heated oven/range, and came up with the idea of making pancakes right on its broad surface. For Christmas, it had to be something special, so I opted to make Swedish pancakes. I had never heard of them before hiring on as a seine boat cook/deckhand with Olaf Gildness in 1964.

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Back then, most of the seiners were of 34 to 40 foot length, and a small oil-fired range was used for cooking. Openers ran the whole week, from 6 am on Monday to 9 am on Saturday. After delivering fish on Saturday, it was time for cleanup, repairs, and maintenance.  On Sunday, Captain Gildness would let us sleep in, and cook breakfast for the crew.

He would scour the top of the stove, and then use an egg beater to blend batter for these thin pancakes that were cooked right on the hot surface.  He started each one by frying a strip of bacon, and then pouring the batter over it. They were a highlight of the weekend, and given Olaf’s heritage, it would be more proper to say they were Norwegian pancakes.  I’m not sure how the name was switched to Swedish pancakes at Xmas time.  Maybe the Swedes outnumbered the Norwegians at one of our early breakfasts.

Needless to say, cooking a strip of bacon for each pancake to feed a house full of guests wasn’t practical, so we opted for ham baked in the oven to speed up the operation. Even so, making the pancakes was time consuming, so we have a large jar of pickled king salmon available to round out the Scandinavian theme, plus coffee, orange juice, or infamous Snappee Toms on hand to keep the crowd occupied.

Snappee Toms are in fact a modified form of a Bloody Mary, and can be made with or without vodka. Their name derives from a key ingredient called SNAP-E-TOM, a spicy tomato cocktail blend of tomato juice, green chiles, and onion, that came in tiny 6 ounce cans and was used for years at the duck cabin to make  “Snappers” to go with a taco omelets following the morning shoot. After arising at 4 am, hunting until 9 am, and returning to the cabin for breakfast, hunters were usually shot.  If they weren’t, a couple Snappers had them heading to the bunks soon.

The SNAP-E-TOM mix is now difficult to find, so as a Xmas present, should you wish to modify your Xmas breakfast routine, here are the recipes for both Swedish pancakes and Pete Dahl Snappee Toms.

Swedish pancakes with strawberries and whip cream are part of the traditional Christmas breakfast at our house. 
Photo by Sue Shellhorn/For The Cordova Times

Swedish Pancakes:

Ingredients:

  • 6 eggs
  • 6 heaping tablespoons of flour
  • 1 can evaporated milk
  • 1 Tbs. vanilla

Toppin’s:

Maple syrup, strawberries, whipped cream

In a blender, place eggs, flour, sugar, evaporated milk and vanilla. Blend until smooth and cook until light brown. Have fun flipping them over.  Serve with maple syrup, or strawberries and whipped cream.

The Xmas Snappees are lined up with care, knowing breakfast guests will soon be there.
Photo by Gretchen Carpenter/For The Cordova Times

Pete Dahl Snappees:

Ingredients:

  • Ice
  • Vodka
  • Lemon juice
  • Lea & Perrins Whorcestershire sauce
  • Tomato juice
  • Celery salt
  • Black pepper
  • Lemon
  • Celery
  • Spiced green bean

Fill large mug with ice.  Add 1 jigger vodka (optional), 1/2 jigger of lemon juice, several dashes of Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce, fill to top with tomato juice, and stir.  Top with celery salt and black pepper.  Garnish with slice of lemon, celery stick, and spiced green bean.

I will not bother adding a pickled fish recipe, as everyone in Cordova has their own secret ingredients. Anymore, the key is to catch a Copper River King Salmon, if you can, and then salt it properly.

One of the keys to a wonderful Holiday season is traditions. They are often born of happenstance, and then become an intertwined part of our lives.  Be sure to enjoy yours.

God Bless, and have a Very Merry Christmas.

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Dick Shellhorn
Dick Shellhorn is a lifelong Cordovan. He has been writing sports stories for the Cordova Times for over 50 years. In his Cordova Chronicles features, he writes about the history and characters of this Alaska town. Alaska Press Club awarded Shellhorn first place for Best Humor column in 2016 and 2020, and third place in 2017 and 2019. He also received second place for Best Editorial Commentary in 2019. Shellhorn has written two books about Alaska adventures: Time and Tide and Balls and Stripes. Reach him at dshorn44@gmail.com.