Gulf News readers share how they celebrated Christmas in the UAE

It was a traditional Kerala style lunch for Gulf News reader Reshmi Padmakumar, from Dubai. The dishes included bread with mutton stew ,rice, Kerala style curry, chicken fry, beef roast, fish chili curry, curd curry which is called moru kootan, cabbage, and lemon pickle. Padmakumar celebrated with friends and family and said: “For lunch we were particular that it should be traditional Kerala style Christmas lunch. Accordingly, each one of us prepared one dish and all of got together to celebrate.”

Selvaraj Daniel Indian nationals Selvaraj Daniel and wife Valarmathy hail from Chennai and live in Sharjah. Daniel said: “Christmas morning we went to St. Michael's Church in Sharjah for Christmas mass in Tamil. After that we started our lunch preparations in our home. Biryani is the main dish for the lunch. We made mutton biryani, chicken 65, Chicken gravy and homemade gulab jamun. We also prepared snacks and sweets at home and shared the food with our friends and neighbours.”

Reader Erica Bodota Gravidez shared this picture from Dubai. For her Christmas lunch she chose to have spaghetti, roasted beef, chicken, grilled meat, Chop suey, boiled crabs and shrimp. She said: “It was a wonderful evening with the whole family. I Invited my family from Sharjah, parents, siblings, in-laws and one of my friends. It was a night full of eating and sleeping afterwards.”

Dubai resident Sherin Varkkichan Anchuplackal had sushi, a Japanese sushi for her Christmas lunch. Speaking of Japan, did you know KFC is a popular go-to restaurant in the country for Christmas? Apparently, it is hard to get turkey in Japan, so chicken is eaten on Christmas day. KFC started selling Christmas chicken deal in the 70s.

Gulf News reader Gijo Joyce had a favourite dish of UAE residents, biryani. He said he liked it because of the taste and to keep things affordable. “It was very tasty and reasonable price,” he said.

Abu Dhabi resident and Gulf News reader Biby Tresa Philip prepared a Christmas lunch for relatives. She said: “A family member cooked one item and rest everything cooked by me.”

Gulf News reader Ernalyn Reyes had Filipino style spaghetti, chicken adobo, bread, cake, breaded beef and oven chicken on Christmas. The Dubai resident said: “Each dishes is prepared by a family member, we start preparing food at 8am, before having our lunch one of the family members leads a prayer, after lunch we do some activities, games and karaoke. We usually end up exchanging gifts at night.”