Celebrating Navidad and Año Nuevo Part 1: Holiday traditions across Latin America

As the holiday season begins, the streets of Latin America come alive with festive colors, joyful music and unique customs that reflect the region’s rich cultural heritage. “It’s stuffed with apples, nuts, prunes, pork meat, onions and spices, and marinated at least two days in advance,” said María Escobar, coordinator of vulnerability management at the L.A. Consulate of Ecuador. Participants “are colorfully dressed, with beautiful costumes, adorned with many flowers and pouring incense.” Bolivia Bolivian holiday traditions include the picana, a rich soup “which contains four types of meat — chicken, lamb, pork and beef — and is cooked with wine, raisins and almonds,” said Paola Vargas, owner of the Bolivian restaurant Pao’s Pastries & Café in Van Nuys. “Every family gathers the week before Christmas or a little before that to make the tamales together,” said Ana Elena Rojas Alvarez, consul general of Costa Rica in L.A. “For me, a tamal is not a tamal unless you have salsa like lizano, a brown-colored vegetable sauce that brings the flavors out.” Christmas cake, or fruitcake, is also part of the holiday customs for many Costa Ricans. They also enjoy “a very typical dish called vitel tone, which is sliced cold veal covered with tuna sauce and capers.” When New Year’s Eve approaches, wearing pink underwear is popular.