Here are all the details about our Spanish Christmas table, along with a few beloved traditions and recipes – for anyone who’d like to add a Spanish twist or some local dishes to their holiday tables around the world.

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How We Celebrate a Spanish Christmas: Traditions, Food & Family

Inside Our Spanish Christmas

After living in Spain for the past 15 years – and being married to a Spaniard – Christmas has become one of the most meaningful times of the year for me. Every December, I celebrate a traditional Spanish Christmas, surrounded by family, food, and customs passed down through generations in Carlos’s family.

Over the years, I’ve moved from being a curious observer at the table to one of the main cooks – especially now that my in-laws are seniors. These days, my husband and I prepare almost everything ourselves, using his family’s traditional Spanish recipes, many of which we share on the Viva Spanish Kitchen blog, and sticking closely to classic dishes. Innovation is welcome in our own home for other holidays, but not at our Spanish Christmas table – especially when senior parents are involved. They’re quite picky and understandably prefer the Christmas menu they’ve enjoyed for most of their lives, often passed down from their own families.

In this post, I’m sharing how we celebrated Christmas this year at my in-laws’ house, along with the dishes that always make an appearance. I’ll also include links to recipes already available on our food blog, Viva Spanish Kitchen, for those who’d like to bring a little Spain to their own holiday table.

Christmas in Spain

Unlike in many countries where Christmas Day is the main event, Spanish Christmas is spread across several key dates, with a strong emphasis on family gatherings. Both of my senior in-laws come from large families, so from December 24 to January 6, most days are spent visiting relatives on both sides. Here are the highlights of how our family celebrates a traditional Spanish Christmas:

• Nochebuena (December 24) – The most important family dinner of the Spanish Christmas. In our family, this is traditionally when my mother-in-law’s two sisters visit with their husbands. This year, only one of her sisters joined us, as she doesn’t have children of her own, while the other celebrated with her grandchildren. In past years, we often managed to gather everyone together.
• Navidad (December 25) – Christmas Day is usually a long, relaxed family lunch, often featuring leftovers from Nochebuena. In our family, we typically go out to a restaurant with relatives on my father-in-law’s side.
• Nochevieja (December 31) – New Year’s Eve is celebrated with the tradition of eating twelve grapes at midnight. It used to be the night my in-laws went out with friends while we spent time with my parents – either traveling together or hosting them at our home. On January 1st, my in-laws would join us for a big New Year’s family lunch.
• Reyes Magos (January 5-6) – January 5 is one of the biggest celebrations across Spain, marked by the Cabalgata de Reyes Magos (Three Kings Parade), held in towns throughout the country. Families usually go out in the evening to see the parade. January 6 is the traditional gift-giving day, especially for children. However, as I mentioned in my Malaga Christmas post, we give major gifts on Christmas so kids have more time to enjoy them during the holidays, since school and work resume on January 7. Beyond gift-giving, we gather with my in-laws for a festive lunch and share Roscón de Reyes, a traditional Spanish Christmas dessert.

What’s Always on Our Spanish Christmas Table

Here are some of the dishes we prepared this year, all inspired by my husband’s family Christmas traditions, with many favorites originating from the Valencia region, where both of my Spanish in-laws come from.

Starters & Appetizers in Spain

Marisco (Seafood)

Seafood is an absolute staple on our Spanish Christmas table – especially for Nochebuena (Christmas Eve) – and for my mother-in-law, it’s non-negotiable. Our table usually includes king prawns and shrimp, but every single year she insists on buying red shrimp from Denia.

These shrimp are considered a true delicacy: expensive and not always available across Spain year-round. While we all love them, no one loves them quite as much as she does. Because Nochebuena is such a special occasion, Spaniards tend to splurge, and larger supermarkets often stock them during the holidays. You can also pre-order them in advance at the fish counter.

In fact, this is common practice in Spain for Christmas seafood and fish. This year, since we were also making lubina a la sal (salt-baked sea bass), we pre-ordered the fish weeks ahead and picked it up fresh and prepared from the local supermarket fish section on the morning of December 24.

In addition to the red shrimp, this year we also made a popular Spanish tapa, gambas al ajillo (you can find the recipe in this post) and pulpo a la peregrina (check out the recipe here).

Iberian Ham, Cold Cuts & Cheeses

No Spanish Christmas table is complete without Jamón Ibérico and/or selection of cured meats, and Spanish cheeses. On our table, this includes longanizas de Pascua. These cheese and jam platters are served generously and savored slowly, often enjoyed well before the main course.

You can find my detailed guide to Spanish cheeses in the post.

Meat Spreads & Toasts

Another very traditional Christmas starter in our family is meat spreads. We usually serve a selection of pâtés with toast and jams, and in recent years we’ve also added cojonudos – toasts topped with sobrassada and quail eggs.

This dish is especially popular in Valencia, Mallorca (where sobrassada originates), and coastal areas of Catalonia, so it’s less common across all of Spain – but it’s a huge hit with both the kids and the seniors in our family.

Main Christmas Dishes in Spain

Fish vs. Roasted Meats

Living by the Mediterranean, seafood and fish play a big role in our family celebrations. However, as someone who travels nonstop around Spain, I often highlight that Spanish cuisine – and tapas in particular – is very meat-focused.

In inland regions, Christmas tables often feature cochinillo (suckling pig) or cordero asado (roast lamb) with perfectly crispy skin. In our family, cordero asado used to be the traditional Christmas main dish. However, over the last few years, though, my in-laws decided that since Christmas dinner is late in the evening and we serve lots of starters, they prefer a lighter fish-based main dish.

As a result, we now prepare traditional meat dishes like cordero asado (roast lamb) or rabo de toro (oxtail stew) on January 1 or January 5, when the family gathers again. For Nochebuena, we usually make lubina a la sal (salt-crusted sea bass).

Soups & Stews for Christmas Eve dinner

In our family, soups and stews aren’t typical for Christmas Eve dinner. We prefer them for Christmas Day lunch (December 25), New Year’s Day, or January 5, when we meet for longer daytime family meals.

The only soup we’ve served for Christmas dinner over the past 15 years is crema de marisco (seafood cream soup). That said, this is very subjective – many Spanish families include soup as part of their Christmas menu. A great example is Sopa de Galets, a comforting Catalan classic. You can find traditional Spanish soup and stew ideas in this post.

Festive Fruit Plate For Spanish Christmas

Another must-have on our Christmas table is a picture-perfect festive fruit platter, often filled with exotic and seasonal fruits. Once it’s brought to the table after the main meal, it instantly signals that this is a special occasion.

My mother-in-law usually orders this as a gift-style fruit plate from a local frutería (fruit shop), where many stores offer this service specifically for Christmas in Spain.

Festive Christmas Sweets in Spain

In recent years, we’ve stopped making traditional Spanish desserts (like peras al vino, which my mother-in-law used to prepare) on Christmas Eve itself. With so much food already on the table, we now prefer to focus on turrones (mostly traditional hard and soft varieties, widely sold as food souvenirs across Spain from October to January), polvorones and mantecados (crumbly shortbread-like cookies), and mazapán (marzipan). These sweets are an essential part of any Spanish Christmas.

If we were to add cakes and desserts on Christmas Eve, the turrón platter would often go untouched. So instead, we save desserts like torrija, Basque Cheesecake, or Tarta de Santiago for other days during the holiday season and enjoy them then.

For more ideas on must-try and must-buy Spanish sweets, check out this detailed guide.

Reyes Magos & Roscón de Reyes

On January 6, the must-try dessert is Roscón de Reyes – a ring-shaped cake decorated with candied fruits and eaten to celebrate the Three Kings (Epiphany), marking the official end of the Christmas season. Inside the Roscón are hidden surprises:

• A small king figurine (whoever finds it gets a plastic crown )
• A dry bean (whoever finds it pays for next year’s Roscón!)

It’s a fun tradition, especially for kids – though everyone eats carefully to avoid breaking a tooth. This year was extra special because, for the first time, we had two Roscones on the table: one made by Carlos himself, filled with cabello de ángel (the recipe will be published soon on Viva Spanish Kitchen), and another brought by my in-laws filled with nata (whipped cream).

While you can find Roscón in almost every supermarket around Christmas, most Spaniards pre-order them from local bakeries (panaderías). If you don’t, my favorite cabello de ángel versions usually sell out first, leaving nata-filled ones as the last option.

If you’d like to recreate a Spanish-inspired Christmas – or simply add one or two traditional dishes to your celebrations – head over to Viva Spanish Kitchen, where we share step-by-step recipes, family favorites, and seasonal Spanish dishes.

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