Gaelic Word of the Week - Christmas Dinner - Biadh na Nollaig by ScotParl published on 2020-12-18T13:35:14Z Many people are excited about Santa coming tonight, or as he is known in Gaelic, Bodach na Nollaig – the old man of Christmas. To try and take your mind off it, this week we are looking at Christmas food in Gaelic so our word of the week is Biadh na Nollaig – Christmas food or Christmas dinner. Food – biadh – is often the topic of debate in the Scottish Parliament – Pàrlamaid na h-Alba, particularly relating to agriculture, fisheries and food standards. Biadh – food – is a very important part of Christmas so let’s look at some types of biadh associated with Nollaig – Christmas. The Gaelic for turkey is Cearc-fhrangach – literally French-hen from Cearc – chicken and Frangach – French. This is somewhat strange for a bird native to the Americas! As it happens, the French call it dinde – “of India” and of course, in English it is named after the country Turkey! Not all people will be eating cearc-fhrangach at Nollaig as many people are vegetarian or vegan, or perhaps don’t celebrate Nollaig at all! The Gaelic for vegetarian is glasraichear, coming from glasraich – vegetable. And for vegetables – glasraich at your Christmas dinner – biadh na Nollaig – potatoesare buntanta a carrot is curran. Our very favourite vegetable name is parsnip – curran-geal – literally “white carrot” though in practise most Gaelic speakers will just say parsnip. A brussel sprout is buinneag-Bhruisealach but, again, many Gaelic speakers will just say brussel sprout. And for pudding for your Biadh Nollaig, you may well be having Christmas Pudding – Duf na Nollaig. Another favourite after-dinner choice is caise – cheese. Whatever you are having for Biadh na Nollaig, or even if you aren’t, we hope you have a Nollaig Chridheil is Bliadhna Mhath Ùr – a merry Christmas and a happy new year. This week’s Gaelic word of the week is Chrismas food: biadh na Nollaig. Let’s practice: This week’s Gaelic Word of the Week has been read by Alasdair MacCaluim, Gaelic development officer who is a glasraichear and rather fond of buinneagan-Bruisealach! Genre Learning