One of my earliest Christmas memories involves the local deli at my home place in Nova Scotia, Canada. The deli was, and still is, owned by family friends and remains the best place to get a huge, delicious sandwich and meet up for a chat with neighbours.

When I was small, each year at Christmas they would place a big tree in the seating area. It would be decorated with strings of popcorn and crunchy gingerbread biscuits. The biscuits were baked with a small hole at the top, so you could put a bit of ribbon through and hang them on the tree. They were decorated with white icing and I still remember, at five years old, how badly I wanted to eat one.

“They are decorations,” my mother said to me. “They are not for eating.” But to me, they looked like the most delectable festive treats in the world. In the end, the owner took down a biscuit decoration and gave it to me with a wink.

Reader, I ate the biscuit.

Years later, my mother handed me a small box on Christmas day. “It’s your annual ornament,” she said with a twinkle in her eye. I opened the box to see a perfect ceramic gingerbread biscuit. It had simple white icing and a red ribbon through the top. Each year, I feel utter and complete joy when I hang it up on our tree.

Food is never far away from happy Christmas memories, whether it’s the gusto with which the turkey was always brought to the table or your first taste of Irish cream liqueur over ice while sitting by a roaring fire.

This year, I am focusing even more of my attention on keeping my plates local, and we are reflecting this on the pages of this edition of Irish Country Living Food.

Small food businesses are currently facing unprecedented challenges with cost increases across the board and staffing issues. When producers and chefs look back on 2024, I am not sure it will bring back the same happy memories.

To show our support, our recipe spreads were not only tested (and tasted) ‘til perfect, but designed with Irish producers in mind. We often overlook desserts when it comes to local ingredient sourcing, but there are farmers and producers working diligently to make Irish grown and milled flours, ice cream and even puff pastry. What’s better news is that these ingredients can increasingly be found on our local supermarket shelves.

Besides our two main recipe spreads, this edition is packed full of tasty inspiration, including a stellar line-up of celebratory wines from Irish Country Living editor Ciara Leahy, a perfectly curated round-up of gifts and cookbooks and some winter travel inspiration from Caroline Hennessy.

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