New Year's Party Foods That Bring Good Luck As Well As Great Taste

New Year's foods that bring good luck will be in demand next week. 2009 was a rough year for so many people that folks will want to begin 2010 with as much good luck as possible. Here are some extra-lucky foods from Wisconsin.
Let's start with fish. Fish is a traditional New Year's food lucky for people, although unlucky for fish. Herring is especially lucky. Whether the herring be in cream sauce or wine sauce changes only the taste, not the fish's future prosperity benefits. Some people are squeamish about eating herring, but if they've suffered misfortune in 2009, they need those nutritious little critters now more than ever. Tell them not to worry about the flavor, one bite and they'll find out how delicious herring actually are. Herring just have a PR problem, that's all.
Another lucky food is pork or ham. European tradition has it that eating a pig on New Year's Day brings good luck because pigs are good at rooting out good things from the earth (i.e. truffles). So, perhaps the delicious smells and flavors of ham, bacon, or pork chops will bring good things to people also.
Other traditionally lucky New Year's foods are round or ring-shaped. Round foods symbolize that the seasons have come full circle. The old year is complete, - on with the new. Black-eye peas are supposedly good luck because they're round. Although people who think black-eyed peas are round have likely been sipping a little too much spiked eggnog. Last time I looked, those peas were oval. But perhaps that shape is appropriate for 2009; our troubled economy did seem to make 2009 last overly long. But better times are ahead. Everything cycles. So let's all eat well and ring in the new year with Wisconsin gourmet food!