Carrying on tradition
Preparations underway for the annual Tuolumne County Christmas Eve Day Dinner Volunteers including a lead cook, cook’s helpers, gift coordinators, pick up and delivery coordinators, traffic flow coordinators, and delivery drivers are getting ready for th
The staging area is the gymnasium-sized Sierra Building at the Mother Lode Fairgrounds on Southgate Drive in Sonora.
Before 10 a.m. Tuesday, Tripp Jenkins, 52, of Sonora, and Richard Mcguire, 64, of Greeley Hill, were getting busy in the kitchen at the back of the building. Mcguire had on a Superman apron, but he deferred to Jenkins as the lead cook.
They started with cleaning and soon had pots simmering on the industrial stove top. Kevin Convers, 70, of Jamestown, tied on his apron to join Jenkins and Mcguire.
“We’re doing cook prep for stuffing, gravy, and mashed potatoes,” Jenkins said. “We’ll be slicing turkey soon.”
Cathie Peacock, who’s been helping with the Tuolumne County Christmas Eve Day Dinner for 36 years, said the cooks were preparing 1,500 pounds of turkey. Jenkins said it was all pre-cooked, smoked turkey breast. Peacock said all the turkey was donated by the Sonora-based Diestel Turkey Family Ranch.
Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, this year’s Tuolumne County Christmas Eve Day Din
ner is pick up and delivery only. There will be no community dinner gathering. Organizers say they have received more than 1,500 orders for individual meals. As always, there is no charge and no one is encouraging anyone to make donations.
Pick up and delivery will begin at 1 p.m. Wednesday by reservation and is expected to be complete by 4 p.m. Thursday, which is Christmas Eve. There will be about 60 delivery drivers and helpers this year.
The menu this year includes turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, cranberry, vegetables, gravy, and rolls or bread.
There will be no on-site eating this year, no band, no Santa, and no music, Peacock said.
“We miss that,” she said Tuesday outside the Sierra Building.
The Tuolumne County Christmas Eve Day Dinner tradition began back in 1982, when Twain Harte residents Paula Bourguet and Sandy Burns got the idea while they were traveling in France during the winter holidays.
They were missing their families back here in the Mother Lode when they visited a small village near Paris. The village people were having a Christmas Eve feast gathering, together, and they invited Bourguet and Burns to join their party.
“The people were so warm and generous,” Peacock said. “They came back here and started it the very next year.”
No one around today can remember the name of the small village outside Paris, but the spirit of community warmth and sharing and giving those village people shared in France still carries on here in the Mother Lode.
Just like previous years, Tuolumne County Christmas Eve Day Dinner volunteers are offering gifts for all children 16 and younger. Organizers say the children don't need to be in vehicles if individuals are picking up meals.
Gift bags being put together Tuesday included a yellow Maxi Truck, a Penelope Crumb book, a Paw Patrol Skye Helicopter, an I'm a Rock & Roller Baby, a Poupée Mode fashion doll, multiple Baby Dolls Playsets, a My Fairy Garden Tree Hollow by Playmonster, and an alligator xylophone.
“They tell us if it's a boy or a girl, and their age, and we try to figure out what's best,” volunteer Judy Hodges, 71, of Sonora, said Tuesday as she organized gift bags.
Hodges estimated the Tuolumne County Christmas Eve Day Dinner has at least 300 different toys for youngsters this year.
At 10:15 a.m. a couple people with masks came into the Sierra Building and asked, “Is this where we volunteer?” They were welcomed to join the preparations for the big feed.
Other goods stacked inside the cavernous building included Clorox Wipes, bottles of hand sanitizer, Scotch tape and sandwich bags, as well as handwritten signs stating “Delivery Volunteer.”
Stacked on one long group of tables were hundreds of Rocky Mountain pies, including peach, pumpkin, apple, cherry, and at least one redwhite-blue pie. On another table there were other snacks and desserts, including Original Two-bite vanilla cupcakes with red and green sprinkles on the icing, a bag of assorted candy including Milk Duds, Snickers, Milky Ways, Skittles and Starburst, and a mixed bag of individual packets of Cheetos, Doritos, Fritos and Lays potato chips.
Because this year's Tuolumne County Christmas Eve Day Dinner set-up is all pickup or delivery, “there is a big worry about congestion, so they have expanded it to two days,” Wednesday and Thursday for either pickup or delivery, organizers said in a social media post last week. “Because of the worry, a reservation must be made in advance by calling Cathie Peacock.”
Reservations were closed at 5 p.m. Dec. 14. For more information call Peacock at (209) 586-4802. The cost of this year's community celebration totaled $4,200. Donors and supporters of this year's Tuolumne County Christmas Eve Day Dinner include the Sonora Area Foundation, Adventist Health Sonora, and local Rotary and Lions clubs.