6 New Year’s Food Traditions and Superstitions for Good Luck

New Year’s food superstitions promise money, good luck, abundance, and a long life through what you put on the table. Lentils resemble coins, long noodles represent longevity, fish is served for abundance, and twelve grapes are eaten for twelve lucky months ahead.

Many of these traditions are still part of New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day celebrations. Here are six lucky foods and the superstitions behind them.

1. Twelve Grapes for Twelve Lucky Months

In Spain, people eat twelve grapes at midnight on New Year’s Eve, one with each stroke of the clock. Each grape represents a month of the coming year, and finishing all twelve in time is supposed to bring good luck throughout the year.

Known as las doce uvas de la suerte, or the twelve lucky grapes, the custom has also spread to several Latin American countries.

Some people take the monthly symbolism further. A sweet grape can represent a good month ahead, with a sour grape warning that a particular month may prove more difficult.

2. Fish for Abundance

Fish is an important New Year food in Chinese tradition because the Chinese word for fish, yú, sounds like a word meaning surplus or abundance. Serving fish expresses the wish to have more than enough in the year ahead.

A whole fish is commonly served, with the head and tail intact to represent completeness from beginning to end.

Leaving some fish uneaten can also be intentional. The leftover portion represents a surplus that carries into the new year, matching the wish for wealth and resources that continue beyond immediate needs.

3. Soba Noodles for a Long Life

In Japan, toshikoshi soba, or “year-crossing noodles,” are traditionally eaten on New Year’s Eve.

Their long shape is associated with longevity, making them a wish for a long life in the coming year. Soba noodles are also easy to cut when eaten, which has been linked with leaving behind the hardships of the old year before entering the new one.

The noodles are generally eaten before midnight, allowing the old year to end with its difficulties left behind.

4. Lentils for Money

Lentils are a classic New Year food in Italy, where their small, round shape resembles coins. Eating them around New Year is associated with money and prosperity in the coming year.

They are traditionally served with cotechino, a rich pork sausage, or zampone, stuffed pig’s trotter. The combination doubles up on lucky symbolism because pork itself is connected with prosperity.

Lentils are also a familiar New Year food in the Czech Republic, where they are eaten on January 1 for the same basic reason: the more lentils on the plate, the more money you hope to have during the year.

5. Pork for Progress and Prosperity

Pork is considered lucky New Year food in several European traditions. Pigs root forward with their snouts, so eating pork became associated with moving forward into the new year.

The animal’s size and richness also connected pork with prosperity and having plenty to eat.

This superstition has a less fortunate counterpart: poultry is sometimes avoided on New Year’s Day because chickens scratch backward. Eating chicken could symbolically send your luck backward or scratch it away.

If your family insists on pork instead of chicken for the first meal of January, an old luck superstition may be behind the menu.

6. Leafy Greens for Wealth

Cabbage, collard greens, kale, and other leafy greens are eaten for New Year luck because their green leaves resemble paper money.

The custom is particularly familiar in the southern United States, where collard greens are commonly served alongside black-eyed peas and pork on New Year’s Day. Each food carries its own lucky association, creating a meal centered on prosperity for the coming year.

Cooked cabbage also has New Year associations in parts of Europe and among families whose traditions traveled to the United States with European immigrants.

The symbolism is wonderfully literal: eat something that looks like money and hope your wallet follows.

Foods Some People Avoid on New Year’s Day

Not every New Year food superstition tells you what to eat. A few tell you what should stay off the plate.

Chicken and turkey are sometimes avoided because poultry scratches backward, symbolizing setbacks instead of progress. Winged birds can carry an additional warning that good luck could “fly away.”

Lobster has a similar reputation in some modern New Year superstition lists because it moves backward. The desired direction on January 1 is forward, so animals associated with backward movement make an unlucky first meal.

A Lucky Meal for the New Year

A New Year table can carry several lucky symbols at once. Pork represents moving forward, lentils and greens invite money, fish promises abundance, and long noodles are eaten for longevity. When midnight arrives, twelve grapes represent the twelve months waiting ahead.

Families often keep the same lucky dish on the menu year after year. Someone who grew up eating lentils every January 1 may continue serving them decades later, even without taking the promise of wealth literally. And if prosperity can supposedly begin with a plate of lentils or an extra serving of pork, New Year’s Day is as good a time as any to keep the tradition going.