By JENNIFER BIGGS, Scripps Howard News Service

There are many modern variations of gazpacho, often in different colors and omitting the traditional tomatoes and bread in favor of avocados, cucumbers, parsley, watermelon, grapes, meat stock, seafood and other ingredients.

The search for new recipes for weeknight meals and dinner parties is ceaseless: We all want something different to serve to our families and something new that'll wow our friends.

When it comes to the holiday table, though, it's the same old same old that we crave.

Who hates an uninspired lunch more, the kid who turns up her nose at it or the parent who begrudgingly throws it together every morning? It's hard to say -- making school lunches is seldom the highlight of anyone's day.

And it's that time again. Five lunches a week. For a whole school year. No wonder it's too easy to fall into the clutches of Lunchables from time to time.

When I once wrote that you can keep your turkey as long as I get dressing at Thanksgiving, many readers generously submitted their family recipes, just like I asked.

"Growing up, I never cared for my mother's dressing, it was too dry," said Beth Frizzell. "I developed a recipe that I have used with my own family."

In Spain and Mexico, the New Year's tradition is to eat 12 grapes at the stroke of midnight as the New Year dawns. In the Philippines, food stays on the table from the old year to the new to ensure a plentiful table all year.
In Japan, it's soba noodles for a long life. In the South, for luck and money, it's black-eyed peas and greens on New Year's Day.