September 2006 
September 4, Monday, Labor Day : Canada, United States.
Designed to honor workers, this day is the unofficial end of summer. Relaxed picnics and barbecues signal a final day of leisure before resuming serious work after the slower pace of summer. Barbecued meats (pork, chicken, steak), salads, and potato chips like those served on Memorial Day and July 4 are typical.
September 16, Saturday, Independence Day (El Día de Independencia) : Mexico.
This is the anniversary of the historic occasion in 1810 when Mexicans first took arms against their Spanish rulers. Today the bell that summoned the original rebels is rung by the president on the evening of the holiday.
FOOD AND DRINK
Tamales are made for every festive occasion in Mexico. These are mixtures of white cornmeal with meat, vegetables, and seasonings wrapped in a corn husk and cooked inside a banana or other large leaf, which keeps them moist. Fillings, and the leaves to cook them in, vary from region to region.
Another especially patriotic dish is chiles in nogada. These are poblano chilies stuffed with ground pork and served coated in a creamy white walnut sauce garnished with pomegranate seeds and flat-leafed parsley. The colors of the dish are those of the Mexican flag—the green chilies and parsley, the white sauce, and the red pomegranate seeds. The dish was invented in 1821 in honor of Don Agustin de Iturbide, who led the final revolt against the Spanish. It can only be made during this season since the sauce requires fresh walnuts, unavailable at other times.
September 23, Saturday, Rosh Hashanah (rawsh-ha-shaw-naw) (rhymes with cautious fauna) (New Year) : Jewish.
Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, begins at sundown the day before. The words "Rosh Hashanah" literally mean " head of the year," and the first ten days of the year are called the Days of Awe or Repentance. At this time Jews contemplate the past year and ask for forgiveness for sins from God and from people they have wronged. The tenth day, Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, is marked by religious services. Jews emerge from these services freed from sin by repentance and sealed into the Book of Life; thus they are renewed for the coming year.
FOOD AND DRINK
Rosh Hashanah coincides with the harvest and many food customs celebrate the plenty of the season by featuring vegetables and fruits. There is also great emphasis on sweet things such as honey and sweet fruits to symbolize the hope for a "sweet" and prosperous year to come.
Jews of all communities begin the holiday meal, served on the first evening of Rosh Hashanah, with apple slices dipped in a bowl of honey.
The main course is usually meat, chicken, beef, or lamb, often cooked with fruit, and sweet vegetables such as carrots or sweet potatoes, or a sweetened sauce.
Tzimmes, a dish of sweet vegetables, sometimes including fruit, is a popular side dish. The selection of vegetables varies from community to community and cook to cook, but likely choices include carrots, winter squash, sweet potatoes, quinces, apples, prunes, and raisins. Honey or brown sugar is used as a sweetener, and some cooks also add spices such as cinnamon or allspice. Sometimes beef is included in tzimmes. As well as being sweet, carrots symbolize prosperity because they look like gold coins when cut into discs. In this form, they garnish dishes such as gefilte fish.
Among Sephardic Jews, green vegetables such as spinach symbolize a "green" year with plentiful crops, while rice is also served because its many grains are a sign of abundance.
In keeping with the emphasis on sweet dishes, challah, the traditional braided egg bread, is made sweeter with extra sugar and raisins and baked in round shapes to signify a full year.
Desserts often make use of honey, fruit, and nuts, once again emphasizing the themes of sweetness and plenty.
Sephardic Jews from the Mediterranean region have a service called Yehi Ratsones (May It Be Your Will) at which they eat seven symbolic foods, each expressing a wish. Apple slices in honey or jellied rose petals signify the hope for a sweet year, dates are to create a sense of wonder, pomegranate is for a year rich with seeds, pumpkin is eaten in the hope of being remembered for good deeds, leeks such as in leek fritters are eaten to diminish enemies and beets to remove them. Finally, each person eats a bit from the head of a whole fish in the hope that they will be at the head rather than the tail of things in the coming year. The fruits and vegetables are chosen because their names sound similar to the wishes they signify.
September 24, Sunday, Ramadan (rahm-ah-dahm) (The Month of Fasting, first day of month-long fasting) : Islam.
Although Ramadan is a month-long period of fasting for Muslims, food is nonetheless very important due to the tradition of iftar, breaking the fast, which ends each day at sunset and resumes the next day at sunrise. In addition, Ramadan is a month of charity in which Muslims make special efforts to feed the poor and to offer hospitality to friends. Sweet pastries such as baklava and khadaife—a syrup-soaked confection made with strands that look like shredded wheat—are offered to neighbors and friends to mark the end of Ramadan. In order to have sufficient food available, it is common to stock up on foods before Ramadan, especially on luxury items. Pork and alcohol, as well as all foods containing pork or alcohol, are forbidden at all times to Muslims.
FOOD AND DRINK
Traditionally the pre-sunrise breakfast includes rice pilafs, meat turnovers, and poached meats. However, leftovers from dinner or regular breakfast foods are likely substitutes.In addition to the foods mentioned in the following section, see the recipe for Pomegranate Compote in the recipe section.
Indian
Biriani, a dish of saffron-flavored basmati rice studded with curried lamb or vegetables and enhanced with raisins, almonds, and sometimes apricots or peaches, is the festive dish of the Muslims of northern India.
Middle-eastern countries such as Turkey
The daily iftar is signaled by the purchase of freshly made flatbreads, sometimes filled with meat. The meal starts with an array of small items including dates, fruits, cheeses, and pickles, followed by soup, often with rice or vermicelli and eggs, and then by a dinner that includes meat— often lamb or stuffed roasted chicken or turkey—and several vegetable dishes—pastries and turnovers filled with vegetables, meat, or cheese of the feta type—followed by a light dessert of pastry or fruit, frequently scented with rose water.
Lamb is the most popular meat in the Middle East. Eid al-Fitr, a three-day event marking the end of Ramadan, is often celebrated with roast lamb, cooked whole when possible.
Moroccan
It is traditional among Moroccans to serve a luxurious sugar-dusted flat pie called bisteeya or pastilla. It is made of layers of thin pastry—filo is suitable—and filled with spiced pigeon or chicken. Before such celebration dishes people usually have harira, a soup made from lamb and chick peas, usually served with honeyed pastries or a sweet fruit, such as dates.
In Turkey, the Balkans, and Central Asia, the Ramadan soup is usually based on yogurt, while in Pakistan a bowl of yakhni, meat broth with vegetables, is common.
Saudi Arabian, Syrian, Afghan
Sweet items like baklava, kadaife and other syrup-drenched pastries, stuffed dried figs, and halwas with pistachios or almonds are often given as house gifts or served to guests during Ramadan. The sweet foods so common at Ramadan, and especially at Eid al-Fitr, symbolize the sweetness of this season.
Somalian Baked kébabs are a favorite dish. Unlike kébabs in this country, they are not cooked on skewers. Rather they are small, sausage-shaped meatballs made of beef, onion, tomato, and hot pepper and cooked on trays in an oven.