I thought I would follow up. Made a lot of those things, not all.
Made:
Chestnut dressing (fabulous, but also added Hill's pork sausage to it, so that's cheating)
Olives (of course)
Cranberry sauce (homemade, fabulous)
Candied Sweet potatoes (by far the very best thing on the menu IMO).
Fruit cake
Cigarettes (VERY rare treat these days!)
Added that to the prime rib. My mom (74 yo) said it was the most pleasant, tasty Christmas dinner she'd ever had. I pointed out I did all the cooking, and also 90% of Christmas eve cooking (bigger crowd, too). She then agreed with my analysis and said we should keep doing it that way every year.
I
did get things to make, but did not make:
Oyster stew
Lemon meringue pie
Sugar cured Ham
Because: time, tide, and formation - which wait for no man (
)- interrupted my plans. We'll do them tomorrow for NYE or on New Year's day so we actually very much round out the full menu (almost).
Thank you all who commented for making this a really fun post and sharing your thoughts, recipes, etc. This was a quirk idea of mine but it was interesting to see other people liked it, added value, and made me do more than I likely otherwise would have. Great holiday feel even if only via an internet forum. But that's why BITOG is a good place - it has good people!
Next year we'll pick another ship's menu from that original Navy Times article and do it!