In Spain's New Year's Eve tradition, people eat 12 grapes, one with each midnight clock chime.
The custom is known as las doce uvas de la suerte, or “the twelve grapes of luck.” Each grape is associated with one month of the coming year, and finishing the sequence is popularly linked with good fortune. Families and friends commonly follow the televised chimes from Madrid's Puerta del Sol.
The tradition is frequently connected with a large grape surplus in Spain in the early 20th century, when growers and merchants promoted grapes as a festive New Year's food. The custom is not simply eating grapes at midnight: the defining feature is eating 12 grapes in time with the 12 chimes. The preliminary warning sounds from Madrid's clock are not counted as the 12 midnight chimes.