The English name of Spain's traditional New Year's Eve custom of eating 12 grapes at midnight is The Twelve Grapes.
Known in Spanish as las doce uvas de la suerte, the tradition calls for eating one grape with each stroke of the clock at midnight on December 31. The 12 grapes represent the 12 months of the coming year, and successfully eating them is associated with good luck and prosperity.
The custom is especially linked with Madrid's Puerta del Sol, where the clock's midnight chimes are broadcast nationally. Families and groups across Spain often prepare a dozen grapes for each person, sometimes buying peeled or seedless versions to make the rapid sequence easier.
Stories about the tradition's origin vary. A widely repeated account credits a surplus grape harvest in the early twentieth century with helping popularize the custom, while newspaper evidence shows that the practice was already known in Madrid before that period. The grapes are eaten at the chimes, not simply at any point during the evening.