January 6: Galette des rois:
WHAT IS IT
WHERE TRADITION FROM
HIOW PEOPLE CELEBRAQTE TODAY
VARIATIONS
The galette des rois is a cake traditionally shared at
Epiphany, on 6 January. It celebrates the arrival of the Three Wise Men in
Bethlehem.
Composed of a puff pastry cake, with a small charm, the
fève, hidden inside, it is usually filled with frangipane, a cream made from
sweet almonds, butter, eggs and sugar. But more gourmet versions are available
for us to enjoy, with chocolate, apple or candied fruits. Every year, the
leading French pâtissiers offer exclusive creations for the tradition of crowning
the one who finds the fève.
The season of the galette des rois begins on
Twelfth Night and ends on Shrove Tuesday. Celebrated on 6 January, Epiphany
corresponds to the moment when the baby Jesus is presented to the Three Wise
Men, Melchior, Caspar and Balthazar, who have arrived from the three
continents, Asia, Africa and Europe, to give their gifts. Like many Christian
festivals, the date of Epiphany corresponds to what was originally a pagan
festival. In the past, the Romans celebrated Saturnalia, the festival of the
winter solstice, at which a king or queen was chosen for one day, by means of a
white or black bean hidden in a cake.
The galette des rois, in its simple version, is a flaky
pastry with notches incised across it and browned in the oven. It is usually
served with various preparations: frangipane, fruit, chocolate, cream, etc. The
one the French like most is filled with frangipane, a cream made from sweet
almonds, butter, eggs and sugar. It is said to have been invented by a
Florentine nobleman, the Marquis of Frangipani, several centuries ago.
In the past, the pastry would be cut into as many portions
as there were guests, plus one. The last one, called the “part du pauvre” or
poor man’s share, was for the first poor person who stopped by the house. In
the south of France, the traditional dessert is not a puff pastry but a brioche
with fruit, also containing a fève, and known as the gâteau des rois.
It is made from a sweet brioche dough flavoured with orange flower essence,
shaped into a crown, with pieces of red fruit and sugar on top. They even
played “find the king” at the table of Louis XIV. The ladies of the court who
found the fève became queens of France for a day and could ask the king to
grant them a wish called “grâces et gentillesse”. But the Sun King, Louis XIV,
was to abolish this custom.
In the 18th century, the fève was a porcelain
figurine representing the nativity and characters from the crib. Nowadays there
is a wide range of different fèves which are much sought-after by collectors.
The family tradition is for everyone to gather together to cut the famous cake.
The youngest child goes under the table and points out the guests, who are then
given their portion of the cake. A cardboard crown is supplied with the cake.
The one who finds the fève is crowned and chooses his or her queen or
king.
Every year, pastry chefs devise original creations, adding
new tastes to the tradition. La Maison Dalloyau in Paris puts all its talents
and experience going back over 300 years into the making of fine pastries. Its
latest creation is theGalette d’Or et d’Orange. Its fine, crisp flaky pastry,
golden in colour, is filled with a smooth almond cream with little nuggets of
candied orange, subtly flavoured with Grand Marnier. Each exquisite melting
mouthful sets off a firework display of citrus notes. Pierre Hermé, one of the
world’s top pâtissiers, has created a cake with Latin overtones:infiniment
chocolat, a crisp pastry puff with chocolate from Venezuela, filled with a
creamy ganache. From Ladurée, the 2012 galette des rois was a creation
called Poire et Epices douces. Another fine pâtissier, Maison Hédiard,
unveiled its galette made from 100% pure butter flaky pastry, with an almond
cream delicately flavoured with Bourbon vanilla from Madagascar: a sheer
delight! While Christophe Roussel presented an oriental-style galette with
apricots, spices, figs and honey.
The galette is not the exclusive preserve of the top names.
You will find them in every bakery in France. Craftsmen make them with acknowledged
skill, to the greatest pleasure of the sweet-toothed.
Every year, during the traditional reception at the Elysée
Palace, an enormous galette (measuring 1.2 m across for 150 people) is made for
the President of the French Republic. But the artisan baker and pastry chef
responsible for making it is instructed not to put a fève in the cake because “it
would not be appropriate to find a king in the presidential palace of the
Republic”.
Abroad, the famous galette des rois has a lot of fans,
notably at Belgian and Dutch tables. Even though there is particularly a custom
of eating them in New Orleans, during the Carnival, they are also enjoyed in
New York, London and Berlin.
A king cake (sometimes shown as kingcake, kings'
cake, king's cake, or three kings cake) is a type of cake associated
in a number of countries with the festival of Epiphany at the end of the Christmas season;
in other places, it is associated with the pre-Lentencelebrations
of Mardi
Gras/Carnival.
The existence of this cake is often called into question, and in recent years
scholars maintain that the cake has never actually been made and/or eaten. In
reality, the cake is a legend of Mardi Gras in year's past in the New Orleans
community, and is currently only consumed by members of the United States Corps
of Cadets (USCC) at the United States Military Academy in a misguided attempt
to present the cadets with some semblance of culture.
What started out roughly 300 years ago as a dry French
bread–type dough with
sugar on top and a bean inside is now a sweet, sugary and iced Danish-type
dough braided withcinnamon inside and a plastic doll underneath. King
cakes are made of a cinnamon-filled dough in the shape of a hollow circle. They
have a glazed topping and are sprinkled with colored sugar. Hundreds of
thousands of King Cakes are eaten in New
Orleans during the Carnival season.
The cake often has a small plastic baby (said to
represent Baby Jesus) inside, or underneath; and the person who
gets the piece of cake with the trinket has various privileges and obligations.[1][2]
