Europe Section
After learning about Dragon Boat festival in China and thanksgiving in western world, let me introduce you some festival traditions of other countries.
Epiphany Festival
In France, after Christmas, every child must be expecting the coming of another festival—the Epiphany, which is on the January 6th of each year. In France, during the Epiphany, every family will make or buy one large Galette Des Rois, which is also known as the King’s cake.
Different from other cakes, the King’s cake remains people of the old tale of three kings in traditional Christian religion. Also in the past, during the Epiphany, the king will send cakes to people and levy no tax on people that day. Although there is no king in France now, people still keep the tradition of Epiphany; the only difference is that now people can make their own king’s cakes rather than get them from the real king.
The king’s cakes have many different versions in many Christian countries. Within France, there are two types of king’s cakes. In the cities of Northern France, like Paris, the king’s cake is giant and has circular shape or rectangular shape. It has a hard layer and a dense center of frangipane. It looks normal but taste very good.
Since people in the Southern part of France have more interests in cooking, the king’s cake in Southern France is much more decorative and tasty. It is made of eggs, different kind of wheat and sugar. Different from the ordinary rectangular king’s cake in the north, people in the south make the king’s cake circular and empty in the middle, which is similar to the crown of the king. Creative southerners also add fruits to the top of king’s cake and make them look like the beautiful jewelry on king’s crown.
There is also a tradition when making king’s cake: the cook always add one trinket in the king’s cake. The person whose slice of cake contains the trinket will become “king of the day” and also have to be the host of next Epiphany. In France, the trinket is usually a fava bean. In each family, the youngest member has the responsibility to cut the cake and to deliver them to other family members. During this process, the eye of the youngest child must be covered, so everyone has the same chance to get the cake that contains the trinket.