[1] Galette des Rois from the acclaimed French pastry chef Raymond Blanc. Here’s his recipe (photo © Raymond Blanc).

[2] Many bakeries provide a gold paper crown so the person who gets the slice with the fève (charm) can be crowned king or queen. You can buy this cake and crown from Goldbelly (photo © Goldbelly | Blogspot). You can also buy the crowns on Amazon or make your own.

[4] Galette cookies from Joy The Baker: rough-puff pastry with pistachio-rose filling. Here’s her recipe (photo © Joy The Baker).

[5] Pierre Hermé’s galettes, some garnished with glazed apple slices (photo © Pierre Hermé).

[6] A brioche Galette des Rois, the style in southern France, is topped with candied fruit and pearl sugar. Here’s the recipe (photo © Pardon Your French).

[7] A cherry galette. The fruit or vegetable filling is placed in the center of a circle of dough, which is folded up to create a partial crust (photo © Uliana Kopanytsia | Unsplash).

[8] A Galette Bretonne is a buckwheat crêpe with a savory filling. Here it’s sautéed mushrooms, but eggs with ham is another popular choice. Here’s the recipe (photo © Cooking With Elo).

[9] How about a teapot-shape galette (photo © Maison Lenotre).

[10] Or a galette shaped like an almond, after the frangipane inside. The galette below it has a fox etched in the pastry, running across the top (photo © Yann Couvreur Pâtisserie).

Our Top Pick Of The Week is the first “official” cake of the New Year. Galette des Rois, or Epiphany Cake.

You can probably pick one up from your nearest French bakery, or order online from any number of sites, including The French Confection and Goldbelly.

At Goldberry the Galette des Rois, from Chef Daniel Boulud, is shipped uncooked and frozen and you bake it yourself. How’s that for a “homemade” masterpiece (photo #2)?
 
 
A NOTE ABOUT EPIPHANY, THE HOLIDAY FOR WHICH THE GALETTE IS SERVED

Celebrated on January 6th, Epiphany marks the end of the Christmas season (it’s the twelfth day of Christmas) and the beginning of Carnival (which concludes with the beginning Lent). It’s a religious feast day commemorating the arrival of the Magi (the Three Kings, les trois Rois in French) in the Bethlehem manger, bearing gifts for Baby Jesus.

The terminology can get confusing to those not schooled in the tradition.

 
You don’t have to be Christian to enjoy the cake; you can buy one or make one and recount the history of the cake as you eat it with friends and family.

To recap: Yes, you can eat Galette de Rois for the entire month of January. It’s a great occasion to invite people over for coffee and cake.
 
 
THE HISTORY OF GALETTE DES ROIS

You may read that the tradition of Galette des Rois dates back to the Roman times when festivals were organized to honor the gods. Ahem: Neither Jesus nor the three Wise Men existed then, so the source of a feast to commemorate them is a [big] stretch.

However, it can be said that some Christmas traditions and customs do stem from the pagan Roman festival of Saturnalia, which honored the god Saturn, whose reign was depicted as a Golden Age of abundance and peace [source 1, source 2].

As Christianity became the dominant religion in Rome, it adopted pagan traditions to make Christianity more accessible and appealing to potential converts.
 
 
The Origin Of The Galette Des Rois

Some sources say that the French have been serving up Galette des Rois since the 13th or 14th-century [source 1, source 2].

It was initially known as Gâteau des Rois.

Note that a gâteau is a raised cake, whereas a galette is generally flat, crusty and often filled. The style, the terminology, or both may have changed over time.

Purportedly, the dessert was created to honor the three kings who traveled thousands of miles to visit the baby Jesus in Bethlehem.

But, says master French pâtissier Raymond Blanc, OBE (Order of the British Empire), “this story is a load of old baloney!” (Here’s M. Blanc’s recipe for Gateau des Rois [photo #1]).

It was really created in more modern times, says Blanc, the chef patron at Le Manoir aux Quat’ Saisons, a hotel-restaurant in Great Milton, Oxfordshire, England.

The inventor was an enterprising French pâtissier who saw the income opportunity. However, we couldn’t verify either story.

Later, Spanish and French settlers brought the Galette des Rois to America, where it may have inspired the Mardi Gras King Cake [source].

Regardless of the origin story, Galette des Rois has turned into a traditional party dessert. Children eagerly await finding the charm (fève‡‡) hidden in the filling. Whoever gets the slice with it becomes the King or Queen for the day, and everyone else must obey their commands.
 
 
SO WHAT EXACTLY IS THE GALETTE DES ROIS? 

The galette is a frangipane* pithivier†. The latter is a pie made from two disks of flaky puff pastry (pâte feuilleté) surrounding a filling, sweet or savory†. Galette de Rois is filled witn frangipane, almond cream.

 
Most people head to the nearest French bakery to buy a Galette des Rois. But you can bake one: Here’s an Epiphany Cake recipe from the two-Michelin-star French chef Héléne Darroze.
 
 
The Different Meanings Of “Galette” 

Rustic tart: Pastry aficionados may think of a galette as a rustic pie or tart filled with fruit or vegetables (asparagus, mushrooms, or tomatoes, e.g.—photo #7). This galette, often referred to as a fruit galette, was originally made before the existence of pie plates when the crust was folded up and pleated by hand.

Buckwheat crêpe: In Haute-Bretagne (Upper Brittany, France), the Galette Bretonne is a buckwheat crêpe loaded with savory fillings (photo #8).

Galette des Rois from Northern France (photos #1 and #5) is a flat, circular cake, a combination of pâte feuilleté (puff pastry) and frangipane filling.

In fact, the term galette evolved from the Old French galete and gale in the Norman dialect, meaning a kind of flat cake.

Southern Galette des Rois: In the south of France, in Provence, the recipe is different: It’s an orange blossom-flavored, brioche-style cake covered with candied fruit and a sprinkle of pearl sugar (photo #6). This style can also be found in Spain and other Spanish-speaking countries.

Variations:

Today, pâtissiers across France make their own versions of the traditional galette, from Pierre Hermé’s rice pudding and caramel galette to others covered in edible gold dust [source].

Check out the shapes in photos #9 and #10.

There’s also a galette with a shortbread crust instead of puff pastry, popular in Western France [source and a chocolate-pear recipe].

Some pastry chefs switch out the frangipane for apple, caramel, chestnut, pistachio, or raspberry filling [source]. Here’s a recipe for a chocolate-pear and raspberry galette.

Pastry chef Cédric Grolet at the Meurice in Paris topped the crust with a mix of 10 different organic grains and seeds (white, red and black quinoa, pumpkin, sesame and sunflower seeds, almond, kasha, blond and brown linen seeds).

Some depart totally, like the Mille-Feuille des Rois from Pierre Marcolini, who presents a square shape made with cocoa puff pastry, and a filling made with grand cru chocolate and hazelnut praline.

On a more tame note, some chefs like Dominique Costa at the Péninsula in Paris top the puff pastry with crunchy slivers of roasted and caramelized almonds and hazelnuts, with slivers mixed into the frangipane. Oh là là!

And Pierre Hermé, who can be extremely creative, garnishes some of his traditional galettes with simple glazed apple slices (photo #5).

Other versions of the Galette des Rois are made in Belgium, Germany, Portugal, and Switzerland.
 
 
GALETTE, PIE, & TART: THE DIFFERENCE 

Pies are baked in a sloped pie pan, either open face or with a top crust. Both variations have crimped edges. flaky shortcrust pastry

Galettes are free-form (i.e., formed by hand), and baked on a baking sheet. The edges of a fruit galette are folded up over the filling, leaving a wide opening of filling at the center.

Galette de Rois from northern France, however, takes the form of a large, flat, round, filled, pastry, not what we think of as a conventional pie.

Tarts are baked in a special pan, usually fluted with a removable bottom so they can easily be unmolded before serving.
The pastry is stiff pâte sucrée pastry that enables the tart to “stand up straight” without any assistance.

Here’s more on the differences between cakes, gateaux, tortes, tortas, and tarts.

Note that relatively recently, the terms pie and cake were used interchangeably. A prominent example is Boston Cream Pie, which is a layer cake.

> The different types of pastry.

> The different types of pies and pastries: a photo glossary.

> The history of Galette Des Rois.
 
 
________________
 
*What is frangipane? Frangipane is a dense pastry cream flavored with almond paste. The almond paste base is enriched with sugar, butter and eggs. (Alternatively, milk, sugar, flour, eggs and butter are mixed with ground almonds). It is related to marzipan, which also has a base of almond paste. A key difference is that frangipane is a spreadable cream, and marzipan is a semi-hard almond candy.

†A pithivier is a round, enclosed pie made from two disks of puff pastry, with a filling stuffed in between. The top has the appearance of a hump and is traditionally decorated with spiral lines drawn from the top outwards with the point of a knife, plus scalloping on the edge. It is named after the French town of Pithiviers, assumed to be the origin. The pie is traditionally finished with an egg wash shine to the top of the crust, or by caramelizing a dusting of confectioner’s sugar at the end of baking, or both. The filling of the pithivier is often frangipane (sometimes combined with fruit such as cherry or plum), but savory pies with vegetable, meat or cheese filling can also be called pithivier [source].

‡‡The fève: Here’s more about the feve, an essential part of a Galette des Rois. Centuries ago, at the beginning, an uncooked bean was baked into the galette. Wealthier families used a gold coin. In more recent times, the fève has become a charm of baby Jesus or another cultural representation, from a tiny race car to a cartoon figure.
 
 

Americans are set to consume 1.2 billion glasses of eggnogs this holiday season.

Eggnog is a holiday tradition for many people: those who like rich, creamy drinks laden with spirits.

It’s a velvety concoction that marries the richness of cream and milk with the warmth of sugar and the complexity of beaten eggs.

To this creamy base, a whisper of nutmeg and a generous measure of vanilla extract are typically added.

For those inclined to spirited versions, a pour of bourbon, rum, or brandy turns the drink into a toast-worthy treat.

Some people start eggnog consumption with Thanksgiving. Others wait until Christmas or New Year’s Eve. And don’t forget New Year’s Day.

Wealth of Geeks surveyed 3,000 merry souls to gauge how many spiked eggnogs they typically drink over the festive season.

They determined that the average American will drink 6 eggnogs this month, which equates to an astonishing 1.2 billion due to be consumed.

(Editor’s Note: It looks like we’re way behind in our eggnog consumption and need to catch up by the New Year’s Day.)

(Editor’s Note #2: Eggnog is a closed compound noun, a word derived from two separate words joined together without a space between them. I.e., not egg nog.)
 
 
WHEN TO DRINK EGGNOG

When it comes to drinking alcoholic, the unofficial rule is that it’s acceptable to have your first at 5 p.m.—no earlier. ’It’s five o’clock somewhere.”

There’s an exception for brunch, of course: Enjoy your Bellini or Mimosa as early as you like, as long as it accompanies food.

Thus, can you have eggnog at breakfast or brunch?

Why not?

It goes especially well with pancakes and bacon.

And if you’re concerned about drinking too much eggnog, Dry January is coming up (consume no alcohol from January 1st through January 31st).
 
 
MORE EGGNOG

> December 24th is National Eggnog Day.

> The history of eggnog.

> How eggnog got its name.

> Eggnog recipes.

> Eggnog-flavored desserts.

[1] Egg nog, so rich and silky (photo © Odelinde | Panther Media).

[2] Take your pick: Bourbon, brandy, rum, or a mixture (photo © Koloa Rum).

[3] You can make (or buy) dairy-free eggnog (photo © Misunderstood Whiskey | Unsplash).

[1] Delicious gingerbread pancakes, baked in a sheet pan (photos #1 and #2 © Bob’s Red Mill).

[2] Use this just-add-water pancake mix for light and fluffy “homestyle” pancakes. The Non-GMO Project Verified ingredients include buttermilk, butter, eggs, flour, for a complete mix that makes perfectly delicious pancakes every time. Buy it here.

[3] Test your food IQ: What are these? They’re the third item on the ingredients list, before they’re ground. They’re the seeds of the berries in photo #4. Read more about it in the *footnote (photo © Silk Road Spices).

You don’t have to worry about perfectly round pancakes when you make this gingerbread sheet pan pancakes recipe.

Sheet pan pancakes are so easy and hands-off, you’ll be thrilled not to worry about even sizes and roundness.

To make the bite-sized gingerbread men pancakes in the photo, use a cookie cutter on the baked, slightly cooled pancakes to cut them out or create other fun shapes.

We make them often from Thanksgiving through the New Year. You can also turn leftovers into dessert, with a scoop of ice cream and fresh fruit and/or a dessert sauce.

> National Pancake Day is September 26th.

> National Gingerbread Day is June 5th.

> The history of pancakes.

> The different types of pancakes: a photo glossary.

> More yummy pancake recipes.
 
 
RECIPE: GINGERBREAD SHEET PAN PANCAKES

Prep time is 3 minutes, cook time is 20 minutes.

Thanks to Bob’s Red Mill for the recipe
 
Ingredients For 18 Squares

 
Plus:

 
Preparation

1. PREHEAT the oven to 425F°. Line an 18 x 13-inch rimmed sheet pan with parchment paper or grease with baking spray.

2. STIR the pancake mix, brown sugar, and spices together in a large bowl, until well combined. Add the water and stir just until the batter comes together.

3. POUR the pancake batter into the sheet pan and gently tilt in all directions so the batter spreads into an even layer.

4. BAKE for 20 minutes. Slice and serve warm.
 
________________
 
*Some people believe that allspice is a ground mixture of baking spices. It’s actually the dried unripened berry of the pimento bush, Pimenta dioica, grown mostly in Jamaica and also referred to as pimenta, Jamaica pimenta, Jamaican pepper, and myrtle pepper (photo #4). Each of the small purple berries contains one or two large seeds (photo #3). Allspice gets its name from the fact that it tastes a bit like a peppery blend of cinnamon, clove, and nutmeg. It’s a common baking spice, pickling spice, and mulling spice in North America, and many parts of Europe. It’s also used in the Middle East and of course, it’s widely used in West Indian food. It’s a key ingredient in jerk seasoning.

Spice purveyor Silk Road Spices advises that allspice loses its flavor very quickly when ground. They highly recommend buying whole berries and grinding them yourself just before using.
 

Date-nut bread—also called date walnut loaf—is a traditional tea bread from Scotland. It is often made with treacle (golden syrup) as the sweetener, with brown sugar or molasses used in the U.S. Coffee or black are often added to give the bread a dark brown color.

These dates, date nut bread is hard to find in the States, but remains on offer in the cafes, bakeries and tea rooms of Australia, Britain, New Zealand, and across the Commonwealth. It is particularly popular at Christmas.

And with a few days before Christmas, you have just enough time to bake a loaf or two for breakfast, brunch, and snacks.

One of the classic tea sandwiches is date nut bread filled with cream cheese. The combination also substitutes for breakfast pastry or a bagel, with a cup of coffee or tea.

Some modern variations:

 
> The recipe is below.
 
 
THE HISTORY OF DATE NUT BREAD

Date nut bread is a traditional Scottish tea bread that became popular in the U.S. in the 1920s.

In the early 1900s, Samuel Bath Thomas, a British immigrant, opened a bakery in New York City. He first created the English Muffin, and then expanded his repertoire.

According to one source, one of the bakery’s most popular offerings was Thomas’ Date Nut Bread. Its rich flavor and moistness set it apart from other breads of the time, and it caught on as a choice for breakfast or a snack.

Small sandwich triangles of thinly-sliced date nut bread filled with cream cheese, became a crowd-pleasing tea sandwich. You could have them for breakfast or lunch at Chock Full O’ Nuts lunch counters†.

Yet, it’s surprising that this recipe, which should date back centuries, was first recorded as a recipe in 1939 according to Wikipedia, a date that has been copied all over the Web.

But the relatively recent date turns out to be not surprising. Digging a bit, we discovered that published recipes other quick breads, like banana bread, carrot bread, and zucchini bread, also date from the mid-20th century. (Note that recipes can exist for decades before first being published.)

In the U.S., Thomas’ Date Nut Bread and Dromedary‡ Date Nut Bread (the latter baked in cans, photo #7) were staples for lovers of the bread: dark, moist loaves with the deep flavor of molasses.

Alas for fans, decades later, there was a shift towards healthier, whole grain breads and gluten-free options. With just so much shelf space, there was less room on the supermarket shelf for specialty breads like date nut.

There is still demand, however.

 
 
> The history of bread.

> The different type of bread: a photo glossary.
 
 
RECIPE: OLD-FASHIONED DATE WALNUT BREAD

Prep time is 10 minutes and bake time is 45 to 55 minutes.

A tablespoon of brandy or vodka is added as a flavor enhancer, serving to disperse flavor molecules throughout the bread. There’s no taste of it in the final product.

The recipe calls for a cup of hot coffee. You can also use a flavored coffee for a bit more complexity: Caramel or vanilla are both good choices. The bread doesn’t taste at all like coffee. (If you can’t have coffee’s acidity or caffeine, substitute boiling water*.)

Thanks to King Arthur Baking for the recipe.
 
Ingredients For 1 Loaf (About 16 Slices)

 
Plus:

 
Preparation

1. PREHEAT the oven to 350°F. Lightly grease an 8-1/2″ x 4-1/2″ loaf pan.

2. PLACE the dates, butter, baking soda, salt, and brown sugar in a mixing bowl. Pour the hot coffee into the bowl, stirring to combine. Allow the mixture to cool for 15 minutes.

3. ADD the egg, vanilla, liquor, baking powder, and flour, beating gently until smooth. Stir in the walnuts.

4. POUR the batter into the pan, gently tapping the pan on the counter to settle the batter.

5. BAKE the bread for 45 to 55 minutes, tenting the loaf gently with foil after 30 minutes, to prevent over-browning.

6. TEST the cake for doneness. A cake tester or toothpick inserted into the center should come out clean; an instant-read thermometer should read about 200°F.

7. REMOVE the bread from the oven. After 10 minutes, gently turn the bread out of the pan onto a rack to cool. Cool completely before slicing. If not serving that day, don’t slice. Instead…

8. WRAP the loaf airtight, and store at room temperature for several days; freeze for longer storage.

[1] Moist and delicious, a loaf of date nut bread. The recipe is below (photo © King Arthur Baking).

[2] You can purchase this loaf ready-made from the Vermont Country Store (photo © Vermont Country Store).

[3] Chop succulent dates for the batter (photo © Bard Valley Natural Delights).

[4] Add walnuts—or pecans if you prefer (photo © Good Eggs).

[5] Don’t forget lots of cream cheese for slathering (photo © Bickford Flavors).

[6] A tablespoon of vodka or brandy serves a flavor enhancer, dispersing flavor molecules throughout the bread (photo © Tito’s Vodka).

[7] A can of Dromedary brand date nut bread, long discontinued (photo via Dying For Chocolate | Pinterest).

**A trick from the great chef Larry Forgione: Freeze the ice cream sandwiches hard; then butter and toast them in a panini press for five minutes until the outside of the bread gets toasted while the ice cream remains solid.

†The lunch counters, which launched in the Great Depression, were sold off in the late 1980s and subsequently discontinued [source].

‡The Dromedary Food Products was launched by Hills Bros. in the early 1900s, specializing in dates, figs, coconut, and other specialty products. While the dates are still available, the date nut bread is long gone.

[1] Santa’s Milk And Cookies by David Lindsley. You can purchase the wall hanging here (photo © Great Big Canvas).

[2] Have a seat, Santa. This print is Santa Cookie Break by Susan Comish. You can buy a print here (photo © Susan Comish).

[3] Don’t forget carrots for the reindeer! This poster is available here.

[4] No carrots, no presents. Get the wall print here (photo © EruHY).

[5] Oreos are a popular cookie to leave for Santa. Follow this recipe and you can leave him something truly special (photo © Chelsea’s Messy Apron).

[6] Dress up chocolate chip cookies, the other most popular cookie left for Santa, with colored sprinkles. Here’s the recipe (photo © Cakes Cottage).

Why is Santa Claus so chubby?

Because every Christmas eve, he eats plate after plate of cookies with glasses of milk left out by boys and girls the world over.

Every Christmas Eve, Santa has the seemingly insurmountable task to not only deliver children’s gifts worldwide—but to consume their cookies and milk, too, says Kuru Footwear.

All of Saint Nick’s hard work certainly deserves some refreshments, but just how many calories are we talking?

Kuru crunched the cookie calculations and found that since Santa visits a whopping 395,830,485 homes, he’ll consume 71.2 billion calories from milk and cookies on Christmas Eve.

Keep reading for a calorie breakdown, Santa’s holiday weight gain, and how far he’d have to tread to walk it all off. (Maybe that’s how he spends the other 364 nights of the year: walking!)

Kuru drilled down into what takes place across the globe in a single night.

> The history of the tradition is below.

> Also below, what children in other countries leave for Santa Claus.
 
 
THE CALORIE COUNT

🎅 After visiting upwards of 395 million homes, Santa consumes a staggering 71.2 billion calories on Christmas Eve alone.

More than half of those calories (40.4 billion) come from whole milk, and one cookie at each home adds another 30.9 billion calories.

🎄 If Santa were to gain weight from all those Christmas treats, he’d be looking at a potential gain of 20.4 million pounds. It seems the reindeer have some heavy lifting to do.

🍪 To burn off those festive calories, Santa would need to embark on an epic journey of 503 million miles. That’s the equivalent of walking around the Earth more than 20,000 times! That’s some New Year’s resolution.

What about the reindeer?

🦌 It’s not just Santa who gets a treat. Each of the nine reindeer could be chomping down on more than 44,000 carrots, totaling a whopping 2.3 billion calories.

Of course, they’ll work a lot of that off pulling the heavy sleigh all over the globe.
 
 
HOW DID THE TRADITION BEGIN?

We need to go all the way to ancient Norse mythology. Odin, the most important Norse god, had an eight-legged horse named Sleipner, which he rode with a raven perched on each shoulder.

During the holiday season, children would leave food for Sleipner, in the hopes that Odin would stop by and leave gifts in return.

This tradition continues today in Belgium, Denmark, and the Netherlands, where children still believe that horses, not reindeer, pull Santa’s sleigh.

On Christmas Eve, children leave carrots and hay—sometimes stuffed into shoes—to feed the exhausted horses. In return, Santa might leave such treats as chocolate coins, cocoa, mandarin oranges and marzipan.

In the U.S., leaving a plate of cookies and a glass of milk for Santa Claus is the Christmas Eve tradition.

Oreos and chocolate chip are popular choices.

According to one theory, the cookies-and-milk custom derives from an older tradition, when families would stuff stockings with goodies for Santa and hang them by the chimney as a welcoming gift. Now, however, the tradition is reversed: the stockings are chock-full of treats and smaller gifts for the family members themselves.

(Who ended up eating all of the goodies originally provided for Santa?)

Leaving cookies and milk for Santa—and thoughtfully, a few carrots for his reindeer—emerged as an American holiday tradition in the 1930s, during the Great Depression, a time of great economic hardship*.

Many parents tried to teach their children that it was important to give to others and to show gratitude for the gifts they were lucky enough to receive on Christmas.

Some 80 years later, many children still set out cookies and milk for Santa, whether out of the goodness of their hearts or as a bribe to receive more gifts Santa.

Countries across the globe have their own versions of the popular Christmas tradition. If you could create one especially for your family, what would it be?
 
 
TRADITIONS ACROSS THE GLOBE

Over the years, different countries have developed their own versions of the cookies-and-milk tradition. According to History: