Which are the traditional Christmas cookies?

2022. 12. 13.

Christmas cookies and their variations

That's why we brought you the most popular Christmas sweets, which you wouldn't even guess are full of symbols and have an interesting history. Knowing all this, we look at luca scones or Christmas gingerbread a little differently. This way, you can celebrate Christmas by continuing the tradition, whether you bake the original cookie or use the key ingredients to create other, similar cookies.

Luca day scone

The Christmas season begins with the first Sunday of Advent. From then on, many rituals, predictions, and folk superstitions surround the days leading up to Christmas. One of the best-known such customs is Luca day. This is when they start sculpting the Luca chair, which should be ready by Christmas Eve. But there are many other rituals and superstitions associated with this day. Because the beliefs associated with the winter solstice make December 13th popular. That is why many customs related to witches are typical on this day, but fertility predictions, love predictions, and of course weather predictions are also typical on this day.

The Luca scone is a type of fertility prediction that was customary in the Alföld. Coins were baked into the dough of some scones, and whoever bit into such a scone was predicted to have a lot of money for the coming year.

If you want to make Luca scones, choose a recipe made with ingredients similar to this, because the essence of scones is to be made from lard: 50 dkg flour, 20 dkg lard, 5 dkg cheese, 2 dl sour cream, 1 egg, 1 packet of baking powder, 1 teaspoon salt .

Why? Because this is the time of the year when there was a lot of lard in the houses after the pig slaughters, and therefore a lot of lard was added to Luca scones made in December. Of course, as we mentioned, the variation of recipes means the continuity of traditions rather than their disappearance. Therefore, feel free to replace the ingredients of the scone with healthier ingredients. But it's worth tasting the original at least once!

An egg separator can come in handy for baking, a flour sifter for preparing the flour, and we can recommend a professional non-stick tray for baking, which was originally manufactured for bakers and confectioners!

Poppy seed and walnut bejgli

It's not Christmas without bejglies. But where does this sweet come from? It's hard to predict. As we have already mentioned with the Easter cake, this type of sweet was born all over Europe by reinterpreting bread dough, which eventually became the festive, sweet dessert version of bread and the ancestor of the cake. Many claim that the bejgli has a history that goes back to the Middle Ages. Some derive it from Armenia, others from Silesia. It is also related to Bratislava kifli, which was also filled with poppy seeds or walnuts.

Bejgli filling

In the case of Christmas sweets, the filling typically receives a lot of attention. It's no different with the bejgli. We have arrived at Christmas superstitions, again. Believe it or not, no matter how fashionable chocolate or chestnut-filled bejglies are, they must be made with the traditional fillings of milk or nuts. Because in popular belief, the poppy means abundance. Since it is small-eyed and there are many of them, it produces many tiny seeds, so it symbolizes the abundance of coins. The poppy belongs to the ranks of Christmas superstitions and those that are almost inseparable from it at the end of the year and at the beginning of the new year. If we eat a lot of poppy seeds and poppy seed cakes at this time of the year, we will have an abundant year next year.

What about walnuts? The walnut was effective against spoilage, so it was considered a lucky plant. Nuts were also an important ingredient for the sweets of the Christmas holiday circle, rather because of the foundation of the next year.

We believe that if you want to follow tradition and innovate at the same time, or create new family habits, by customizing the traditions of the past, you can make something new from the basic ingredients of traditional Christmas cakes, which is still something old. If you use walnuts and poppy seeds, it can't be that bad, can it? If you decide to listen to us, we recommend using an electric nutcracker, which will make preparing for Christmas much, much easier and more enjoyable!

If you find the origin of Christmas cakes and food exciting, then keep an eye on our blog, because we will continue this topic!