Once again, I’m ashamed to say that I was in my late twenties before I ever even know this holiday existed (commemorating the day when the three kings presented their gifts to the baby Jesus). Here’s how they celebrate it here.
You knew it. You knew there had to be one. You were right; they have a special pastry. Every holiday here seems to have its own special pastry and this is not exception. It is a ring of buns, one of which contains small plastic kings. If you get that roll, you win a crown and the right to tell everyone what to do for the rest of the day. Carolers dressed as three kings also roam the streets singing (known as Star Singing).
Who doesn’t love a great loaf of bread? Before we moved, we would sometimes go to our neighborhood’s French bakery and buy a nice loaf of fresh bread.
Since we moved, we have been buying great bread at local patisseries. It is made fresh each morning and we buy a loaf to eat over the next 2-3 days while while it is still fresh. Ymmmm. This is dangerous because you have to go there several times a week (only a block away). When it’s no longer really fresh, we feed it to the ducks on Lake Geneva (except for when our niece visited when we bought loaves to feed to them).
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