The holidays are all about food. The month between Thanksgiving and Christmas is by far the most gluttonous in America, and while most of us bookend the season with a pair of large, greasy fowl, others partake of different foods and traditions, all of them imbued with historical and cultural significance. As we at Urban Oyster are gearing up for our own holiday celebration – this Sunday will be the first of our two special Christmas tours of Most Holy Trinity-St. Mary’s Church (get your tickets here) – I thought that we would write a few blog entries about different holiday foods and celebrations. From Scandinavia to the Caribbean to the American Midwest, we will share recipes and traditions that may be unfamiliar, but hopefully they will be tasty and will enliven your own holiday celebrations.
On Monday, December 13, I received an email from my sister. Contained within was a photo of my nieces, Catherine and Annika (pictured above), decked out in white robes and crowns made of plastic evergreens; Catherine, the eldest, had five electric candles atop her head. I had forgotten that it was St. Lucia Day.
On Monday, December 13, I received an email from my sister. Contained within was a photo of my nieces, Catherine and Annika (pictured above), decked out in white robes and crowns made of plastic evergreens; Catherine, the eldest, had five electric candles atop her head. I had forgotten that it was St. Lucia Day.
I'll pass on dessert.
For those of you who don’t regularly venerate saints on their feast days, or are unfamiliar with the folk traditions of Sweden, Monday was probably not a very significant day. But being vaguely Swedish (one-quarter to be exact), the holiday has been intermittently celebrated in my family since I was a kid. Like the feast of St. Nicholas and the winter solstice, St. Lucia Day is a December holiday that has many traditions and rituals wrapped up with Christmas (and vice versa). It has been widely celebrated in Sweden since the 1700‘s – the centerpiece of the holiday is when revelers process through the streets carrying candles, led by a girl in a white robe and a crown of candles, usually the eldest daughter of the family. My sister has embraced it mostly heartily in my family, I think in part because she has kids who fit the part. Though Catherine and Annika have their Swedish blood even more diluted by their Anglo-Irish father, their impossibly blonde locks would shoot them to the front of any St. Lucia Day procession in Stockholm.
The saint and the feast day are closely associated with Sweden, but Lucia is neither Swedish nor the country’s patron. Though the holiday is enjoyed by children, like most saints, the biography of St. Lucia is much too ghastly for young ears. A Christian living in the city of Syracuse in Sicily in the early fourth century AD, Lucia (or Lucy) was betrothed to a rich pagan man, but she rejected him and had her dowry disbursed to the poor. Upon hearing this, he denounced her as a Christian (which was then a crime), and she was tortured and executed, but not before a series of miracles prolonged her martyrdom, like when she continued to speak after he throat was slashed, and when the flame that was meant to burn her alive kept going out. Eventually her executioners became so exasperated that they just stabbed her to death. Lucy is often depicted holding a plate or cup containing her eyes, which were gouged out before her death.
The saint and the feast day are closely associated with Sweden, but Lucia is neither Swedish nor the country’s patron. Though the holiday is enjoyed by children, like most saints, the biography of St. Lucia is much too ghastly for young ears. A Christian living in the city of Syracuse in Sicily in the early fourth century AD, Lucia (or Lucy) was betrothed to a rich pagan man, but she rejected him and had her dowry disbursed to the poor. Upon hearing this, he denounced her as a Christian (which was then a crime), and she was tortured and executed, but not before a series of miracles prolonged her martyrdom, like when she continued to speak after he throat was slashed, and when the flame that was meant to burn her alive kept going out. Eventually her executioners became so exasperated that they just stabbed her to death. Lucy is often depicted holding a plate or cup containing her eyes, which were gouged out before her death.
Thankfully, none of these gory details are part of the holiday’s celebration. I wanted to mark the day myself, but since there are no St. Lucia Day processions to be found in Brooklyn, and Cindy had no interest in donning a crown of plastic candles (or real ones for that matter – hair catching on fire was a common problem in Sweden before the advent of electric light bulbs), I decided to celebrate by baking the traditional food of the holiday, Lussekatter, a sweet bun made with saffron.
I went online and found a recipe, and I was lucky to discover that I had all of the ingredients in my kitchen already. I borrowed the recipe from this article on About.com, so I’ll just direct you there. The buns turned out pretty well, as you can see – they’re not very sweet, but I would warn you about the saffron. I didn’t think it was possible to put too much saffron in something. I mean, it’s the world’s most expensive spice, it makes all foods delicious, and even the tiniest amount turns everything a deep, rich yellow color. But if you’re not used to that flavor in your desserts, go easy, using just enough to turn your batter mixture yellow, not deep orange, as I did.
Once the dough is kneaded and ready, you can form the buns into shapes. We stuck with the traditional “S”, which, though not unique to Sweden, does have special significance there. Scandinavia was the home of Vikings and Norse gods and all manner of nasty pagan things that Christianity has tried to stamp out, but they have now become integral to modern Christmas celebrations. Lussekatter are no exception – the traditional “S” shape was likely handed down from earlier pastries baked to celebrate Yule, the pagan solstice holiday. The cakes were also common treats on St. Nicholas Day, but Lutheran reformers stamped out the holiday in the 16th century (they considered the veneration of saints polytheistic heresy). The buns came back two centuries later when the reformist zeal died down and the veneration of different saint – St. Lucia – became popular.
I went online and found a recipe, and I was lucky to discover that I had all of the ingredients in my kitchen already. I borrowed the recipe from this article on About.com, so I’ll just direct you there. The buns turned out pretty well, as you can see – they’re not very sweet, but I would warn you about the saffron. I didn’t think it was possible to put too much saffron in something. I mean, it’s the world’s most expensive spice, it makes all foods delicious, and even the tiniest amount turns everything a deep, rich yellow color. But if you’re not used to that flavor in your desserts, go easy, using just enough to turn your batter mixture yellow, not deep orange, as I did.
Once the dough is kneaded and ready, you can form the buns into shapes. We stuck with the traditional “S”, which, though not unique to Sweden, does have special significance there. Scandinavia was the home of Vikings and Norse gods and all manner of nasty pagan things that Christianity has tried to stamp out, but they have now become integral to modern Christmas celebrations. Lussekatter are no exception – the traditional “S” shape was likely handed down from earlier pastries baked to celebrate Yule, the pagan solstice holiday. The cakes were also common treats on St. Nicholas Day, but Lutheran reformers stamped out the holiday in the 16th century (they considered the veneration of saints polytheistic heresy). The buns came back two centuries later when the reformist zeal died down and the veneration of different saint – St. Lucia – became popular.
Past 'official' St. Lucias of Stockholm/burn victims.
Saints and desserts seem to go hand in hand. The Lussekatter has had a rather circuitous path to its place today as the official dish of the feast day, but another Sicilian martyr has a much more evocative namesake dessert. Earlier in life, Lucia had prayed to St. Agatha to heal her mother’s illness (it worked); Agatha had been killed 50 years earlier, also for her faith and her rejection of a powerful suitor. One of the many tortures she endured was having her breasts cut off, and like Lucia, Agatha is also portrayed carrying her dismembered organs on a plate. While we don’t remember Lucia’s sacrifice with eyeball soup (though the raisins in the Lussekatter could resemble eyes) or some other ocular-themed dish, in honor of Agatha, Sicilians eat a dessert called Cassatella di Sant’Agata, also known as Minni di Vergini (literally “virgin breasts"). It is a small cake with a cherry in the middle that looks remarkably like a breast.
So, you don’t have to be Swedish to celebrate St. Lucia Day, and you certainly don’t have to be Christian to enjoy some Lussekatter. If you do decide to share this tradition with your family, you might want to leave out the story of the eye-gouging and the burning at the stake and just stick to the pastries.
So, you don’t have to be Swedish to celebrate St. Lucia Day, and you certainly don’t have to be Christian to enjoy some Lussekatter. If you do decide to share this tradition with your family, you might want to leave out the story of the eye-gouging and the burning at the stake and just stick to the pastries.
An unsurprisingly Italian dessert.
If you have any comments, questions or suggestions for other traditional holiday cuisine, please leave a comment or contact Andrew Gustafson (andrewg@urbanoyster.com). And don't forget to buy your tickets for our Holiday Church Tour of Most Holy Trinity-St. Mary's, December 19 and January 6. All proceeds with benefit the Trinity Human Service Center.