La rentrée today – back to school. The children were desperately hoping for a blizzard to blow up, so they’d be snowed in at home. It looked like happening a few days ago but the forecast now is just for cold and overcast today, so they were doomed. It was a shock for us all this morning. A dreaded 6am start for Benj, Caiti and I to get to the lycée coach bus-stop for 6.45am, and then getting Rors out of bed at 7am. Still, only five weeks till the next set of holidays so there’s light at the end of the tunnel.
Term ended in disarray before Christmas because of the snow. Caits was already home sick, but the two boys missed their last day. Rors had presents ready for his teacher, beloved dinner lady, classroom assistant and one of the bus drivers. He’s not that fussed about handing them out anymore. The Christmas spirit has gone!
It was the Feast of Epiphany yesterday (Sunday 3rd January). In France it’s held on the Sunday closest to the 6th January. So I made a galette des rois for tea. This is a delicious pie made from puff pastry with a frangipan filling. It also conceals a ‘feve’ – literally a bean, but in actuality a ceramic figure. The person who gets the feve will have luck all year, or so the belief is. The correct way to serve up the pie is to put the youngest family member under the table! He or she then dictates who will get which slice of pie as it is cut. We haven’t actually tried that out ourselves. Rors prefers to keep his gimlet eye on the proceedings so he can suss out which slice has the feve. He’s not a great one for leaving things to chance. I posted a ‘how-to’ project on making a Twelfth Night Cake at http://www.cutoutandkeep.net/projects/search?q=twelfth+night+pie&x=8&y=10 so do check that out.
Tags: epiphany, galette des rois