Epiphany

As stated before, we got a bit into the Epiphany spirit at the end of the Christmas vacation. I always learned that the Christmas period officially continues until January 6th with Epiphany. So no way a Christmas tree can ever be taken down before that date! 

In Belgium 3 King's Day or Ephipany used to be quite Children's tradition to celebrate. Children would hit the street in trio's , dressed up as the 3 kings with a big star to ring the doorbells to sing and get candy. I must say I never did it as a child and I regretted that a bit, but my parents waren't to much a fan of me "begging" at doors and I had no accompanying friends. 

I don't see many children walking the streets anymore on Jan 6th but Kabouter went singing with his class and his newly built star. I noticed car drivers were grinning broadly to us when they saw us walking the street with his star.

There is another tradition on Epiphany which is the 3 king's cake with a hidden bean. It is actually linked with the 3 king's singing because the finder of the bean it the cake, gets the crown and can be the black king.  Those cakes become quite mainstream now in the supermarkets so Kabouter had some of them previous years and happened to get the bean twice already. So he is quite a fan and had great expectations to try again. 

I remember getting such a cake once in my childhood when visiting friends from my mother's.  I won the bean and crown but only found out later on that the cake was marked so they could manipulate who'd get the winning piece. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a manipulating mark at modern ephiphany cakes. 

When we went to visit for New Year at my in-laws, there was a 3 king's cake from my brother-in-law's bakery.  I was the lucky one to find the figure representing the bean and I wore my crown with pride.

Obviously Epiphany is only on January 6th, so Jan had also bought a cake for Monday night.  Both children tested the crown with eagerness and did their best to eat the cake (because in fact they don't like it!).  Sure enough it was Kabouter oncer again who found the hidden gem on his plate, which led to great disappointment with the tired Beertje. Poor little fellow. But Kabouter is a nice big brother who gave away his crown on the condition he could keep the bean.  With that compromise we could settle the evening with no further tears.  And I hope I can manipulate somehow next year's cake so Beertje can get his first winning piece for once.