Emily in France 🇫🇷 Holidays in Lockdown
I used to be obsessed with holidays.
To be fair, I come from a pretty holiday-obsessed household. My mother's favorite is Thanksgiving, for which she has no shortage of turkey-shaped dishes, butter plates, and cheese knives, but come Black Friday, we forewent shopping in favor of CHRISTMASSING IT UP. (We have more decorations than space, but damn it if we're not gonna use as many as we can.)
Halloween costumes were planned out in August (this Manhattanite trick-or-treated down the fire stairs, FYI), and the Easter Bunny hid eggs and chocolates in the (usually-company-only) living room or on my grandmother's lawn in Queens, depending on the year. My father, meanwhile, championed Valentine's Day, not just for my mom, but also for each of his four children.
While my family certainly pulls out all the stops, I know we're not unique, as I'm reminded any time I return to the States, only to be bombarded through the aisles of my local Duane Reade with seasonally appropriate (or *slightly* premature) music, chocolates, decorations, greeting cards, and Reese's cups.
Holidays are just not as big of a deal in France.
Christmas music lazily takes root in the aisles of the local Franprix sometime in early December; Advent calendars are plentiful, but nowhere are the seasonally-appropriate colored M&Ms for each of the major (and minor) holidays; nowhere are the mall Santas and holiday-centric made-for-TV-movies. The holidays exist, of course... they're just more... subdued. And far more food-focused.
Which brings me to today: Chandeleur.
While today, Americans look to a groundhog to tell us how much longer winter will last, in France, February 2 is devoted to crêpes – a tradition rooted in the Catholic feast of Candlemas that has since become far more secular. To me, it's emblematic of the French attitude towards holidays. No pomp and circumstance: just dinner and (even more important) dessert.
Things I'm Writing
1. From the archives: here's a guide to celebrating Candlemas the French way (including a tradition that may bring you luck and fortune in 2021... we can hope, can't we?) for Devour.
2. Technically, spaghetti and meatballs is bad grammar. Discover the weird, unspoken rules of what makes a meal for Atlas Obscura.
3. From the archives: intermittent fasting is all the rage; discover five common myths about this popular practice for Organic Authority.
Things I'm Reading
1. Given the weather in the northeast, it seems only appropriate to dive into the second of Ali Smith's seasonal quartet: Winter.
2. One French farmer has uncovered a way to produce goat cheese without forcing the ewes to fall pregnant each year, in Modern Farmer.
3. An intriguing study of the ideal relationship to the truth, in the Atlantic.
A bientôt !