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luce-neidert
Community Member

Galette time is back

I don't know about your country, but here in France, January 6th means it's time for "la Galette des Rois". Any opportunity to share this delicious galette with family or friends is a an opportunity to put on weight. This year, I'm particularly blessed:

 

. we had a guest last Sunday, and had galette for desert.

. this afternoon, I'm having galette with my neighbours.

. this evening, I'm having galette with an association.

. next Tuesday, I'm having galette with another association.

Galette is full of butter, I'm starting to get seriously worried about these conventional extra grams. Anyone here facing the same kind of delicious torture?

Galette-des-Rois.jpg

 

 

 

 

19 REPLIES 19
versailles
Community Member

January 6th? I thought It was the whole month. I'm doing la galette whenever I can during January.

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"Where darkness shines like dazzling light"   —William Ashbless

Luce, the solution is easy. Walk to where you are feasting on the next galette.  You can eat all you want this way.   -:)

We don't do  gallette, per se (except for one magnificent bakery in New Orleans) but we do have King Cake from January 6 until Ash Wednesday.  There is a small plastic king hidden in the king cake (which is brioche with or without filling and Mardi Gras colored frosting).  Whoever gets the king is supposed to buy the next King Cake.  It can get out of control in some office and some firms limit King Cakes to Fridays only.King cake.jpg

Mary, the colored frosting looks deadful! What on earth is it made of? How about the decorations, what are they?

 

Guess what, in Toulouse (South of France), where my son lives, they have a similar way of deciding who is to buy the next galette. The galette comes with a "fève". Well, my son found out the hard way that if you bring a galette to your office, you'll end up eating galette day after day as whoever gets the fève has to buy a galette. The rule of Fridays only doesn't seem to exist. My son told me that in his company one group had galette every work day for a whole month.

Luce - The frosting is pretty awful - just sugar.  I prefer King Cakes with just sugar sprinkles.  The "decorations" are Mardi Gras beads which are thrown from the floats at all the many MG parades.  Not edible.  The dough is a slightly sweet brioche.  In recent years, they have begun braiding the dough with various fillings - raspberry, cream cheese, even chocolate.  My favorite is just cinnamon.

 

And Mardi Gras isn't until early March this year so there are weeks of calories to look forward to.


@Mary W wrote:

Luce - The frosting is pretty awful - just sugar.  I prefer King Cakes with just sugar sprinkles.  The "decorations" are Mardi Gras beads which are thrown from the floats at all the many MG parades.  Not edible.  The dough is a slightly sweet brioche.  In recent years, they have begun braiding the dough with various fillings - raspberry, cream cheese, even chocolate.  My favorite is just cinnamon.

 

And Mardi Gras isn't until early March this year so there are weeks of calories to look forward to.


Mary, thanks for this mine of information! I guess your cake is the descendant of the version of the Galette des Rois you have in the South of France. I've never seen it, but from what my son has told me, it must be like that:

 

CouronneRois.jpg 

 

There are fancier versions too, like this one:

 

Gâteau-des-rois.jpg 

 

Anyway, they all have in common that they must make you gain weigh!

I had one at a dinner party the other night (not the 6th) which had a very undelicious filling and to add insult to injury no king, but a (bad - very bad) replica of Johnny Halliday...

 

ETA: Oops - I meant a piece, and I didn't go back for seconds.  


@Nichola L wrote:

I had one at a dinner party the other night (not the 6th) which had a very undelicious filling and to add insult to injury no king, but a (bad - very bad) replica of Johnny Halliday...

 

ETA: Oops - I meant a piece, and I didn't go back for seconds.  


Never heard of a Johnny Halliday fève before. That must have been a terrible shock!

gilbert-phyllis
Community Member

Goodness, gracious! If this is going to go on until Mardi Gras, I'm gonna have to find a drool shield for my keyboard. (I've instituted my annual post-holiday embargo on sweets in the house--no choice, since I have the impulse control of a 2-year old--so this thread is especially torturous!)


@Phyllis G wrote:

Goodness, gracious! If this is going to go on until Mardi Gras, I'm gonna have to find a drool shield for my keyboard. (I've instituted my annual post-holiday embargo on sweets in the house--no choice, since I have the impulse control of a 2-year old--so this thread is especially torturous!)


 Phyllys, yesterday, for the first time in my life, I had Galette des Rois twice in the same day. I survived the delicious side of the torture, but you can imagine how I felt in the evening... 

My son brought a King Cake home yesterday.  "Mississippi Mud" - chocolate ganache and pecans.  I hope the calories fell out when I cut it.

DIY version, for smaller scale, lower budget Epiphanies (it seems like it could be just as fattening, except for the engery exerted):

https://www.davidlebovitz.com/galette-des-rois-kings-cake-recipe/


Looks delicious! Have you tried making one? I have yeas ago, but with so many wonderful bakeries around it's easier to just buy them.

  


Luce N wrote:

Looks delicious! Have you tried making one? I have yeas ago, but with so many wonderful bakeries around it's easier to just buy them.

  


I haven't tried it yet, but judging by the instructions, it doesn't seem that difficult (especially if I could track down some readymade, all-butter puff pastry, which might be a bigger job than simply finding an unclaimed galette). But DL is a trained pastry chef and they make everything look like a piece of cake. 🙂 

I have more experience with the recipes from his book on ice cream. Eating homemade strawberry ice cream is the June version of a culinary epiphany.  


Homemade strawberry ice cream sounds like a nice June epiphany.

 

Readymade, all-butter puff pastry? I must be dumb, or extremely French, or maybe both:  this had never even crossed my mind. What an heresy!  Smiley Happy

It may be heretical but we can buy pretty good frozen puff pastry at the grocery store in the US.


Mary W wrote:

It may be heretical but we can buy pretty good frozen puff pastry at the grocery store in the US.


 Mary please! How can you say such a thing! I'm sure frozen puff pastry tastes as terrible as it sounds. 


Luce N wrote:

Homemade strawberry ice cream sounds like a nice June epiphany.

 

Readymade, all-butter puff pastry? I must be dumb, or extremely French, or maybe both:  this had never even crossed my mind. What an heresy!  Smiley Happy


 Heretical? Possibly. But I am finally coming around to the idea of making my life easier. If no one notices the difference, I can't see the harm. I also have a strangely arranged kitchen due to some not-so-well-conceived renovation approaches that were applied to my apartment. 

There's a lovely quotation attributed to Julia Child (who knows if she said it):

"Always remember, if you're alone in the kitchen and you drop the lamb, you can always pick it up. Who's going to know?"


I hear you can even buy frozen puff pastry from bakeries in some parts of the world. 


Renata S wrote:

Luce N wrote:

Homemade strawberry ice cream sounds like a nice June epiphany.

 

Readymade, all-butter puff pastry? I must be dumb, or extremely French, or maybe both:  this had never even crossed my mind. What an heresy!  Smiley Happy


 Heretical? Possibly. But I am finally coming around to the idea of making my life easier. If no one notices the difference, I can't see the harm. I also have a strangely arranged kitchen due to some not-so-well-conceived renovation approaches that were applied to my apartment. 

There's a lovely quotation attributed to Julia Child (who knows if she said it):

"Always remember, if you're alone in the kitchen and you drop the lamb, you can always pick it up. Who's going to know?"


I hear you can even buy frozen puff pastry from bakeries in some parts of the world. 

 It must be Julia Child, sounds just like her!

 

Well, I make life easier for me too: either I buy galette, or someone offers me some, or I do without. However, tonight I'm having galette again with an association I'm a member of - and I must'nt forget to cross the street to get the 3 big galettes I've been charged to buy - since I live opposite a really good bakery. And that should be it, no more galette this year.

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