New Year Traditions

To jumpstart our New Year’s blessings, we embrace several Greek traditions in our family. The first is breaking a pomegranate, which is an ancient Greek holiday tradition with origins in the Peloponnese region, where my mother Athanasia and my grandparents Theodora and Constantinos were born. We believe that by smashing a pomegranate, we release its plentiful ruby-red seeds thereby unleashing an abundance of health, happiness, and prosperity for the coming days, weeks, months, and entire new year.

As soon as the clock strikes twelve (or whenever we return home from celebrating elsewhere), we throw down pomegranate with force upon the front door threshold. Then one by one, we step on the pomegranate and enter the home with our right foot, as yet another symbol to take the right path forward for the year ahead. 

A friendly tip for avoiding a mess: place your pomegranates inside large or extra-large Ziploc bag, then double bag it but be sure to remove the extra air before sealing it. 

After a good sleep, we wake up on January 1st and get to baking as it’s the Greek Orthodox Christian feast day of St. Basil, a 4th century bishop. He is remembered for being compassionate and for helping  the poor. While there are many variations of how the Vasilopita came to be, my family has passed down the legend of him hiding from the tax collectors the townspeople’s jewels and money by baking them inside of a pita. The pita was then cut and distributed to each person, miraculously returning the jewels and coins to their rightful owners. 

In his honor of St. Basil, we bake a Vasilopita with a hidden coin inside. My late mother’s cake recipe includes fragrant orange zest and baked in a round pan, topped with a generous heap of powdered sugar. The top is also decorated with the numbers of the new year usually made from nuts or edible silver beads. We cut the cake in a specific order starting first with a piece for God, the church, the head of the household and continuing from the oldest to the youngest family member. 

Just make sure not to inhale when taking your first bite or you’ll have quite a mess (and a laugh)! The person who finds the coin in their piece of Vasilopita wins good luck for the entire new year, and the lucky coin is meant to be saved, because you should never throw away your good luck. We place it in a spot where it can be viewed often as friendly good luck reminder.

Give a try baking our beloved family recipe below.