Two Christmas Eve, we can explain if we don’t understand… It is indeed the tribute to be paid at Christmas for “where we come from”, the family, and “where we are going”, friends, for December 31 . But the cake!
The galette that seizes us from January 6, heavy tradition of Epiphany. Tragic Monday for our tired organisms. Magical Monday for the bakers who will make us pay a fortune for flour, sugar (a lot), butter (a lot, a lot) and almond cream. An explosive cocktail for all our organs.
A recent study shows that the “reward system” of our brain, which is activated mainly by our diet, is much more sensitive to fat and sugar than to other substances; the explanation of the taste attractiveness of the steak and fries and the galette compared to that of a mixed salad. And this has probably been going on since the dawn of time, at the time of the great famines during which the amount of energy it provided was the criterion for choosing a food. It was necessary to “gorging” on rich food as long as it was available, in anticipation of periods of scarcity or migration during which it was difficult to hunt. This was the rule for millions of years. Rich foods only appeared less than 200 years ago. Our brain has not yet had time to change the functioning of our reward system.
It is therefore the Cro-Magnon that slumbers deep within us that will rush you today in front of a dripping portion of butter and pleasure.
It will be objected that the tradition of the Galette des Rois is a way for our baker to catch up a little, while he sells bread at a price that does not correspond to the strain of his backbreaking work. He finds there an elegant – but dangerous – way to allow us to express our gratitude.
But, even if the image is necessarily a little exaggerated, it wouldn’t come to those responsible for garbage collection to dump a torrent of garbage in front of our door, to remind us that it’s New Year’s Eve season! So an idea: next to the essential piggy bank of the “Yellow Pieces”, our dear baker, on behalf of her team, could offer some raw vegetables and a small box in which we could express to her our joy of tasting the others products; especially on the day of our choice…
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