{"id":6437,"date":"2019-09-29T01:13:09","date_gmt":"2019-09-29T05:13:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/?p=6437"},"modified":"2019-09-29T13:00:21","modified_gmt":"2019-09-29T17:00:21","slug":"the-sweet-things","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/the-sweet-things\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sweet Things"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Two holidays come this 29th of September: It’s Michaelmas, when we celebrate Michael the Archangel, and later, with the setting sun, Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, will begin. Blackberries are traditional to Michaelmas and apples and honey, of course, to Rosh Hashanah. The apples and honey are purely symbolic: eat these sweet things to help ensure a sweet year ahead. You might also eat challah bread and\u00a0Teiglach<\/em>: small balls of dough that are baked in honey and mixed with chopped roasted almonds and candied cherries. My family discovered them one September in a local Jewish bakery. We were mesmerized by the tin plates of Teiglach, piled high into a cone, wrapped in cellophane. They reminded us so much of the struffoli<\/em> we make each Christmas. We bought a plate and took it home and the teiglach was so good, we went back the next day for another. Something about the nuts and the cherries and the honey make for a sublime combination of sweetness and substance and texture. Eventually, we began making our own. The photo above is of my mom’s and sister’s Teiglach. They are so good (and not bad at all for a couple of Italian American Catholics!).<\/p>\n

Blackberries for Michaelmas comes not from symbolism but from story, and I do love good story-based foodways. It is the story of Satan, the fallen angel, battling Michael the Archangel, and it is essentially thus: Satan fell to Earth and landed in a bramble patch\u2013\u2013a blackberry patch. I love blackberries, but I can tell you\u2013\u2013from well remembered experience\u2013\u2013that they are a fruit that will make you curse and swear as you harvest them. So many thorns. They lay claim to your clothes and wound you. Satan cursed the bramble patch he landed upon, and legend has it that he returns each year to curse and spit upon that same patch.<\/p>\n

Roast goose for dinner is traditional for Michaelmas, and it is one of the first traditional nut-roasting nights of autumn. In Scotland, there are\u00a0Struan Micheil<\/i>, Michaelmas bannocks,\u00a0somewhat like a scone but\u00a0a flatbread, basically, cut into wedges, typically made from equal amounts of oats, barley, and rye, traditionally made without the use of metal: wooden fork, wooden or ceramic bowl, baking stone. And served, of course, with blackberries or blackberry jam.<\/p>\n

The day belongs to St. Michael the Archangel, but traditions have arisen in various parts of the world that honor other angels this day, too. Some will honor Gabriel and Raphael along with Michael. Others will include Uriel, Raguel, Ramiel, and Sariel. This is something I’ve written about in the past about Michaelmas, but will say it again: I love these names, for the further down the roster we go, the more mysterious the names become and we cross a fascinating linguistic bridge to ancient tongues. The \u201c-el\u201d suffix of these angelic names is Sumerian in origin, signifying \u201cbrightness\u201d or \u201cshining,\u201d names that in their true form would be Micha-el, Gabri-el, Rapha-el, Uri-el, Ragu-el, Rami-el, Sari-el. The list continues: Camael, Jophiel, and Zadkiel; Anael, Simiel, and Oriphiel; Metatron, Israfil, and Malak al-Maut. Their\u00a0etymology connects to the Akkadian ilu<\/em> (radiant one),\u00a0Babylonian\u00a0ell<\/i>\u00a0(shining one), Old Welsch ellu<\/em> (shining being), Old Irish aillil\u00a0<\/em>(shining), Anglo-Saxon aelf<\/em> (radiant being), and English elf<\/em> (shining being). Speak these names aloud; immediately we are transported to an ancient time, a time when angels were perhaps more commonly seen.<\/p>\n

Are they still around? Many folks think so, and I am not one to doubt them. In a few days time, on the 2nd of October, we’ll celebrate another angelic day, one even older than Michaelmas and one much more personal: the Feast of the Guardian Angels. Its roots are in\u00a0the Fourth Century, when believers began setting up altars in their homes each October in honor of their angelic protectors. But today, we enjoy the sweet things in life. L’shanah Tovah.<\/p>\n

COME SEE US!<\/strong>
\nWe begin popping up a lot throughout South Florida these last few months of the year. Here\u2019s where you\u2019ll find us these next few weeks. To be kept apprised, follow us on Instagram or Facebook: @conviviobookworks<\/p>\n

FLORIDA DAY of the DEAD: OFRENDAS EXHIBITION OPENING<\/a><\/strong>
\nSunday October 6 from 11 AM to 3 PM
\nHistory Fort Lauderdale (inside the historic New River Inn)
\n231 SW 2nd Ave, Fort Lauderdale
\nWe\u2019ll be there with a mini pop up of our traditional Dia de Muertos artisan goods. My family is also building one of the ofrendas in the exhibition.<\/p>\n

FALL NIGHT MARKET at SOCIAL HOUSE<\/a><\/strong>
\nSaturday October 19 from 4 to 8 PM
\nSocial House
\n512 Lucerne Avenue, Lake Worth
\nSocial House is always a favorite venue of ours, and its magic is especially potent at night! Not sure yet what we’ll be showing, but count on anything we bring to be handmade by traditional artisans.<\/p>\n

AUTUMN MAKERS MARKETPLACE<\/a><\/strong>
\nSunday October 20 from 10 AM to 4 PM
\nFlorida Atlantic University in Boca Raton
\nLive music, family fun, and lots of great local makers. We\u2019ll be there with a big boutique of traditional Dia de Muertos artisan goods, Shaker herbs & teas, Seth Thompson\u2019s Royal River pottery, and maybe even a little advent calendar preview.<\/p>\n

REAL MAIL FRIDAYS: HALLOWE\u2019EN SOCIAL<\/a><\/strong>
\nFriday October 25 from 2 to 6 PM
\nJaffe Center for Book Arts at Florida Atlantic University Libraries, Boca Raton
\nIt\u2019s a special edition of the Jaffe\u2019s popular Real Mail Fridays letter writing socials, this one with an All Hallow\u2019s Eve theme. Expect good old fashioned autumnal fun plus a mini Makers Marketplace. We\u2019ll be there with a selection of our traditional Dia de Muertos artisan goods.<\/p>\n

DIA de LOS MUERTOS LAKE WORTH BEACH<\/a><\/strong>
\nSaturday November 2 from 3 to 9 PM
\nHatch 1121
\n1121 Lucerne Avenue, Lake Worth
\nLake Worth’s homegrown Day of the Dead festival. Find us in our usual spot out in the courtyard near the dancing and the mariachi!<\/p>\n

FLORIDA DAY of the DEAD<\/a><\/strong>
\nSaturday November 2 from 3 to 8 PM
\nHuzienga Plaza
\n32 East Las Olas Boulevard, Fort Lauderdale
\nOne of the nation’s largest Day of the Dead festivals; current plans have us there for the first portion of the event in the park on the New River where the Skeleton Processional begins. (The event continues on in one form or another all the way through to 4 AM!)<\/p>\n

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Two holidays come this 29th of September: It’s Michaelmas, when we celebrate Michael the Archangel, and later, with the setting sun, Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, will begin. Blackberries are traditional to Michaelmas and apples and honey, of course, to Rosh Hashanah. The apples and honey are purely symbolic: eat these sweet things to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[124,123],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6437"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6437"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6437\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6450,"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6437\/revisions\/6450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.conviviobookworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}