A Happy Feast of the Epiphany to all of our paesani our there!
Today is January 6th… La Festa dell’Epifania – which means if you were a good little Italian this year, you should have received a few extra treats in your stocking this morning courtesy of La Befana, the Italian Christmas Witch! This legendary lady flies on her broom all over Italy on the Eve of the Epiphany, sliding down chimneys to fill children’s socks with presents and candy if they’ve been good all year, or a lump of coal (a special confection made to look like real coal) if they were bad.
But just where does this Italian tradition come from? We’re going to find out with the help of Kate West and Dina Gregory, the Italian Americans behind “La Befana and Friends”, a movement dedicated to the history and message of this beloved old maid.
This dynamic duo will share how a mysterious family Befana cookie recipe inspired Kate’s book, “La Befana and the Star”, how fate (and La Befana) brought this unlikely pair together, and how their instant chemistry has evolved into a movement to save the world one cookie at a time.
We’ll discuss the legend of La Befana, and what her story means to Italy, Italians around the world, and the future of mankind… all the while keeping to our show’s spirit of intellectual free-styling… meaning you’ll learn about saints and mystics, Italian baking traditions, the Italo-Albanian Community, and how Pat once solved a friend’s generations old genealogical mystery by studying their pepper recipe!
It’s an episode filled with the joy of the holiday season, with lots of laughter, a few tears, and more than enough trivia to satisfy even the most voracious listener… after all, this is the first episode ever to be so filled with topics that it leaves Pat speechless! So it’s probably one you won’t want to miss!
Grazie mille,
The Italian American Podcast Team