Lutzelfrau & St. Lucy Tarts: A Tale of Winter Solstice Food Magic

Soon the blessed Winter Solstice will be here, and thank Goddess for the return of the light! For the Germanic and Northern European peoples from which I descend these dark days were preoccupied with the old winter magic known as holiday baking. Cakes, breads and buns, tarts, and strudels were prepared to celebrate the imminent […]

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A Toast To Ukrainian Christmas: Wild Winter Berry Uzvar

I shared this lovely healthy Uzvar recipe with my Gather patrons last year, but I’m sharing it tonight in honor of Ukrainian Christmas and my beloved mother-in-law Rosie who passed away late November 2021.  For the many, many years I’ve been married, I loved hearing her remembrances of this holiday, how the house was full […]

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Spellbinding Sweet Woodruff Cake: Prosperity Magic

In my tiny wildish garden, nestling at the foot of a tall tree, is sweet woodruff. Her glossy leaves and small white blossoms may be hidden by a profusion of taller plants, but it is her scent that perfumes the air. Fresh, her fragrance (like rain, earth, fresh air and green grass all condensed into […]

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Reclaiming the Magical Herstory of Food

“When we learned to cook is when we became truly human, but we’ve lost touch with how that food got to our plates.” Michael Pollan in Cooked. As is so often the case with history, the “herstory” tends to get left out – and food is no exception. While there are as many books on food […]

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Recipes for a Feast of Light: Reviving the Magical Foods of Imbolc

Note: I’ve updated this post many times over the years; this is the latest version. I love the ancient feast days that once celebrated the turn of the seasons.  Take the old Celtic spring “feis” (feast or festival) known as Imbolc, Imbolg, or Brigid’s Feast of Fire,  one of my personal favorites. It inaugurated the […]

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