It's almost Halloween, and in Ireland, it's time to bake the fortune-telling barmbrack bread. I knew nothing about this bread until my Irish husband Patrick told me about this ancient tradition of hiding objects in a cake and hoping that on Halloween, your slice contained an object that brought good fortune.
So what items were placed in Barmbrack bread? Here are a few:
A coin signifies good fortune but a cloth means you'll stay poor.
There are a number of items related to marital fate, so if a woman receives a thimble, it means she remains a "spinster." The term used in the past. But a pea means
you're likely to stay single for at least a year.
The matchstick predicts an unhappy marriage or an upcoming argument.
Then there's the ring. That means a likely upcoming marriage.
Nowadays, only the ring is baked into the cake, but if you get a slice with that ring in it, can it really predict the future?
Well, in full disclosure, for me it did. Patrick, while still living in Ireland, had a slice of this bread that contained the ring. Two years later, we got married. So, of course, I had to include this story in All the Broken Angels. But things happened quite a bit differently for Cate and Declan. Poor Cate. And poor Declan.
If you're looking for a barmbrack Irish Halloween recipe that might bring you good fortune, you can find it here in the Irish Times.
Irish Times:
If you'd like to read what happened to Cate and Declan and see if they had the good fortune, pick up a copy of All the Broken Angels.
Happy Halloween!
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