Crete tourist guide

Pure Monday and a 4-meter long lagana

2023-02-27 19:33:51

Just yesterday there were crazy carnival games, but today in Greece is completely different. This is called Clean Monday ( Καθαρή Δευτέρα ), which marks the beginning of the 40-day fast. It is a movable feast that is celebrated on the Monday of the seventh week preceding Orthodox Easter. This holiday is a day off from work in Greece and Cyprus.

The entire first week of Lent is often referred to as " Clean Week " and according to Greek customs, the house must be thoroughly cleaned during this week. However, the main meaning of this holiday is purification and spiritual change, mutual forgiveness and the beginning of the fasting period with a clear conscience. As far as possible and if the weather is good, the Greeks spend this holiday outdoors flying kites.
Common meals with family and friends include dishes based on fasting ingredients, e.g. shellfish, molluscs, lagana bread and boiled vegetables. In some parts of Greece, one of the popular dishes appearing on Clean Monday is bean soup.

Lenten lagan bread

One of the Clean Monday traditions includes the baking of lagana bread, which is the basis of the Lenten table. Although many housewives still prepare their own bread, the vast majority of Greeks buy lagan in local bakeries, which start producing this bread on the evening before Clean Monday. Although in larger cities the sale of this bread starts at night, no one is surprised by the gigantic queues that line up in front of the best bakeries in the morning.

This flat, oblong and sesame seed sprinkled bread is prepared without leaven using flour and water. The history of lagan has its origins in antiquity. References to this bread appear in the plays created by the ancient writers Horace and Aristophanes (performed around 400 BC). At that time, the Greeks ate an unleavened bread called laganon, and it is probably the ancestor of the present holiday bread eaten on Clean Monday.

Lagana of record sizes

Despite a lot of work and all-night preparations for traditional lagans to be available in stores from the dawn of Clean Monday, there is no shortage of bakers who prepare special laganas of record sizes.
This year, one of the biggest pastries was prepared by 6 people at Theoharis Dimitroulakis' bakery located in Nea Chora, Chania. Lagana, which he prepared, is 1.9 meters high and 4.2 meters wide. 50 kg of flour and 28 liters of water were used to prepare this lagana, and its final weight after baking was 70 kg. The whole process of kneading and baking bread of this size took 3 hours. Dimitroulakis has been baking such large lagans for 26 years, so it's a private tradition. Such huge pastries are always displayed outside the entrance to the bakery, and their photos appear on news sites. Dimitroulakis, when asked what he would do with his huge lagana, announced that he would distribute bread to those in need.

Image source: zarpanews.gr

Gosia,  2023-02-27 19:33:51

Średnia: NAN

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