Thread:61Storm/@comment-29709319-20181110010804/@comment-29709319-20181209021757

December 9: National Pastry Day, and Weary Willie Day.

🍁National Pastry Day! Pastry is a name given to a large variety baked goods which are made with ingredients such as flour, sugar, milk, butter, shortening, baking powder and eggs. Pastry dough is rolled out thinly and then used as a base for different baked products. Pastries can be traced as far back as the ancient Mediterranean where they had almost paper-thin, multilayered baklava and Phyllo dough. Pastry making began in Northern Europe after the Crusaders brought it back from the Mediterranean. French and Italian Renaissance chefs eventually perfected the puff and choux pastries while 17th and 18th-century chefs brought new recipes to the table. Included in the new recipes were; Napoleons, cream puffs and eclairs. Culinary historians often consider French pastry chef Antonin Careme (1784 – 1833) to have been the original great master of pastry making in modern times. There are many different types of pastry, most of which would fall into one of the following categories: Shortcrust pastry – simplest and most common. Sweetcrust pastry – similar to the shortcrust but sweeter. Flaky pastry – simple pastry that expands when cooked. Puff pastry – has many layers that cause it to puff when baked. Choux pastry – very light pastry that is often filled with cream or other fillings. Phyllo pastry – paper-thin pastry dough that is used in many layers.

🍁Weary Willie Day! This holiday was named for the character made famous by Emmett Kelly, who was born on this day in 1898. Weary Willie was a unique character in the art of clowning. Kelly had developed Weary Willy at a time when the white-faced, goofy clown was the norm, and selling the idea for a sad, down-on-his-luck clown did not fit the formula most circuses were seeking. Times and attitudes changed when the country was in the depths of the Great Depression. Downtrodden and world-weary was the face of the nation. People could identify with Weary Willie like never before. Weary Willie, his frowning, whisker-shadowed face and his dirty, torn and worn costume, went on to become an American icon. His son, Emmett Kelly, Jr. carried on Weary Willie’s persona well into the modern era until his death in 2003, at the age of 83.

I would like my pastry filled with apples please. Yum! Clowns are not on my favorite list of things but to those of you who like them here's your day.

Sending apple scented hugs!🐶💕🎄💕