Birthdays are meant to be special occasions, don’t you agree? The day you were born and entered this world as another human being is significant. While it may add up as a mere statistic in the country’s census, for your near and dear ones, it is a day of fun and frolic. Did you know that birthday traditions are varied across cultures? The cake cutting ceremony on birthdays is actually quite common these days so it is natural for us to assume that it was this way always. However, it is far from the truth.
The ritual of cakes began in ancient Rome around the 15th century when wedding guests were treated to flat, sponge cakes on the D-day. Gradually, Germans adapted the concept to whip up single-layer cakes for birthdays and the Greeks picked it up too, although in Greek culture, it was restricted to Gods and Goddesses for the longest time. While cakes seem the obvious and customary choice is most traditions, certain others do not follow suit.
For instance, Russians bake a pie with a specialized message engrained inside the pie for the person who’s birthday it is. Similarly, you would find Koreans drinking seaweed soup on such special occasions because the soup signifies and honours the goddess of childbirth and destiny as well as the sacrifices and pain their mothers have gone through during their birth. China prefers to slurp a bowl of longevity noodles on birthdays because it gives them a hope of longer life, basically longer the noodle, the more years added to one’s lifespan.
With so much talk of birthdays, we came across Karisma Kapoor’s recent Instagram story. It was her mother, Babita Kapoor’s birthday recently and she shared a picture of a lip-smacking cake on her story. The off-white cream cake had beautiful floral design made with whipped cream around the rim of the cake. The base of the cake read, “We love you, Happy birthday”. The cake had a 75 sign on top and looked absolutely delish. Here’s what the cake looked like.
Source: Screengrab of Instagram Stories/Karisma Kapoor
A simple and basic home birthday celebration doesn’t require a lavish cake. Yet the cake needs to be delicious and fresh so pair your carrots with some coffee and relish the cake to the core.
