Christmas Sweets: A World Tour of Traditional Desserts

A journey around the world discovering traditional Christmas sweets: are you ready to take off?

From England to Iceland, every country has its own holiday desserts.

With scents of cinnamon, cloves, chocolate, and icing, Christmas is a feast of sugar and color on the table.

Let's explore together the traditional Christmas sweets from distant countries.

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Christmas pudding dates back to medieval England. It initially started as a way to preserve meat and did not become a dessert associated with Christmas celebrations until the 1700s.

Often referred to as plum pudding, it doesn't actually contain plums. In pre-Victorian England, the term was often used for raisins, which are commonly found in this pudding.

Traditionally, it is prepared with eggs, butter, molasses, and various spices to flavor, made four to five weeks before Christmas.

The Bûche de Noël is a very popular Christmas dessert in France, Quebec, and other former French colonies. Traditionally, it is prepared by baking a sponge cake in a shallow pan, frosting it, rolling it into a cylinder, and frosting it again.

This process gives it the shape of a "log." Bark-like designs are usually made in the frosting to make the cake look more like a tree branch. The cake dates back to the 19th century but became popular in the first half of the 20th century. Here is the recipe.

Bibingka is a fluffy rice cake traditionally served at Christmas in the Philippines, both as breakfast food and as a dessert.

It has a slightly sweet flavor and is best served warm. Made primarily with rice flour and coconut milk, it is common in the Philippines to see these sweets sold outside churches in the days leading up to Christmas. Here is the recipe.

Originating from New Zealand, named after a Russian ballerina, Pavlova is a unique dessert served during the holiday season.

It is a meringue-based cake with a crisp crust and a marshmallow-like center, topped with whipped cream and fruit.

Popular also in Australia, the recipe is believed to have originated in the late 1920s after the famous Russian ballerina, Anna Pavlova, visited New Zealand and Australia during her world tour. Here is the recipe.

Similar to gingerbread, Lebkuchen is a traditional Christmas treat in Germany. Originally invented by monks in the 13th century, this cookie has become a symbol of the Christmas festivities.

Ingredients include honey, spices, and nuts, and the taste can range from sweet to spicy.

While usually soft, a harder type of Lebkuchen is used to make heart-shaped versions of this treat, which can be found at many Christmas markets around the country, including at the Oktoberfest in Munich. Here is the recipe.

Rum cake is a popular fruitcake during Christmas in the Caribbean. Derived from traditional European fruit cakes, the main difference between this cake and others is the alcohol.

It is made with rum, wine, and dried fruit. The dried fruit is soaked in rum for months before the cake preparation begins. The batter is made with caramelized sugar found easily in places like Jamaica, Puerto Rico, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

During the Christmas season, it is impossible not to find szaloncukor in Hungary. This chocolate-covered fondant candy is wrapped in bright colors and hung as decoration on Christmas trees.

This tradition dates back to the 19th century: children often eat all the candy from the tree before the season is over!

Vaniljekranse translates from Danish to "vanilla wreaths." They are the typical Danish butter cookies.

With a simple vanilla flavor and slightly crispy exterior, these cookies are sold throughout Denmark and are often exported around the world. Here is the recipe

It's unlikely that Christmas in Australia will be "white," but the typical sweet is called White Christmas: a mixture of raisins, cherries, dried coconut, powdered sugar, milk powder, and rice bubbles, with hydrogenated coconut oil as the ingredient that brings everything together. It is served cut into squares.

This sweet bread from the Netherlands is shaped like the baby Jesus and decorated with various elements like flowers, circles, etc.

The ingredients are flour, eggs, milk, yeast, raisins, sugar, and it is usually enjoyed with a cup of hot chocolate. Here is the recipe

In Iceland, it is common to eat this flat, round, and very thin cake decorated with geometric patterns similar to leaves and briefly fried in oil or hot fat during Christmas.

Baking this leaf bread is an important part of the Christmas preparations in every household in Iceland.