Doughnut Report: It’s Fastnacht & Pączki Time
Photos by Jenn Hall
On Fat Tuesday, starting early, lines thread around the mom-and-pop bakeries of greater Philadelphia. Drive out to Bucks County, parts of Jersey, or Pennsylvania Dutch Country and you’ll see the same. Doors swing in and out. The occasional snowflake drifts in, drawn like I am to the scent of sugar and sizzling fat.
It’s Doughnut Day, and bakers have been working ‘round the clock to feed demand.
More than a hashtag holiday, this sweet celebration that precedes Ash Wednesday has spiritual roots. For the observant, the penitence of Lent looms just on the other side of tomorrow’s sunrise. Shrove—or Fat—Tuesday is a last chance to feed one’s inner glutton. For those of German or Polish upbringing, that means doughnuts called fastnacht and paczki, and you may as well make it a dozen.
In the Orthodox and Catholic traditions, Shrove Tuesday is a time of repentance and cleansing, a far cry from a doughnut feast. Indeed, shrove finds its roots in the verb shirve: “to free from guilt” or “to confess one’s sins especially to a priest.” References to rituals of confession and absolution go back to the Middle Ages.
Photo by Jenn Hall
While seeking a clean slate, however, Christians also needed to use up soon-to-be forbidden pantry items—and the Lenten list was intimidating. Meats, fats, eggs and dairy were all verboten. In France, the resulting feast was dubbed “Fat Tuesday” or Mardi Gras, appropriate given the indulgence. Other traditions include British pancake races, church pancake suppers, Rio’s carnival and yes, doughnuts.
Why pancakes and doughnuts? That’s a matter of convenience, their recipes calling for much of what needed to be consumed. And even for a spiritual independent without a sweet tooth, it’s hard not to get swept up in the excitement.
Feasting on FastnachtPhoto by Jenn Hall
In the Pennsylvania Dutch Country, housewives traditionally spent Shrove Tuesday using up the larder’s most sinful ingredients: sugar, butter, eggs and (well) lard. Nowadays, German and Amish bakeries throughout Southern Pennsylvania do the same, crafting old-fashioned doughnuts that share their name with the German pre-Lenten carnival: fastnacht (pronounced fash-naht).
According to the Oxford Companion to Food, the German Shrove Tuesday doughnut tradition dates all the way to medieval times. Heagele’s Bakery, a 1930s-era German shop located in the Mayfair section of Philly, notes that fastnacht translates to “feast night.” (Others say it’s “fast night” or “night before the fast.”) Either way, a visit for their annual fastnacht sale is like time traveling. Old-fashioned string dispensers hang from the ceiling, perfectly placed to tie up boxes with a bow. Women wear tasteful dirndl and history feels close at hand.