Empress Wu Designs with Wilma

A Christmas favourite food of  children - candy canes. Next week ( the second week of December)  is allegedly the most popular time for candy cane sales... here are some other "facts" about candy canes • National Candy Cane Day is celebrated in the United States on Dec. 26. • Each year about 1.76 billion candy canes are made.  • Ninety percent of candy canes are sold between Thanksgiving and Christmas. • Candy canes are the number one selling non-chocolate confectionery in the month of December.  ( from candycanefacts.com)  There are quite religious connections with candy canes and even simple poems have been written as a reminder of the significance of the colour and shape of candy canes.  I like the story of the choir master in Cologne ( about 1670) who commissioned a confectioner to make some sweets for his restless young singers to eat during the long Christmas church service. It is said that they were white for ...

Christmas Countdown ...5... Candy Canes  The first historical reference to a candy cane at Christmas goes back to 1670 in Cologne, Germany. The choirmaster at the Cologne Cathedral gave out sweet sticks to children in the hope of quietening them during the Nativity church service on Christmas Eve. To justify giving out sweets, he asked the candy maker to add a crook to them to represent the staff belonging to the shepherds who visited the baby Jesus.    A German immigrant August Imgard allegedly took the idea of candy canes to America. The candy canes remained white.   On Christmas cards after 1900, the red and white stripes which we now know, appear although the history of the stripes and the now traditional peppermint flavour is unknown.