Vasilopita (Greek New Year’s Cake)

Welcome to Episode 17, the Final Episode of My Big Fat Greek Christmas, a series where I shared Holiday recipes from my Greek Childhood and ways you could elevate your holiday traditions with some Greek flare! Today, we are making Vasilopita!

Christmas has come and gone, and we look forward to a prosperous New Year filled with health, alignment, freedom, joy, blessings and family! One way Greek families like to ring in the New Year is by enjoying a Greek New Year Cake, something we call Vasilopita!

Vasilopita is the traditional Greek cake or bread served at midnight on New Year’s Eve (AT THE STRIKE OF MIDNIGHT 🎆) to celebrate the life of Saint 🌱Basil. Before or after baking the Vasilopita cake, a coin is inserted through the top or base. When your family goes to cut the cake, the person who finds the coin is said to be honoured with blessing and luck for the whole year!

Ingredients:

Butter to grease the pan
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
2 1/2 cups Bob’s Red Mill all-purpose Flour
3/4 tsp salt
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups sugar
3/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 cup fresh orange juice (about 2 large navel oranges)
2 tbsp fresh orange juice
1/2 cup whole milk
zest from one orange
2 tbsp vanilla extract
1 Coin - wrapped in tinfoil
icing sugar
1/2 cup pomegranate seeds

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350F and grease a 10-inch spring form pan with butter. Line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper. Set aside.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt and set aside.
In a large mixing bowl, add the eggs and sugar and use a hand mixer to beat the eggs and sugar until creamy and pale in colour, about 1-2 minutes.
To the egg and sugar mixture add the olive oil, 1/2 cup + 2 tbsp orange juice, whole milk, orange zest and vanilla extract and mix together with the hand mixer on low speed to fully combine.
Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix on low speed until well combined.
Pour the cake batter into the prepared cake pan and gently place the foil-wrapped coin into the batter. Smooth out the top of the cake batter and then bake for 35-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean.
Let the cake cool in the pan for 15 minutes before gently removing it from the pan to fully cool. Once cooled, sprinkle icing sugar over top of the whole cake and then use the pomegranate seeds to make the new year number (i.e. 2025, 2026 etc) on top of the icing sugar (see photos in the blog post).

#Greece #GreekFood #GreekRecipes #NewYearsCake #Vasilopita