St. Phanourios Donuts

One of my favorite things to discover are new traditions that I can share with my family, so I thought it would be fun to share a little tradition with you that you may or may not know about! 

Have you ever heard of St. Phanourios? I sure hadn't!  Well, that is, I hadn't until my friend introduced me to him! One morning, Elizabeth and I showed up to my friend Alexis' apartment for a usual playdate/mommy-hang-out. She set out homemade donuts on a pretty wooden cake stand on her kitchen island and had iced coffee ready to go. Side note, if you ever get the chance to make a friend like this, never let them go! GOD BLESS HER! I was struck with how adorable these donuts looked all covered in yummy powered sugar and inquired more about them. She said "Oh this is my St. Phanourios cake I was telling you about! I just made it in donut form!"  I'm pretty sure my response was something dramatic like, "Ummm what? Is this a thing? I forgot! Remind me again about this Saint."

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Have you ever lost something and thought, "Gosh I wish I could find that! If I could, I would ______." Well, this might interest you! St. Phanourios is known in the Orthodox Church as a saint who helps people find lost or stolen items, or helps single people find a spouse! Neat huh? We can ask the Saints for help! We ask St. Phanourios to help us find whatever it is we lost, and when we find it, we bake a cake and share it with friends and loved ones as a way of giving thanks. And today is actually St. Phanourios' feast day (August 27th). Which is just another great reason to make these yummy treats!

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Later Alexis explained how she lost her daughter's earrings that were a very special gift, so she prayed and asked for St. Phaniourios help to find them, and she found them! So as a way of giving thanks, she baked Fanouropita (or St. Phanourios cake). I asked her if other people make this cake into donuts too, because clearly I've never heard of it, and she actually wasn't sure if anyone did, but she had a really great recipe from Figs and Feta Blog that she adapted and made into donuts. GENIUS! What a fun way to give thanks to God for His saints for helping her find those special earrings that went missing. Not to mention a very YUMMY thanks!  I cannot wait to share this tradition with my own family and to teach my children these rich traditions as we live out the life of the church! 

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You can find the recipe for Fanouropita that Alexis used here (just bake it in a donut pan instead). If you want to read more about the life of St. Phanourios, I've linked a few useless websites below:

https://orthodoxwiki.org/Phanourios   

https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2015/08/saint-phanourios-resource-page.html

And just for fun, here are some cute pictures we took of Elizabeth later that day in Central Park. Mommy playdates with a photographer are the best!

-Destinie

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