In full boiling of solemn drums, lighting and black manthillas, there is a procession that breaks the molds with flavor. Because yes, in this corner of Spain, Holy Week is not only lived with fervor … it is also savored.
Between religious prints and traditional songs, what flies from the balconies are not petals or Saetas, but Cute Easter, candies, sandwiches and even Empanadillas. A unique procession in which devotion and appetite march in hand, conquer stomachs and hearts in equal parts.
Murcia, seventeenth century. A penance of covering the caramel
In the seventeenth century muccia, when the sun caressed the old stones of the city, the bells played the rhythm of a tradition that still resounds strongly: Processions of Holy Week. A religious fervor that crossed the alleys of Murcia, not only with the weight of the steps of the greatest sculptors of the time, but also with the sweet and colorful aroma of the candies. Why yes, in Murcia, Penance has always had a sweet touch literally.
In the remote eco of the Murcia processions of the past, the sanction was not measured only in bare steps or prayers. It was also offered in the form of simple gestures, humble as candies and sweets. The Nazarenes, hidden under hermetic cloaks and amidaceous clothes, brought home baskets, small snacks and candies wrapped carefully, in an act of delivery, which went far beyond a simple symbol or sustenance.
While the steps advanced between incense and silence, a peaceful exchange between the brotherhood and the people was intertwined: people: A dessert in the spectator’s hand, a smile after Capuz’s anonymity. Some argue that the gesture was born from a spiritual need: the penitents that, protected after anonymity, tried to redeem a detail to those who had offended. Therefore, the caramel acquired a new symbolic load: it was no longer just melted sugar, but lose wrapped in cellophane.
However, like almost everything that blooms in Murcia, this peculiar tradition is identified with the Huerta seal. In this Spanish city, where generosity grows at the same speed as the limits and heat of April permeates everything during the days of Holy Week, the sharing of food and desserts is natural as breathing. Penance, in Murcia, is not bitter: it is slowly chewed, with anise flavor, honey, childhood.
A edict, ingenuity and a handful of candies
But not everything was always sugar and complicity. In the year 1712, this sweet tradition classified with a edict. Him Cardinal Luis BellugaBishop of the diocese of Cartagena, he raised his voice against what he considered a deviation of the penitent spirit and clearly prohibited the distribution of food during the processions. “Neither sweet nor nothing”The document prayed. The order was clear. However, Murcia’s answer, as always, was more ingenious than rebellious.
If the food could not be shared, you should choose to act with cunning. The Nazarenes replaced the cute voluminous and the eggs with caramel pills: small, discrete and easily camouflaged inside the clothes. Thus a new sweet liturgy was born, a way to derive gravity with ingenuity and keep alive the generous spirit of the celebration. What started as food to reintegrate the strength has become a symbolic gesture and the symbolic, with the centuries, He ended up being a cultural heritage.
It was then that the foster creativity of Murcia entered the scene. Pastry like The Turro, Ruíz Funes, Ros or Alonso They started making customized candies for these dates. They were not simple delicacies: they were sweetened verses, small wrapped jewels that spoke of the muccia woman, holy week, earth, even politics and humor. The candies, eliminated and wrapped carefully, became a parallel language of the procession.
A legacy that is still alive
Today, more than three centuries after that edict, the custom has not only survived, but has become One of the most loved and famous identities of Holy Week. Just approach any procession to see how the Nazarenes, with their tunical characteristics, embroidered in half and atone Candies, cute and cooked eggs, fresh and even, in some cases, small hempanadillas or snacks wrapped in an aluminum sheet.
The “collected” is nothing more than a kind of bag or bag that surrounds the body of the Nazarene, right at the height of the belly, and which performs a double function: symbolic and practical. Because although penance is still present, hospitality is so. At each step, the candies fly through the air and the earth in the hands, or open pockets, children, adults and visitors who live this tradition as a game, a gift, a festive communion with local culture.
And they are not improvised gestures. In many families of muccia, filling the holes becomes A kind of ritual before the Holy Week. Chili of candies are prepared, the Easter Munas are responsible, the eggs are cooked and crafts desserts are selected. All to satisfy a custom that is no longer understood as an exception, but as an essential part of the parade.
Candies with Murcia accent
They are not simple delicacies: In Murcia, the candies that fly in the air every Holy Week are edible fragments of popular history, identity and malice. The most emblematic are the famous Murcia pillselongated, hard and translucent candies, which since the nineteenth century have been developed in the pastry shop with a hearth like The Turro, Ruiz Funes or Ros. Your most distinctive seal? A winding that not only maintains the dessert, but also a small poetry, a phrase with a wink or even social criticism undercover, in the purest style of Valencian’s failures but in the miniature version.
Intense and simple flavors – Anies, lemon, mint, strawberry, licorice – these candy that have sugary generations and that many mucia still maintain in cans as nostalgic treasures.
Although most are already acquired, some courageous still dare to make them homemade, reviving recipes that have gone from grandmothers to grandchildren with the care of the relic. Do you have the courage to prepare them? We facilitate a traditional recipe of the Murcian pills. The ingredients are as follows:
- 400 g of sugar
- 200 ml of water
- A few drops of natural essence (anise, lemon, mint …)
- Food color (optional)
- Small silicone molds or an greasy tray
Its processing process begins in a saucepan, where 400 grams of sugar are merged with 200 milliliters of water. The mixture is brought to a boil, without removing, to reach the right caramel point, of about 145 degrees Celsius, that precise moment in which the liquid begins to transform into crunchy amber.
It is at that moment when some drops of aromatic essence are incorporated, it can be anise, mint, lemon or licorice, depending on the family tradition or the whim of the day and, if desired, a pinch of food dyes to give visual character to the dessert.
Speed, before the caramel begins to harden, the mixture is poured into small silicone molds or on a greased tray. You just have to wait for them to cool completely and go!
