Roscón de Reyes: The Spanish Christmas Cake for Roman Orgies

Christmas isn’t complete until I bite into a little plastic Jesus.

There’s nothing like that moment when your teeth break against a toy Christ—honestly, it’s as Christmassy as Rudolph and Mariah Carey songs.

If you don’t remember biting into a baby Jesus last Christmas, it might be because you don’t live in Spain. That’s a pity, because if you’re eating Jesus it means you’re probably eating a Roscón de Reyes. Either that or something has gone seriously wrong with your catering.

Keep reading to find out what a Roscón de Reyes actually is, and why it’s related to Roman orgies and a gangsta Santa!

The Three Kings: Santa’s Little Subcontractors

The Roscón de Reyes (King’s Cake) is my favourite part of Spanish Christmas. Any tradition that turns eating cake into a game is a win for me!

When little kiddies open their presents on the morning of the Three Kings Day (January 6th for any pagan readers), it’s not Santa Claus they thank. No, no, no—Santa doesn’t commit his usual breaking and entering in Spain, he just hires a few subcontractors.

The Three Kings take the reindeer reins here, and deliver all the presents across the country on the Twelfth Night of Christmas. (Luckily, responsibility for choosing the gifts was taken away from them after the frankincense and myrrh disaster on Christmas #1).

The next morning, Spanish girls and boys open their gifts and give thanks to the Three Kings by eating a cake in the shape of their hats. It sounds weird, but just remember that we still let an immortal fat man with an obsession with kids break into our houses on Christmas Eve.

What is a Roscón de Reyes?

The Three Kings must have had weird crowns though, because the Roscón is in the shape of a doughnut. It’s two layers of sweet, yeasted dough with a layer of fluffy cream sandwiched between them. On top, little jewels of dried and candied fruits mimic the decorations of a King’s crown.

But what about the little plastic Jesus baby?

Well, that goes somewhere inside the cake dough, just waiting to be found and/or break a tooth on. It’s hidden along with a dried fava bean, bringing us the competition element of the cake:

Whoever is lucky enough to crack their molar on Our Saviour gets good luck! And the poor sucker who chokes on the bean? They have to buy next year’s cake. This must really add insult to injury after having their slice of cake ruined by a dry bean.

Why is there a toy in my cake?

The idea of hiding toys and beans inside Christmas cake goes way back. Even further back than Jesus and plastic.

Before Christianity, the Romans enjoyed a December celebration called “Saturnalia”. Taking place at the Winter Solstice, the Romans lauded the god Saturn in the best way they could think of:

A week-long, wine-fuelled orgy overseen by a Chief Mischief Maker, a.k.a. the Lord of Misrule.

Ancient Rome sounds amazing.

The Lord of Misrule was chosen completely by chance. Each household would eat a cake, with a coin hidden inside—whoever found the coin became the mischief maker in chief. Given how coins were made, they probably got lead poisoning as well, but it seems like a fair trade.

While we’ve stopped celebrating Saturnalia (which I’m super bummed about), we’ve kept the coin in the Roscón de Reyes cake! But, to update it for modern times, we’ve swapped out the metal for a plastic Jesus.

The Notorious Santa.Claus

For an added fun fact bonus, Santa also gets his catchphrase from Saturnalia! During the celebrations, Romans greeted eachother with a zesty “Io, Saturnalia!” or just “Io! Io! Io!”. Sounds a bit like “ho, ho, ho” right?

“Io” is just an old Latin happy greeting—so Santa is just yelling the Roman version of “yo, yo, yo”. He’s the O.G. Gangsta!

Go get your Roscón on!

So, this Three Kings Day, go get your Roscón on. It’s made for sharing, so if you don’t have a Spanish family, get some friends together and hide plenty of foreign objects in their slices.

And, in honour of Roman Saturnalia, why not give a wine-fuelled orgy a try?

Read more

Please, go and read more about Saturnalia. Once I started digging into this, it took me down a rabbit hole involving hours of Wikipedia research.

But then, go and read about other Spanish desserts! Complete your Christmas with turrón, a Hispanic Christmas nougat, and the New Year’s Eve favourite: churros!

And if you’re after still more sweet treats, take a look at my picks for the nine best Spanish desserts in the country!